Cape Town - Everyone kept telling Aletta that she had to meet Maurice, the new gentleman who had arrived in the village of Philadelphia. With a population of just over 500, a new man in town was definitely news.
Aletta had raised her family in Philadelphia. After being single for many years she marked her commitment to singlehood by having her daughter and niece dreadlock her hair.
Inevitably, given her passion for crystals, the newly dreadlocked Aletta visited Maurice’s Mineral Magic shop. There she found herself drawn to a Kyanize crystal that she wanted to wear, wrapped in wire, as a necklace. Maurice insisted she accept it as a gift.
Aletta and Maurice discovered a shared passion for Rodrigues who happened to be playing in Cape Town. They made a date to hear him play. Then, “It was like a crazy teenage love story,” jokes Aletta.
How wonderful that Kyanite was the start of this crystal loving couples late-blooming love story. Was it coincidence that Kyanite is purported to attract your soul mate?
The couple were married in 2008 and today run Philadelphia’s Mineral Magic, which stocks the widest range of minerals in South Africa. Saturday and Sunday sees a steady stream of customers coming to this iconic outpost to find a piece of earth’s ancient beauty to wear, decorate their home, add to a collection or use for healing. Customers are treated like friends and warmly hugged and greeted by Aletta and Maurice.
Philadelphia means brotherly love and is a proverbial, blink and you will miss it town. Although only half an hour from Cape Town, it is a universe apart. The town came into existence when a farmer donated a portion of his land to build a church and save local farmers the journey to Durbanville for the Eucharist. The church still retains ownership of the land which has arrested development and preserved the picture-postcard prettiness of the original town.
Mineral Magic is housed in what was once the general store. Inside, crystals glint, gleam and wink invitingly as they reflect the sun’s rays. I feel like a child being allowed to rummage in granny’s precious jewel box as I examine the myriad of crystals on display.
Aletta, arrestingly elegant, wears a flowing crushed velvet gown paired with knee high Doc Martin boots and pixie hair. Definitely not the twinset and pearls type, she favours wearing wire-bound chunks of crystal around her neck.
Aletta grew up in Namibia and recalls with wonder weekends spent with her rock hound father ploughing sandstone koppies for crystals; “You can imagine how magical that was for a nine year old child,” she says.
Maurice’s passion for minerals was also instilled at an early age. As a teenager, he visited his uncle, who was the mayor of a Namibian dorp with a population of less than 80. There wasn’t much to do but the 15 year old mineral enthusiast entertained himself by pursuing a quartz vein which led him to dig a furrow along the dirt road which served as the town’s main street. The young boy pocketed some fine quartz, but his uncle wasn’t charmed by the damage he caused to the town in the process.
Nowadays, getting crystals is no longer a matter of plundering koppies and streets. The once obscure hobby of mineral collecting has exploded in popularity, gone mainstream and become big business. Minerals are money and demand has outstripped supply. Recently, a South African professor sold his collection for R1.4-million. Many miners know the value of crystals and pocket them for sale to enthusiasts: a piece of Rhodocrosite, reclaimed from a magnesium mine, fetched R64 000.
New age esoterics flock to Mineral Magic on the weekend. Can a crystal really heal you, help you concentrate or make you a better person, I wonder? “I hear daily so much nonsense,” sighs Aletta. “There are so many charlatans turning crystals into a religion.” Yet, Aletta admits that she has her own stories about stones. Each day she selects from her large crystal collection which crystal to wear for the day: “Everything has an energy. I wear certain crystals because I know I need that vibration.” She says. Today’s choice, a smoky quartz crystal that looks as though it could double as a spell casting wand, comes from Brandberg Namibia, hailed by new agers as one of earth’s spiritual centres.
“I’m more sceptical” says Maurice.
But what convinces Aletta that crystals have special powers is that children are so attracted to crystals. On many occasions she has seen a child drawn compulsively to a particular crystal. “Children,” she says, “choose their own stones.”
Whatever their mystical properties, crystals are undoubtedly beautiful. I’m mesmerised by the grey rocks which, split asunder, expose mysterious amethyst caves within. The slabs of earthy coloured sandstone, imprinted with mysterious snail shaped fossils, draw me back in time.
As with all sub-cultures, mineralogy has its niches. There are those with a passion only for sandstone; others adore quartz and Maurice particularly enjoys agates. He explains that, “You can take 300 aquamarines and they are all the same; take 300 agates and none will be alike.”
When we’ve finished our chat, I’m lucky enough to be allowed a peek back stage, behind the store front: Boxes of crystals in are piled and scattered everywhere. “We are just a little bit over the top crazy. It is a bit all consuming,” says Aletta.
I leave as the weekend is drawing to a close. The whole set up is so darned romantic it has me hugging myself with joy.
My visit to Philadelphia was a personal odyssey. A crystal ball that reflected my hopes for a better life – away from the soul crushing grind of the city, engaged in beauty and living in community.
Aletta sums it up when she says: “For me, the reason for living is to be there for one another. That’s what I love - sharing with fellow human beings.”
l Aletta 021 972 1139, www.magicminerals.co.za
Cape Times