DESPITE working for a few years in South Africa then remaining in the rand monetary area after crossing the border into Swaziland, I have never dabbled in the Republic’s stock and shares. However, I did once buy a small heap of frosted krugerrands. These were handsome coins containing one ounce of pure gold and were popular in the apartheid era as a hedge against inflation. The frosted variety were more expensive due to the unusual and attractive design on their surfaces, its description helping decide where to hide them – the bottom of our freezer, covered by already-cooked impala meat.

Once the price of gold rose, I drove to Johannesburg and walked to the gold coin broker’s office in the central business district. In one hand I carried the krugerrands, in the other some silver troyans, both in supermarket plastic bags. The city then was notorious for theft, muggings or worse, and had several no-go areas. It has since deteriorated, most legal businesses having left the CBD years ago for the soulless, security-saturated suburbs.

That afternoon, I walked in off the street through the open door, no guard or CCTV camera in sight, and dumped the bags on the counter. The young Afrikaner casually looked inside the bags, then began to talk about Swaziland and politics. When I reminded him I wanted to sell the metals, he continued talking while scribbling on a piece of paper with the calculations then checked on a cheap hand calculator. After we agreed with his calculations, he rummaged in a locked box under the counter and produced bundles of banknotes and a tiny receipt.

There was also an emotional connection to the krugers. My brother Ken was a physicist in Australia with a research interest in the heat problems posed by mining at deep levels. He was brought across to the Witwatersrand gold reef where Carletonville is one of the deepest mines in the world. The rock temperatures are so high that the miners can only tolerate about 40 minutes at the face, despite ice-cold water and air being pumped down to protect them. Buying some pieces of fine gold would keep their jobs going, I rationalised.

In the current difficult times, copper is not people’s favourite metal. The usual cause of our clinic laptops failing to start is the previous night’s theft of copper wire from internet cabling. Occasionally a partly-cooked felon is brought in to casualty, having misread the wiring.

Tin is used by several skilled craftsmen here but the most impressive example witnessed was when exploring the old harbour in Mombasa in Kenya. We were listening to a bearded and venerable man from Oman who traded in perfumes and scents brought across from Arabia once a year in a large dhow, returning home once the trade winds reversed. A tapping sound from nearby never stopped during his explanation of the ingredients and manufacture of his wares which he would dab on our hands, arms or necks from time to time.

Eventually he led us next door and there, in the gloom, was the source of the sounds. Two men using small hammers were beating out very ornate traditional Arab coffee pots. Beneath the pot there was a space in the base for charcoal to warm the brew while a spoon-like creation for sugar was attached to its handle. These were not tourist baubles but portable workhorses and the one bought that day continues to be a source of pleasurable smells and tastes.

A diamond is not, of course, a metal but is mentioned here as it arouses similar security concerns to pure gold. Dvokolwako is a diamond mine, not very far from the sugar estate in Swaziland where I worked. Our senior male nurse at the clinic, Musa Magagula, was being pestered by a relative to buy a diamond from the diggings. The three of us met one evening in the consulting room and several small shining stones appeared from a small pochette.

“If it’s genuine, it will score a line on glass,” I offered.

Musa immediately took one and made for the nearest window. Not a mark. Then he swallowed the alleged precious stone and laughed at our consternation.

“This is a better test. If this was a real diamond, my cousin would already be running to the police.”

And that was the last we heard or saw of the cousin.

Dr David Vost studied medicine at Glasgow University and works at a hospital in Swaziland. He and his family live on a farm in Northern Uganda near the Albert Nile. davidvostsz@gmail.com