The drought South Africa is experiencing has been crippling.
Which makes the recent rains all the more welcome. The relief felt by South Africans has been palpable. Even though Water and Sanitation Minister Nomvula Mokonyane cautioned us on Tuesday to not get too excited, watching the rains come down, and our dams and rivers slowly fill, has had an almost therapeutic effect.
Which makes the video above all the more heartening to watch. Videographer Heinrich Stofberg managed to capture on camera the very moment the Matlabas River in Limpopo started to fill up. A trickle of water runs out onto dusty earth at first. Soon after the water starts flowing, soaking the parched earth.
Stofberg posted the footage to his Vimeo account saying it shows how "life returns to Matlabas". The footage is paired with music by Dexter Britain.
"After the worst drought this country has seen in many years, every drop of water is precious," he says, as quoted on Traveller24. "Many rivers are nothing but dry sandy causeways crisscrossing through the landscape. The land is awaiting the return of the water with angst. And then, one day, the call is answered."
Indeed it is a dry white season, to quote the poet Mongane Wally Serote. But hopefully this season will come to pass.