Socially Savant

I always promised myself that if I was going to share this part of my life I would ask for permission from the people involved in this story to share their lives and that I would be able to dignify their existence while telling this life lesson. I am going to tell you about a family member that we gained in the December of 2004. My stepdad had injured himself after trying to move a big glass mirror off his van in his attempt to show my mom. It was his Christmas present to her. That accident ended tragically and fast forward a few months from that day, the head of the family was laid to rest, a few weeks ahead of what would have been their 7 th wedding anniversary. My mom was a widow with 2 young girls. I was in my Matric year and my sister was in preschool.  I stretched myself between school, a school play, choir and home.  I was stretched but I didn’t care because my biggest worry and hugest life concern was and is my mother. There was a series of health complicatio...

I began this blog in my mind a very long time ago. For me it’s been a real thing. Its lived with me every Sunday. Some Sundays it looks different. It looks decent , it behaves and smiles back at me. But most times I return home and for days I get gripped by how and when it got to me and how did I allow it to get here? Well the best place for Racism to thrive had to be the church. It is in the church where systematic thinking thrived because it became ok through the bible verses to validate Racism and Pastors where not willing to talk about it because money in the church is very important. We would like to think that was left in the 80's but I'm afraid not. I’m about to drag the church and I’m about to drag Pastors and I’m going to use my experiences and I am going to take the brunt for my truth. If you read to the end then congratulations from firstly me and/or secondly the church because I don’t write this with your emotions in mind. Now that I have placed the disclai...

There comes a point when being consumed by everything needs to stop. You find the people around you boring. The family drama draining. That’s when being still needs to happen for you to hear your soul whisper: ‘‘take care of me please. I am starving for attention. I’m hungry for affection’. I turned 26, then 27. Next thing it was 29, now I am 30 (please note how much I’ve been editing this post). In a space of a few weeks prior to my 29 th birthday I was so unhappy with where I was in life. The flat I lived in was cold and dark. It was a true reflection of me and where I was emotionally. I needed it to stop. A friend invited me to an all expenses paid holiday in Cape Town. I grabbed the chance and was on a plane to the beginning of my 29 th year. I had a blast and on that Sunday afternoon friends invited us to climb Lion’s Head an landmark that will test your hiking and climbing abilities. I was there ready to climb this mountain. In my head I thought easy peasy. But littl...

I was tweeting and came across a tweet saying let me write myself a love letter. It was tweeted by one of the formidable women I am following. So after a few tweets I realised that as much as a love letter should and would normally come from a lover, surely the word LOVE is universal so this is for all the lovely woman out there. Not forgetting to say Hloni thank you for the idea. I didn’t write this about one woman I wrote for every woman that will read it. I also wrote it for those who think love can only come for the man you are with. I also write it because I believe someone will rise from this letter and realise they were always designed in love because the one who made them is love. Dear Masterpiece, I LOVE YOU! That’s all that I initially wanted to say however I feel I should say more. After realising I come from a legion of great outstanding woman of the Gatsheni clan who have taught me that Umuntu ngumuntu ngabantu. I have seen a Person in you and I LOVE that pers...

The token of privilege and what it means says that you are given an advantage. An opportunity someone else was dying to have. I understood the words; ‘you are so privileged’ and noting that I was not deserving, throughout my life. I grew up in a beautiful, wealthy suburb called Westville in Durban. I still live there in fact but I live alone and my mom still lives there with my younger sister. A few things have turned for us in the recent years, which I will share in another blog. When I was born mom was a domestic worker. She was a single parent and up till this day I have come to understand mom’s life to be that of single parenting. So she had me and the couple she worked for at the time took it upon themselves to help her raise me the best way possible. This meant I was sent to great schools money could offer. I went for swimming lessons as a toddler and I enjoyed the best experiences when it came to life. I was different compared to family members like my cousins and I...

We never needed more women in industries in fact we never needed to be recognised by others. We what we need is more women to support each other and be happy for each other at any point in time. That saying; ‘not everyone is going to be happy for you’ is commonly said in female circles and not male circles, go figure. Having had a conversation with a friend this morning I felt compelled to write this because it is important we see where we are getting it wrong. We are getting it wrong when we are holding grudges and being jealous towards those who are doing better than us. Holding bitterness and not being strong enough to stand in the sun with a friend and say I will stand with you for your “glory” while I wait for mine. So speaking frankly in this post I would be correct in saying that we don’t do that. We don’t want to stand with another sister while she shines for how many times she shines. I would like to say that many of the lessons we learn we learn from the female f...

Social Media has exposed us to so much society and connected human beings to information like no other era has before, nothing new here. We have managed to get information effortlessly and be informed hours before the News ticker can say “breaking news” on the bottom of our favourite news channel’s screen. But when we saw that Redi Thlabi’s twitter page had been hacked over the weekend some of us sat up and waited for what would unfold as the days went by. Then she launched her much anticipated book Khwezi at Hyde Park Mall. It is said that 700 people had sent their RSVPs but from watching the hashtag #Khwezi on twitter one could be satisfied with fantasising that it was much more than just a book launch. From the front row you could see Dj Fresh (Thato Sikwane) and his wife and other familiar faces of the “South African broadcasting elite”.  However that’s not why this blog is being typed. It’s the emotional yet poised posture in which Redi Thlabi conducted her launch...

Dear black child, you wake up to too much every single day. Do not lose heart. It won’t be like this forever. We are here to reclaim our dignity one ad at a time. Kind regards a fellow black child. This is a short letter to all black people and the future black child. We won’t always have the most disturbing and antagonising adverts, brought on by agencies and creative directors who feel they can do whatever they please in their positions power. Whilst it’s said that Dove has made a distasteful advert apparently it’s not the first time. Six years prior to this advert they had another racist and disgusting advert. Meaning that six years ago we might not have been as “woke” as we are now, since we don’t remember dragging them on Social Media. But I would much rather think we were not as vocal as we are today. We were still in our passive slumber and not willing to unpack racism as we are now. Now we see people writing books and realising albums depicting the very essen...

I would like to formally introduce myself as I will not do it on this platform ever again. Instead I will be enhancing my life. I am a young, bold, enthusiastic woman who enjoys nothing more than to meet other people. I also love to blog, writing is my passion I gauge from previous experiences in life and I share what I can, what I deem plausible for others to know. People watching on social networks and occasionally at coffee shops, is exactly the things that keep me inspired. I value family values and loyalty. I am running my own race. I know that my calling is much greater than I have imagined in my head, and trusting in God I know I will reach my destiny. I pray you are blessed in my sharing. I was raised in the backrooms of the servant courters (essentially 2 rooms) in a very luscious suburb called Westville in Durban South Africa. I was raised by the village being in the form of a church. A church that had people from all walks of life. My influences are therefore, E...