Caleb Sebastian Serafin – scout since October 2013 and ATS since 2020 – is leaving us for the beautiful but distant land of the Czech Republic. I write this article with a heavy heart, since it is finally sinking in that Caleb is – for real – departing.
I have been forced to reflect on Caleb’s time in scouting, because truly I don’t recall him joining. He sort of appeared out of the abyss one day. The earliest photo I have of him is below, and I think this summarises the dynamics quite well between the two of us:
I think it’s quite fitting that I write this article. In much the same way one would get a Springbok Scout’s patrol leader to speak at their springbok ceremony, it makes sense then to have me – Caleb’s first (or rather, most influential1) patrol leader – speak Caleb’s “springbok ceremony” equivalent (leaving the troop).
Caleb can often be heard talking about his early days in the troop. “You know, I think David [Knight] looked at Daniel [Le Jeune] and thought he was doing too well. So he put me in Swifts as Daniel’s ball-and-chain”. Looking back through the photos in preparation for this article, I find myself agreeing with him – at least about the ball-and-chain bit. Caleb joined the Swifts on some date that I can’t remember, but immediately became an integral part in its functioning.
Caleb would regularly point out how things that I did were wrong or incorrect or inefficient. He would stand by and watch as the patrol would do something wrong and, instead of correcting us in the moment, laugh about it afterwards and berate us for not having done it a better way from the start.
Some may remember Caleb’s Communist Phase. This was a great moment in the Caleb timeline since it led to wonderful imagery, as is common in socialist regimes.
I remember this one troop camp particularly well. It was day 3 of a 5-day camp, so we were all quite tired. Unbeknownst to be, Caleb had been plotting a revolution for the past few days. On this very warm late morning at Hawequas, Caleb walks up to me with Simon and Natasha (and likely some other scouts) and informs me that this is a coup-d’etat and he is now in charge of the patrol. Exasperated after having dealt with Caleb for the last two and a bit days, I gave way to the new totalitarian regime and went to sleep in a bush for a few hours.2 This bit of the story is disputed by historians. As I recall, Caleb, crying, came to wake me up a few hours later, citing the people not listening and doing what they’re told, after which I swiftly (pun intended as I was a swift at the time) came out of exile and regained power. If you ask Caleb what happened, at dusk I came out and begged him to give me the role of PL back, which he gracefully accepted so long as I would be a puppet PL, with him still in control. The real ending will never be known unfortunately.
Anyway – as I neared the end of my scouting journey, I embarked on my Springbok. As any Springbok scout will tell you, your Springbok lives or dies on the participation of other scouts in your activities. Well, Caleb took it upon himself as a personal challenge to attend every single one of my Springbok activities. I still don’t know why – and I don’t know if it was a challenge. But the fact remains that Caleb was at my construction project, 28 hours of my service project, the meal, my camp, and finally my hike.
Now, although this man attended every Springbok event I ran – and even more patrol events – he constantly complained, moaned, pulled skew, pointed out holes in everything at every possible opportunity (see my comment a few paragraphs up). He truly was living up to the ball-and-chain label he has later assigned to himself. From the outside, you may feel sorry for me for having to put up with this. But then you realise that I kept inviting him back. So from this one could gather that either I’m a masochist, or I actually enjoyed having Caleb around me, and found him to be quite useful in fact.3
I want to highlight two instances of “Caleb-esque” behaviour. The first occurred on my Explorer expedition in September of 2016. Hiking to the top of Maanskynskop just outside Hermanus, we stop for a brief break. Caleb pulls out some peanuts. I ask him what’s wrong and he exclaims that “the peanuts are greasy”. I then state that “this man never stops complaining, and will be the reason I never get my Springbok”. He then asks me to cut his peanuts for him with a bottle opener, stating that I’ll probably manage to cut myself on that regardless.
The second instance occurred on my Springbok hike. I won’t bore you with the long details, save to say it was incredibly tough, we ran out of water, lost the path multiple times, and quite literally fell down a cliff. Caleb, of course, was not amused from the second we began the hike. This photo was taken of him on the third day, moments I had watched him fall head-over-heels down a cliff, losing his rollmat in the process:
I think that says all you need to know, but just incase – and just so that everyone can understand the levels of abuse I received from this man – here is the Hike in Caleb’s own words:
This leads me to a point in the Caleb Timeline that I’m not sure about. During the 2018-2019 years, I was mostly absent from the troop (or I can’t remember things). I do know that Caleb was promoted to the PL of Boks, which most people would know then gave rise to many of the newer generations of PLs and Springbok scouts. His appointment as PL did not stop his incredible propaganda output:
Caleb attended all the various competitions and stuff, but I won’t bore you with those details (not because I can’t remember them) and instead fast forward to what I’ll term “the neo-classical Caleb era”. Caleb left scouts in Matric, and rejoined on the 25th of November, 2021. When I expressed my surprise that he only came back when I was TS, Caleb said:
When I came back, someone made the announcement that you’re TS now and I didn’t believe them – Caleb Serafin, Jan 2025
Although we’d both aged about five years and we now held different positions than on that expedition in 2016, Caleb self-appointed himself as the “ball-and-chain to the TS”. However, and it’s probably becoming incredibly clear to you by now, Caleb’s talent for complaining and causing a ruckus is far outmatched by his myriad of skills, keen (if sometimes unwanted) insights and (most of all) his humour.
In the early days of being TS, my support group became Caleb and Simon. They were constantly reliable, insanely useful to have to bounce ideas off of, and just quite fun to be around.
Caleb’s career as an adult in scouting has taken him many places. He’s staffed most major competitions (Upton, Rayner, Gordon’s), staffed multiple badge courses and even (helped shape the Pioneering SC one). He’s attended, again, almost every single troop camp, hike, event at 1st Claremont. He became the 1st Claremont quartermaster – a job he takes very seriously when he wants to, but when I enquire about the state of the ropes, he has repeatedly said something to the tune of “I can only do so much with what upper management provides”.
Caleb and I have been on some of the most harrowing and demanding adventures of my life (I’m not sure about Caleb – but personally it was a struggle).
Troop Camp 2023 is one that comes to mind: Departing Cape Town at 21:00, destination Riviersonderend in the Land Rover with a very heavy trailer on the back. Doing 12kms/hr up Sir Lowry’s Pass. Arriving at the campsite at 03:00AM the next day. And then being the First Aider for a camp of 40 scouts.
This image – again – speaks for itself.
Around this time, the meme of “Daniel and Caleb, off together” became a reality. Caleb himself described it as follows:
More recently, we both went on the Senior Scout adventure, which itself was a whole ordeal. I don’t think this poor man knew what he was signing up for. We spent two full weeks in the Cederberg – and Caleb spent 90% of that time at a campsite with no running water, electricity, or permanent toilets (hence the get-up below):
I have an unending supply of Caleb stories and anecdotes. I haven’t even touched on his quotes and adages. I won’t continue with them here, and instead I’ve put together some captioned photos at the end of this article.4 A photo is worth a thousand words, and a Caleb photo is worth exponentially more.
Writing this article has not only forced me to come to terms with Caleb’s departure, but also to realise how integral he has been to my scouting experience. I have known Caleb for close to 12 years now and, despite all the memes, my life has been richer for it.
Caleb has been such a staple in my life – as I said, he’s come on pretty much every event I’ve ever been on – and I am really going to miss that. I don’t think I can properly quantify the impact that Caleb has had on me personally, but also countless other scouts. This is truly a big loss for the troop, the scouters team, Scouts South Africa, and me personally.
I am quite sad that you are leaving, Caleb, yet simultaneously excited for the world of new opportunities that you have unlocked. Bohemia Interactive doesn’t know what they have signed up for. I know this isn’t farewell, and that you’ll be back to visit, and I hope you know you’ll always be welcome back, and there will always be a free seat in the landrover for you.
On behalf of the troop, thank you for everything that you have done. It would be “intractable” to try and quantify the amount you have done for scouting.
From a personal side – thank you for quite literally always being there. Thanks for the adventures and I hope someday, when you return, you get to run a troop camp so I can complain as much as you did on all the camps I ran.
I – and the whole of 1st Claremont – will miss you lots.
Daniel le Jeune
Troop Scouter
- self-proclaimed ↩︎
- To this day, I recall that being one of the best sleeps of my life. If we’re ever at Hawequas, I could point you to the exact bush I rested in while Caleb toppled the government of the patrol. ↩︎
- Two things can be true ↩︎
- The editors needed to publish, so the captions haven’t happened yet, but the album is here. ↩︎
