Eish, my ugly boss said I couldn't go

Katharine Child, Leigh-Anne Hunter, Shanthini Naidoo and Denise Williams hit the streets of Johannesburg and Cape Town to speak to South Africans who could not attend yesterday's memorial service for Nelson Mandela. This is what they were told:

* Alfred Sibambo (79) sat in his bed at Charlotte Maxeke Hospital and watched the TV. He said he worked as a delivery man at the Soweto tailor where Mandela bought his wedding suit when he married Winnie.

"So I know Mandela before he was president."

A clearly ill and coughing Sibambo said as he watched: "I am crying with all the families. He was a great man at peace with everybody".

* Bottle store employee David Mabuza was bitter about missing the event.

"It's not a nice feeling. I also wanted to go there. But unfortunately I am working today. There is no TV to watch the memorial service at work. I am not happy, not at all. I wanted to see people paying respect."

Despite missing the event's he knew about the people booing and was disgusted.

"Whatever they are feel about Zuma, today is a funeral for Madiba not politics."

* Cook Khetiwe Zuma said: "It's a pity I can't be there". She watched television during her tea breaks. But she praised the "commitment" people showed in the rain.

* Near Greenmarket Square in Cape Town, musician Joe Petersen sang "what a wonderful world" and fondly recalled how he had once shared a donkey cart ride with Madiba. Petersen said the former statesman kept saying "this is fun, this is fun".

"He was a free man," said Petersen, who plays the Djemba Drum and was part of the band that travelled with Mandela to many occasions.

* Lungile Maninjwa, another busker, said he remembered the day Mandela was freed.

"As they came through Greenmarket Square they came across me and my friends and then they joined us singing protest songs which turned the whole of my street performance into a street rally. That's when I came to the realisation that people are on to something more dramatic; a political change," said Maninjwa.

Waiter at a bar in Melville, Johannesburg, Kelvin Majakwara said the first thing the waiters did when they got work was erect the screen only used  in live sports matches so they could watch the event.

His favourite moment of the service was "the arrival of the world leaders and seeing Robert Mugabe attending the service", said Majakwara, a Zimbabwean.

* Furniture store employee David Nkomo said he had wanted to go the FNB stadium. "But my boss wanted us at work."

He said: "You have to work..

"I saw it on TV and I was running to my room at the back of the shop. I was listening to the radio. Obama's speech was good."

* Sam, a waiter, said: “I couldn’t get off work, so I’ve been watching the memorial on TV whenever I can get a few minutes. It has made me reflective. I’m thinking of going back to study. I want to live my life in the way Madiba did”.

* Aawande Maseko, 7, was waiting for a bus with her mom in Braamfontein. Mrs Maseko said: “I told her we could watch on TV at home, but she insisted we go to the stadium because everyone is going and we have to pay our respects to Tata Madiba. We’ve been waiting for over an hour in the cold but she hasn’t complained.”

* Fezeka Sekeleni, 25, a writer, was waiting for a bus: “I came to pay my respects on behalf of my parents, both freedom fighters from the Eastern Cape, who couldn’t be here”.

* Lara, an American, travelled here from Los Angeles and hasn’t slept for two days. “It’s one of those landmark events you can’t miss. One day my grandchildren will ask me: ‘Where were you when Madiba died’?”

* Naome Mamajie, 43, a domestic worker, caught taxis and buses to get to the memorial from Yeoville: “I just finished my night shift this morning. You can’t be tired on a day like today.”