What was going on when I was born?

South Africa is seeking to negotiate a ceasefire with Angola as a preliminary step toward settling the tangled issues of independence for South-West Africa and a Cuban troop withdrawal from Angola, Foreign Minister Roelof F. Botha said today. He said a cease-fire would provide an opportunity to ''test the ground'' for this wider settlement. Mr. Botha's account of the negotiations came as a South African envoy, Adriaan Eksteen, was meeting in the Cape Verde Islands with Angolan officials to arrange a second round of ministerial talks. Discussions were held there last month. The first round, the Foreign Minister said, skirted both South Africa's demand for the withdrawal of the estimated 25,000 Cuban troops as a condition for a settlement in South-West Africa and Angola's charges that South Africa supports the Angolan insurgency led by Jonas Savimbi.

President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt said today, after meeting with President Reagan, that ''top priority'' had to be given to bringing about the withdrawal of Israeli troops from Lebanon before time ran out on the latest Middle East peace efforts. A senior State Department official told reporters later that Mr. Reagan had told the Egyptian leader in their two hours of talks that he shared his concerns about the slow pace of the @Israeli-Lebanese negotiations. ''President Reagan is very impatient with the lack of progress so far in the Lebanese situation,'' said the official, who refused to be named, ''and he wants to break them loose as soon as possible.'' Framework for a Withdrawal He said that in the Administration's view, ''The key to this is the current negotiations between Israel and Lebanon.'' Once a framework is worked out for Israeli withdrawal, ''then you'll also be able to get Syria and the Palestine Liberation Organization to withdraw in that time frame,'' the senior American official said.

International Egypt's President, Hosni Mubarak, said after meeting with President Reagan in Washington that ''top priority'' had to be given to bringing about the withdrawal of Israeli troops from Lebanon before time ran out on the latest Middle East peace efforts. A senior State Department official said later that Mr. Reagan told the Egyptian leader that he shared his concerns about the slow pace of the Israeli-Lebanese negotiations. (Page A1, Column 3.) Sofia, Bulgaria, which is known as a restrictive Communist capital that has also gained the reputation of being a focal point of highliving international crime syndicates, has come under intense scrutiny with investigations into reports that it may have been involved in a plot to kill Pope John Paul II. (A1:5.)

Despite months of negotiations on the withdrawal of all foreign armies from Lebanon, it has become clear in recent weeks that the Israeli, Syrian and Palestinian forces now crowded into this tiny country are all planning on a long stay. Many Lebanese are now realizing that the ordeal that started with the Israeli invasion last June 6 may not end with all of the foreigners going home, but rather with all of them staying. The obvious danger is that the longer the rival armies remain the greater the likelihood that they will come into conflict, either accidentally or intentionally. U.S.-Israeli Incidents Since early this month, Israeli soldiers, who said they were on the trail of ''terrorists,'' have tried to pass through Marine Corps checkpoints of the multinational force in southern Beirut. This has led to some tense confrontations, but nothing more, between gunwielding marines and gun-wielding Israelis.

The New York premiere of a play by David Hare, whose acclaimed ''Plenty'' is now on Broadway, opens tonight at 8 at the SoHo Rep, 19 Mercer Street. Called ''Fanshen,'' it tells the true story of a village caught in the upheavals of the Chinese Revolution. However, it is being done with a multiracial cast to emphasize the play's broader concerns. Mr. Hare has said that ''Fanshen'' is not only about land reform but also about the relationship in any society between leaders and the led. It deals with the difficulties of effecting change, too. The play won high praise when it opened in London in 1975. ''Fanshen,'' which means ''to enter a new world'' and is based on a book by William Hinton, will play Thursdays through Sundays until Feb. 20. Tickets: $8. Reservations: 925-2588.

JAZZ tends to hibernate in small, crowded cellar clubs and lofts during the winter, with occasional concerts as a change of pace. With the coming of summer and the Kool Jazz Festival, the music bursts into the concert halls and the streets, shakes the cold out of its bones and begins to strut. At least, that's been the routine in recent years. It's a routine Lehman College's first Midwinter Jazz Festival aims to shake up a bit. Tonight, tomorrow and Sunday, Benny Goodman, Stan Getz, Gary Burton, Oscar Peterson and other leading jazz musicians will be heard in two evening and three afternoon programs in the comfortable, modern concert hall and theater of Lehman College's Center for the Performing Arts. The center, on Beford Park Boulevard West in the Bronx, offers amenities of a kind not usually encountered by those out listening to jazz - buffet dining with music beginning at 5:30 P.M. today and tomorrow, for example, and free parking in an attended lot. Lehman College's regular jazz program has been making a reputation for itself for several years, especially because it provides a place for musicians to learn about the nuts and bolts of jazz improvising.

Discrimination against girls in New York City's vocational high schools is denying them equal opportunity, and there are few signs of improvement, according to a study released yesterday by a private education group. The study, entitled ''Their 'Proper' Place,'' found that 12 of the city's 21 vocational schools had primarily male enrollments and that girls predominated in just five. In those five schools, the curriculum centers on professions that are ''traditionally female,'' such as cosmetology and stenography.

The Dow Jones industrial average jumped 25.66 points yesterday, to 1,063.65, as the latest economic news bolstered investor confidence that the economy is recovering from recession. Analysts said that the market was buoyed by a report that new claims for unemployment benefits in the week ended Jan. 15 had fallen by 71,000, to 491,000, their lowest level in 18 months. And investors were encouraged by a General Motors announcement that it was recalling 21,400 laid off workers to increase auto production. Some economists have issued forecasts this week of a rise in corporate profits in 1983 as the economy picks up. Leif Olsen, chairman of the economic policy committee of Citibank, was among the economists making this prediction. He told a bankers' group yesterday that recovery ''is under way.''

The New York City Board of Education is planning to lay off 1,000 teachers on Monday, officials said yesterday. The decision came after Warren M. Anderson, the majority leader of the State Senate, refused to endorse a legislative plan to provide $9 million in state funds for the city's public schools. ''It looks like the package of support for the schools may very well have fallen apart,'' said Frank J. Macchiarola, the city's Schools Chancellor. The school system found itself facing a $37 million deficit earlier this month, largely because of a dispute over eligibility for state special-education funds. It had based its hopes of avoiding the layoffs on an aid package that it was negotiating with city and state officials.

Governor Cuomo said yesterday that his budget proposal would not include increases in the state's corporate tax, income tax or sales tax, the three taxes that provide most of the state's revenues. At the same time, he warned of program cuts and hinted that more than $800 million in new and increased taxes, fees and other revenue-raising measures would be required to close what he said would be a $1.8 billion budget deficit. Mr. Cuomo said his proposals ''will antagonize and be opposed by all the lobbyists in Albany.'' ''They will all be unhappy with how it touches them,'' he said. The remarks, at a forum sponsored by The New York Post at the Sheraton Centre Hotel, were Mr. Cuomo's first public comments on the budget that he is to send to the Legislature on Tuesday. He declined at the forum to provide new details on what tax increases he would propose and what programs he would ask to be cut.

Paul A. Volcker, chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, said today that the Fed was continuing to push for an economic recovery, but he warned that the threat of future budget deficits could make that job much more difficult. ''The emphasis is clearly on wanting to support recovery while maintaining the progress on inflation,'' Mr. Volcker told the Joint Economic Committee of Congress. ''That's the emphasis in terms of objectives.'' ''I am also acutely aware that the recent gains against inflation have been achieved in a context of serious economic hardship,'' Mr. Volcker added. ''The present state of affairs must not continue.''

For decades, parents in search of a better education for their children have moved from the cities to this suburb. Now the future of the very thing that attracted them, the public school system, is dividing them in a battle over desegregation. In a community so small - 2.7 square miles, 22,000 people, 3,200 pupils - residents find themselves at odds after years of working together in the Little League, school plays and the annual health fair. Even the judge who will rule on the case Friday, V. William DiBuono of State Superior Court, lives in Hillside and once served as Mayor. ''People, white and black, moved here because this was a pretty town, a quiet town, an oasis,'' said John Kulish, a former Mayor and the father of three children in public school. ''But now we are being tested to the nth degree.''