Surfer Kholo Langa, who is an U14 surfer, has a quick wit and a sharp sense of humour.
I asked him, as I so often do in interviews, what his biggest fear might be? I am just testing the water to see if sharks come up so to speak and for good surfers, they never do.
“Let my brother answer first,” he suggested, adding that he wanted to think about it a bit more.
Older brother Ndalo, who competes at U16 level, said: “Eight foot Nahoon Reef or no access to any sport of any kind.”
Interesting to note that even as a 14-year-old schoolboy, soon to turn 15 in 2026, that waves are still measured in feet and inches, and surfboards too.
“Hell”, as in the biblical sense, is Kholo’s measured answer after he has had some time to think.
His big dream is just to be a top pro sportsman one day, and it is going to be a tough choice because the young man is multitalented across a bundle of sports.
You name it — rugby, cricket, hockey, tennis, swimming, surfing.
In surfing he has an advantage. Older brother Ndalo is a good student of equipment.
It is his passion to know which surfboards are good and why.
How does a round pin tail differ from a squash tail or swallow tail?
He makes a point of following top local surfers and buying their second hand surfboards, and riding them to test them out.
This young man is fast developing an understanding of which inches count and where.
Nice knowledge to have and Kholo is following fast in the slipstream behind his big brother, who is doing the pathfinding for him.
It is unlikely that Kholo is going to be riding any lousy boards in the future and his surfing ability is expanding at a rapid rate.
The boys have inherited some of their smarts and sports talent from dad, who is keen on his tennis.
Mom, Vuyo, an ex-netball player, is a strong supporter of the boys in their sport, even if it is against some cultural headwind from granny or family.
Born and raised north of Mthatha river in Pondoland where surfing does not have good credibility, mom has faced some questions: “Are you trying to kill the kids? Why are they in the water? Do you know how dangerous this is?”
But her intuition is to support her boys and how much more can she be proved right than at the 2025 Buffalo City Closed Surfing Championships at Nahoon Reef when her lads earned placings — Kholo first and Ndalo second in their respective divisions.
No flash in the pan, Kholo came first again in the most recent Junior Summer Surf Series and Ndalo took fifth in his division.
Vuyo is an information technology graduate from University of Johannesburg.
Figuring stuff out is her forte so she built the boys a rack for storing their surfboards from timber and recycled materials.
You can’t have a mom who is much more supportive than that.
Besides, she was getting a little tired of surfboards in the lounge.
Ndalo and Kholo were taught to swim at an early age.
After moving from Johannesburg to East London they quickly took up the opportunity to go surfing with Martin, Fran and Gemma Smith.
Loving the game, they took lessons from local surfer Tagen Smith and have graduated to the Junior Summer Surf Series and Buffalo City Surfing.
Lilyfontein has reason to feel proud of these two young men. Not only are they excelling in surfing, but in other school sports too.
Ndalo has two Otter awards (swimming across the school dam every Tuesday at 6am for a year) and Kholo has just signed up for his first year of Otter.
Psychology teaches that one key universal factor that underpins all success is grit.
The Otter award is a fair measure of that. And breaking the mould.
Venus and Serena Williams, Tiger Woods, Eminem and Grayson Boucher (The Professor) have all broken unexpected boundaries.
Perhaps Ndalo and Kholo will too. I look forward to watching this space.
Keep up the good work, lads.
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