Melissa Riordan wrote on Facebook:
From my very first Arts Festival at about age 6 (sitting in a Monument venue at Patrick Mynhardt’s feet as he told Oom Schalk Lourens's tall tales), to angst-ridden Eistedfodd recitals on the main theatre stage in primary school and English Olympiad classes in high school, and then many, many, many more National Arts Festival shows and Rhodes student parties throughout my teens and adulthood, plus the hours I spent walking up this hill when I worked at The Settlers’ Inn “Mot”, and then the Rhodes graduation ceremonies of my stepsons, this patch of Africa is a special place for me, a kind of home for my imagination for which I’m always grateful.
While I’m uncomfortable with its name, I hope it will always be a safe space for music and art and performance and learning and ceremony and celebration and meeting.
