17 May 2015

Last week, a couple of new volunteers came along to Kwantu all the way from Ontario, Canada; Erin and Amanda Maitland. Once we discovered each other’s full names, we were both stunned and excited. Neither of the three of us had met another unrelated Maitland before! We reached the only obvious conclusion: We must, in some way or another, most definitely be related. After all, I do have some relatives in Ontario, and they do have some kind of distant Irish heritage, and how else do you explain such an usual name as Maitland cropping up in the middle of Africa!

There was only one way to celebrate, of course; Dinner at Cubata!

One mark going against the potential of blood relation, was that the Maitland sisters were more than 30 minutes late for dinner!
“Don’t people nickname you Lateland?” they laughed
“…No.” I smiled politely “…They just call me Maitland.”

There lateness worked out in our favour in the end though, as we got to try another thing on Cubata’s beautiful menu, the Portuguese Chorizo starter!

Finally though, all invitees we in attendance and Cubata’s standard of fantastical food was enjoyed by all!

Erin very particularly impressed with the ribs

I, of course, was delighted by my beautiful Cubata prawns

And the Maitland bonding returned to an undoubtable can-only-be-blood-relative level

Even Paul, a Cubata first timer, couldn’t resist exposing enthusiasm

For a change, I even brought a pudding along to top the evening off! So we were stuffed!

Sadly, this was the girl’s final SA weekend, and we students were returning in a taxi to Kwantu (to allow for a sensible Sunday study day) so it was time to say goodbye

But if this is really family, then we don’t need to worry.

Real Maitland’s never truly say goodbye.