Carol’s Column

My daughter the fish

MY DAUGHTER is a marlin.

Now it's not every mother who has a marlin for a daughter.

It happened this way.

As I screeched up to Rosebank Primary in my crimson chariot to fetch my youngest, unmarried daughter, I was greeted by a watermelon grin.

And from a family of watermelon grinners, that's saying something.

“Mummy, Mummy, guess what?” she said as she tumbled into the car with her satchel, tennis racket, tog bag, netball, project on space and all the other paraphernalia 10-year-old little girls accumulate for one day of school.

“You found your lost left shoe. You got a detention. You were moved from Jackie and Alexia because you were talking. You swapped your polony sandwiches for Stacey's tuna roll.”

I was wrong.

“Mummy,” I'm a Marlin,” she said with great joy and happiness.

Child psychologists say parents should never stifle their children's innermost urges. Besides, we have a cat who thinks he's a dog, so why shouldn't I have a daughter who thinks she's a fish?

“That's wonderful, Nicky,” I said enthusiastically. “I think you're a beautiful marlin. Mind you, your nose isn't quite long enough — perhaps you're a stumpnose, not a marlin.”

She looked at me as if I was insane.

“Mummy, I'm not a fish. I'm a Marlin.”

The generation gap was beginning to tell. I was lost.

“I'm a Marlin in the swimming team. I made the inter-areas team and all the schools in our side are called Marlins.”

“Aah,” I said faintly.

Which is why Saturday a week ago, in the heat of the African sun, we found ourselves sitting with several thousand other parents at Ellis Park swimming pool.

We had to be there at 1.45pm sharp. It's a 10-minute drive from home, so we left at 11am to get a good seat on the stand.

Oh, we went prepared.

I packed carefully. Several extra-thick, foam-chip-padded cushions for Lazar derrières. A picnic hamper complete with cold chicken, cucumber sandwiches, koeksusters, naartjies and pickled cucumbers.

Binoculars, cameras, the cine camera and the telescope I pushed into a rucksack and the stop watches we wore around our necks.

By 1pm, the stand was choc-a-block full. Like pilchards we sat, 3 000 proud parents, binocular to binocular. It was a fearsome sight.

And below, the massive pool was a seething, splashing cauldron of swimming children.

I focussed the telescope. “Where is she, my daughter the Marlin?” I said frantically to my spouse who had fallen asleep under his sun-hat.

And then, there was a horrendous sound. Three thousand parents ducked.

“It's the bomb, it's a terrorist invasion!” screamed the women in front sitting on my toes.

“Relax, it's just the commentator,” growled the parent on my right.

“Good afternoon parents, and children,” he bellowed, shattering our eardrums and causing the tin roof of the stand to quiver. “Welcome to our inter-areas gala.”

And that was the beginning.

Swordfish, Barracudas, Sharks, Pikes, Whales, Salmons, Dolphins, Marlins and Piranhas — they lined the starting blocks and swam their little hearts out.

On the stands — things got tense.

The under-11 butterfly swimmers shot off the block, legs kicking, arms pulling.

Two teams fought it out kick by kick and then one child pulled away.

“Who's that fat lump losing the race,” shouted one mother?

“That fat lump is my daughter,” said her neighbour and punched her in the stomach.

The father on my left was a most enthusiastic spectator. He swam along with each race. Figuratively, of course.

Which I didn't mind until we got to the breaststroke and he knocked me off the stand with his vigorous arm movement.

The mother behind me shouted: “Kill him, kill him,” every time her Claude swam, and the one three along had to be restrained from jumping into the pool to push her son to victory.

But it was the under-11 backstroke event that captured the Lazar family's attention. Because that was the race our own, home-grown Marlin was swimming.

There they stood, six miniature Mark Spitzes.

The race was thrilling. We shouted ourselves hoarse, our vocal chords going into spasm from the unexpected activity.

And then Nicky dived. “What a swimmer! What a dive! What a fantastic backstroke! This year Ellis Park, next year the Olympics!” I shouted to my husband with pride.

It was then he went to sit on the other side of the pool. “I think Daddy is embarrassed,” said Jamie as we watched him go.

There's no doubt — fathers just don't have the same spirit as mothers.

After the gala, as we departed, there was a buzz of excitement.

“Johnny, you swam like a champ.”

“Annetjie, you'll make Transvaal this year.”

“Fred, you were brilliant. You flew through the water like a bullet.”

“Ag, Agnes, if it hadn't been for the other nine teams, yours would have come first, not last.”

“What a gala!”

They say Jannie le Roux's having problems with the Ellis Park Stadium.

Forget soccer, rugby and boxing.

What he needs is to dig up the grass, build an Olympic-size swimming pool in the middle and hold a primary schools' inter-area gala every week.

He'd make a killing ... and he wouldn't even need fertiliser.

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