This very week the residents of Kingswood Golf Estate have been riveted to witness massive gatherings of swallows in their annual pre-migratory assemblies about to depart like swarms of bees in incredible flights to their Northern summer nests.
Only two swallows have been locked down in their South African home in Kingswood, unable and not allowed to fly to their second home in Spain and welcome the swallows there as they would normally do annually at this time. They are the popular Larry and Judi Smith who have, without complaints, set a huge example to all of us South Africans with two separate anti-corona virus donations to the George Hospital Trust, totalling R50,000 – R10,000 for a campaign to provide masks for all the residents of George and R40,000 towards the building of a new Paediatric wing for mothers and children in the George Hospital.
Larry, a very personable British born and educated man, had a brilliant career in the famous Castrol Oil Company which took him into wide responsibilities across the globe, inter alia, to the Rhodesia of old.
Judi, a true daughter of the old English Natal country community, he met at work and married in Johannesburg. They have one daughter, Jemma, resident in New Zealand, with whom they have communicated in a novel way. When Larry finally retired, he learned to ride a motorbike. With Judi on the pillion they covered more than 150,000 km worldwide without accident, all recorded for Jemma by Sparky a toy bear, an imagined reporter, strapped to Judi.
