Demo’ is a word – short for demonstration – that means different things to different people.
Here’s what the dictionary has to say:
Well, today I experienced all of the above. And I need to talk about it.
This morning on the commute to work… An atypically soaking wet Johannesburg morning where the typically bonkers traffic was snarled more than normal. The local radio was cheerfully talking about a disturbance at Witkoppen Crossroads. This piqued my interest as that’s pretty much where I was. As I dodged and cajoled my way past the reckless taxis – minibuses driven disregard for the laws of physics, let alone traffic rules – there was a concertina of smashed cars: a domino of fender benders by the look of it. But that acrid smell? Ah, that’ll be the burning tyres, wheelie bins and piles of smoldering detritus. Wait up, whut…? Now the road is covered in broken glass and oh, there are rows of chunky boulders here and there. At no more than walking pace I pick through these hazards – careful not to damage the car I have been generously loned – clocking the presence of several riot-squad-vans-worth of armed police. Equipped with very big guns I notice as we pick up speed.
I’ve just passed through the dying embers of a riot.
A mere 400m later, I turn into the security gate of the client compound, unscathed. Calmness and order descend; manicured grounds and immaculate displays abound. I go about my day training clients.
Turns out that the inhabitants of the local, erm, informal settlement have decided this morning is the appropriate time to stage an attention-getting demonstration. This has worked: radio coverage, traffic carnage, distruption at the very least. Yet it makes no further difference to my day.
At the close of play the business owner – an admirable, accomplished gentleman – and I have happened upon a mutual love of music and hi-fi systems. It turns out he has a side-hustle – a hobby business – trading in audiophile kit. Translation: Very, very expensive stereos.
Would I like a demonstration?
We repair to the auditorium he owns and has repurposed for this end. (It’s about the size of Marlborough’s Parade Cinema lower level.) Set up in front of the screen are brutalist stereo speakers that would befit a rock concert – each weighing 350kg, 1.7m tall – set on their own granite plinths. Alongside, another set which are emblazoned with a familiar – if not for this context – designer logo. They look much more, well, designed (as if by the Empire from the Star Wars universe): dangerous, all shiny and deeply-black. Their mid-range drivers – Translation: speaker-y bits – are grown as industrial diamonds that take a month to form. There are multiples of these enclosed. The amplifiers and turntable – record player if you prefer – look as if they too have come straight from the Death Star.
I am invited to take the best seat in the house while my host takes surgical care to cue a 2008 live LP from Canadian legends The Cowboy Junkies: Trinity Revisited. An exceptional recording that sounded, well, phenomenal through a truly sublime sound system. Truly was I transported. We then spend a mesmerising hour where the kit is put through its paces with Lebanese gutiar-folk, piano and voice, thundering drum solos and a haunting cover version. My host is deeply nerdy about the kit and I am geeking out. It was not so much the genres that impressed but the sheer love of music reproduced to an incredible immersive, all enveloping pinnacle state-of-the-art. We chat about recording engineers, performing live and stagecraft. We even discover that both our daughters studied at Royal Holloway.
Emerging into the night my host bids me good evening and I retreat to my hotel, musically stimulated.
In my room, I reflect on the contrasting elements that bookended my day.
Demonstration one? It turns out this took place because the local telecoms giant had dug a bloody-great trench and left it unmarked overnight. Whereupon a child from the squatter camp had fallen into it and perished.
Demonstration two led my curious mind to a quick Googling. The value of the kit that had wowed me? Turns out I had been listening to a circa 23,405,530.00 South African Rand stereo*.
Just another day in urban South Africa.
What a country of extremes this is.
* aka a million pound hifi.
A pair of the shiny speakers? £600,000 to you chief.
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