Former bare-knuckle champion Mr Muvhango "Mudzi wa tombo" Tshiwandalani was pleasantly surprised when family and friends showed up to celebrate his 66th birthday with him on Sunday, 30 July.
The birthday party, which was held at Mutamvuni village, was secretly organised by his children. One of his daughters, Lydia Tshiwandalani, said they had decided to surprise him with a party for his birthday to thank him for the love he had shown them when they had grown up. "He is a wonderful father to all nine of his children, and we say happy birthday, Dad, and we wish you many more returns," she said.
During his heydays as a bare-knuckle fist fighter, Tshiwandalani never lost a fight and most of his victims (over 100 of them) were rumoured not to last more than a minute with him in the makeshift bare-knuckle ring.
When asked why he was nicknamed "Mudzi wa tombo", which literally means "roots of a stone", he said this was because of the way he used to hit his opponents. "Just look at my hands, they are very strong, even today. We all know that stones have no roots, but I used to hit them so hard, it was as if my hands were made of stones. Remember a boxer called Roberto "Hands of Stone" Duran? To be honest, I used to hit harder than him," he said.
In the late 1970s, Tshiwandalani said, he went without a fight for six months because no opponents were left who dared to fight him. "There were times when no one wanted to fight me and then I had to travel to faraway places, where I was not known, to get a good fight. But after fighting one or two opponents, they would also refuse to face me," he said.
In Vhembe, Tshiwandalani had fought at nearly every bare-knuckle fighting venue, including at Ndarieni, Tshifudi, Tshitavha and Mbwedi. One day, he said, he hit a man, who was said to be a champion from Gazankulu, so hard that the man asked to inspect his fists to see if he was not hiding stones in his hands. After realising that Tshiwandalani had nothing in his hands, the opponent hugged him and whispered to him: "My brother, I have never been hit so hard in my life. I surrender and will never fight you again."