“It was the best time in my life – I was so carefree,” remembers Karen Zoid of busking on Melville’s streets as a teenager. It certainly beat her grade 10 weekend job as a Mr Delivery call centre phone operator, earning R3.20 an hour towards an amplifier (“Nobody ever knows what they want, they always change their mind!”).
Out on the pavements she could perform to an audience, playing Rolling Stones tunes to 50-somethings, Smashing Pumpkins hits to students, sad Tracy Chapman ballads to loners.
Nils van der Linden 