The Estate

Dinner on The Estate. Started with a wine tour. Catering to

the impudent curiosity of we-the-tourists. The British owner did what

was expected of him. He stood by a vine, showed us the light green grapes, the

leaves, and spoke of what made his wine special. His words danced over his posh accent, slipped by me in unconnecting tones, unaffected by my judgement. He then showed us the large aluminium

systems for fermentation, and finally the musty cellar in which we did our part: we ooed and aaed at the sight of the barrels. After which we were invited into the home, built

by parents, led straight through the hallway to the back, the garden, with its

view over their rolling vineyards. There, we tasted the wines. The other tourists had disappeared, had returned to their holiday homes scattered

over the estate. Not us, we had been invited for supper. By then, their friends had

joined us. The Portugueze wine-producer, the Dutch banker, the Austrian diplomat.

The estate owners’ five sons played out their territorial games on the lawn

as we discussed things we knew nothing of: the taste of wine, the keeping of chickens. Yet in turn their guests knew nothing of literature, not of Disgrace nor of Half of a Yellow Sun, which

common ground has led me to discuss; these, our shared histories, upbringing in Africa, or

Portugal, in countries other than those of our heritage. Our own microcosmic, wordly

order. The children ate pasta in the kitchen while the grown-ups took place in the

dining room, then moved to the living room for coffees and more wine. For

Portugueze sweets. I felt strangely melancholic of my youth, of the past that

lay behind me, of a dying order within me. It had taken me years to fight, only to find that sometimes, on days like this, I missed it. Why? Not

for all its outwardly show, its pretense, the bubble that is most easily

pierced. But for the dramatic stories that lie beneath the glisterine surface.