TG Newsletter: OnderOnsie

Apr 27
8 min read

OnderOnsie

(4 April 2026)

We know… We know… It’s been months, but it took us an inconceivable amount of time to recover. Whether it be from shock, financial ruin, deep regret, painful stomach churns OR coughing up crocodilepissriverwater…

Let’s go back to the beginning!

A word conundrum played out in Skinny’s head. They sometimes do occur, but never linger long enough for her to grab the Oxford or open a Google search page. This time however…

What is an ‘onderonsie’?

Chikita plainly described it as a selfie, except with more than one person, also known as an “usie” or “wefie” and obviously only of the bottom half of ‘us’ or ‘we’.

Next up was the shrewd Hollander, Nienke. I mean, Afrikaans is just Hollands version 4. “Oh, what a pretty word that is!” she exclaimed. And with her explanation, she also unravelled the Afrikaner tendency to see drought when there are only four beers left.

‘Onder’ meaning between, and ‘ons’ meaning us. It would be used when someone tells a secret that should be kept between the two of them. But always a harmless secret.

“Just between you and me…”

In Afrikaans it has metamorphosed into a dispute between two people, which may even escalate into a fight (…read poes klap), but as long as the confrontation stays just between those two people, it qualifies as an onderonsie.

And so it was that Skinny and Chikita experienced all three of these beskrywende naamwoorde in one weekend.

We booked this weekend in our dairy. It had to be in our dairy, because neither of us have ever kept a diary! Who does that?!? Ouchie Fauci!

Up north with us, back to an oldie, but a goodie – Witkop Pass.

And so, life shot up the first flare… Petrol shortages country wide!!! But the Tank Girls never fear. We can ride on 93 puffs; we can roll over the inner linings of tyres; teeth on our sprockets? – bah!

First petrol garage, a full 7km from the farm was dry as a dronkie’s mouth the day after a beer festival. We gave each other a squinty glare. One of those glares that outsiders might have construed for love but was in essence an urgent quest for knowledge. Was life trying to tell us something???

We decided to head (keep that word in mind) back to the farm to fetch the two jerrycans… just in case we might need them travelling up north. Back on the farm, Chikita inspected her Nelly’s undercarriage. His header pipe was loose. Panic set in and Chikita nearly lost her head. We didn’t have the right size key/spanner/driver and in any case, the thing was bloomin’ hot.

Quick logistical adjustment. Chikita transferred her luggage to the new DR650 horse in the stable – Potoooooooo (named after an 18th-century British thoroughbred racehorse)! It would be his first ride out with the Tank Girls and he was bucking happy.

(See how far we’ve written, and we haven’t even left the farm yet… Hold on Sally, this weekend is gonna get wet!)

On the move again, we started down the roads less used by vehicles with suspension. We kept running into dead ends, riding past manky cows, crossing sewage filled intersections and koes-ing for sparks from overloaded Eskom substations. You know what? Let’s not tempt Fate. She seems to be quite busy today. So, back to hell’s highway we went.

We came to a crossing with the main road leading up to Pilanesberg. Stopped on the other side and had a quick look on our maps. We were running out of daytime and hadn’t even left the municipality yet. Let’s turn back and take that Pilanesberg road, boring, straight, slightly busy… we thought.

Riding about 500m down this clear, open, straight, tar road, made even safer by a few speed bumps, we found ourselves entangled in wreckage so fresh that wheel hubs were still rolling into the field, one car was still tilting back onto its wheels, and luggage was still hanging mid-air waiting for gravity to pull it back down to earth. If we didn’t stop minutes earlier for that quick GPS check…

Head down, throttle open, ride up!

We found Terrence’s little bar between two towns too far for anyone to visit. It was time to drown that little voice, “Safety second!”

In Lephalale, we had a onenightstand in an overpriced guesthouse with kids next door screaming all through the night. HOW LOOONG MUST THIS GO OOOON???

The next day we were grumpy, and ready to leave civilization far behind. Witkop would suit us well. Fate, Karma and Destiny decided to sleep in…

The first river crossing was over 100m long, with no signage to offer any information as to how deep. Swaying along came a babbelasfarmworker heading to the other side! Maybe his 2-step would help him?

Dipping his sandals into the water, we asked how deep it gets. Not deep, he shrugged, only about waist deep, he gestured!!! We stood frozen, watching him slowly being devoured by the NyamiNyami all the way up to his belt before being spat out the other side. Guess that river god doesn’t like umqombothi.

Nope! A detour had to be found.

But like before, the Witkop showed us all her splendour. Awash with deep rivers, water pouring out of mountain crevices, more rain still looming behind the mountains. Farms were cut off from the roads, and we were convinced we saw a zebra with a pool noodle!

We snaked over 18km of pass in the blink of an eye… if you blink very slowly. Elite eye control it’s called! Elite slow steering is what we know it as.

However, we had to turn all the way back to Lephalale, having forgotten our loosey-goosey hipflask in the fridge. Just keep telling your Conscience that fuel will be aplenty and to concern himself with more important things like if it is acceptable to tip the car guard only R2.

We collected our tequila-tin in Lephalale and scooted a bit further up towards the border to a spot with the name tag ‘Ons Hoop’. There must have been an onderonsie, as Hope ran away and only left a few mielie fields with a lone map point called Kroeg Oop (renamed from Lapa Lê Lê Lodge). We dropped in and surprise-surprise found journalist Dave Cilliers there and another guy called Dave Cilliers! Onder ons, we had such a lekker kuier with this legend of a word dispenser.

Dave and his son (Dave) headed out while we were still contemplating our next move. The barman recommended an epic-sounding route with a nice lookout point, barbed up, but which we could just hop over, ending at his brother’s bar (seems like it’s a Lephalale thing) where we would pitch our tent on the lawn for the night. As in our language we said ‘Naaaais’ and waved them goodbye; with a see ya later alligator… not paying any attention to the cruel and unkind snickering of Life as we rode out of the gates.

Not far down the road was a turnoff onto another 100m long low water bridge. Skinny got to the middle, and saw that the last 10m disappeared under angry, foamy water, making waves big enough to scare the bedjeesus out of Kelly Slater. Chikita was still on the far side setting up her camera. Skinny gave the underwater driveway one skewe look and decided – NADA! As she was doing a 10 point turn on the narrow bridge, Chikita came past. She yelled at Chikita that she could go have a look, but there was no way across. Still busy going bietjie voerentoe bietjie agtertoe, Skinny heard the two fishermen screaming, “Someone stop her!!!”

She just knew…

In one foul swoop (imagine Skinny’s boot hooking on the luggage, stumbling backwards, nearly plonking down into the shallow side of the bridge kind of swoop), she immediately started disrobing. With a quick glance in the direction of the-one-that-you-should-never-follow, she saw the bike swept out from under her in a split second, sinking down the deep end like a bag filled with bricks suspiciously tipped over the water’s edge by some dirty mobsters. A few small air bubbles drifted to the top with Potoooooooo’s soft screams growing fainter and fainter as he quietly went to sleep with the fishes.

Chikita was carried downstream by masses of bubbling water, faster than a ZX on the back straight of Phakisa. Stripped down to her underpants, Skinny was ready to dive in when Elvis, all shook up, mentioned in a low voice that… “Ma’am, that water she is filled with crocodiles and hippos!”

There stood the 50-year-old auntie in her panty and a small black fisherman, staring after a white helmet barely bobbing above the water. In unison they shouted, “TAKE OFF YOUR HEAVY CLOTHES!!!”

On the river’s edge pulled up a small white bakkie and three men jumped out. One ran up onto the bridge while the other two jumped around the bakkie in tense disbelief. Skinny’s mind was racing about what to do next, when she heard them screaming…

“PHONE THE AMBULANCE!”

“THE AMBULANCE NEVER COMES!”

“PHONE THE POLICE!”

“THEY’RE USELESS!”

Chikita started a brave but weak attempt at back-stroke, barely keeping her head above water for big gulps of air. Elvis and Skinny made their way across the flooded bridge hand-in-hand, down the river bank, climbing over fences, stepping in thorns, and stumbling through mud. Chikita slowly inched her way over to the bamboo-covered embankment. When she got near enough to the side, Elvis risked himself getting eaten alive, snatched her up and dragged her as far away from the water as possible. Ready for mouth2mouth, Elvis loomed over her until she started coughing up brown slushy water.

The colour was just about to return to her cacoethic cheeks, when Elvis told her about the crocs and her eyes widened to show more white than is actually humanly possible.

The two of us sat there in deafening, death-defying silence on the river bank, with streams of nothingness flowing through our minds. There was just zero activity in the cavity above our shoulders. No guilt, no accusations, no fear, no comprehension, not even a desire for a tot of tequila. And so we sat…

Dude, wharre vok…!?!

Elvis told us that earlier that same month, a Fortuner also went down there, and soon after a Mahindra. Much like the Bremen Town Musicians, if at least only a bicycle went down next… Potoooooooo would be okay, né?!?

As our brain cells started returning to normal function, we got back on the only remaining DR, Brom, who always seems to be holding the fort. Tank Girls’ unstable, rickety fort. The bakkie-guys were still watching us expectantly, as if these clowns had one more trick up our sleeves…

We rode home 2-up on Brom, with a soaking Chikita, and no pillion-pegs. It was cold, it was uncomfortable, and Life just kept on snorting.

We can confirm:

1. To this day Potoooooooo is still lingering at the bottom of the Mokolo river

2. Not even the tow-truck company is willing to brave the crocodile infested waters

3. All of Chikita’s luggage may very well still be dry, as it was inside a Nomad Bike bag

4. If found, please return the 10L of fuel

5. Death does not want Chikita!

CHIKITA PRODUCTIONS PRESENT:

After more than a year's no-ride sabbatical... we decided it was time to dust off our DR's and ride North. From the very first morn, we had an ONDERONSIE with Life. He tried his very best to convince us to STAY VOKKEN HOME! (Listening is not one of our superpowers)

No fuel in Mooinooi; a loose header on Nellie; a moer of a crash minutes before we passed on the Sun City road... but with long, determined twists, we made it to Lephalale. The next day we climbed up/down Witkop pass, swimming though Waterberg mountain puddles. We found new friends in old pubs, and old friends in new pubs. But then... our onderonsie got real!

Our beloved Potoooooooo (Skinny's loan DR to Chikita), swam to his forever home at the bottom of the Mokolo river. Potoooooooo - give those crocodiles hell!

Video produced by Jolandi Mentz (3 Apr 2026)

https://youtu.be/0MQdjUh9-Tk

HONESTY NEWSLETTER!

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