Guns for Pens

HM Queen Silvia with the 2012 Child Jury (http://worldschildrensprize.org/photos)

It’s the child soldier who always makes me cry...this time it was a young boy with a round face and dark, haunting eyes which had seen too much. The boy on the stage could not have been more than fourteen years old, but he had seen his two friends killed and been forced to step over their bodies, on his way to becoming a killing machine. How can we do this – teach children to kill? How can we stand by when children are robbed of their youth, robbed of their right to a childhood – to learn, to play, to live without fear?

It was an ordinary day for Ndale when he left for school that morning. He and his friends were a little late and took a shortcut through the forest where they were captured and forced to march to a camp deeper in the bush. Their clothes were burned and they were dressed in adult uniforms with the legs and arms cut off to fit. Rifles were placed in their hands with the words – “this is your pen now”. It would be three years before Ndale escaped and made his way to BVES, an organisation which rescues children who have been forced to be soldiers in the war-torn D. R. Congo.

Ndale is the newest member on the jury of the World’s Children’s Prize for the Rights of the Child, the largest global organisation which teaches children about democracy and their rights. 27 million children are registered with the organisation which meets annually to honour child rights activists.

When I first attended the awards ceremony in 2008, Bwami was the child solider who brought a lump to my throat and tears to my eyes. He told a similar story and shared his revelation that education was the key to improve his life and the lives of all the other children in similar situations. Now Bwami is 18 and too old to sit on the child jury, but there are many more to take his place...

Overnight Heiress

This morning when I turned on my cell phone, I discovered that I was a millionaire! My cell phone number had been awarded R2,5 MILLION FROM "COCA-COLA PROMOTION 2012". I was instructed to CONTACT MR TIM VIA EMAIL: coca2549@live.co.uk or CALL ON 083 97 30 732 and was to SEND FULL NAME, CELLPHONE AND ADDRESS (all shouting at me in capitals).

I am obviously on a run of good fortune here. Last week I received a very official-looking email telling me that a relative in the UK had died and left me a fortune. In order for me to receive this, I was to email my bank account details to...drum roll...the Deputy Governor of the Reserve Bank. Apparently, for my safety and security only such an important official would be handling this transaction.

Last I heard, I had no relatives in the UK, living or dead. The email had the letters "HSBC" emblazoned down the left side. I read it again, impressed by the professionalism of the scam. And then I spotted it - the hotmail address that I was to send my details to - as far as I know, the government has not resorted to hotmail accounts. 

These are not by any means the only examples of my amazing good fortune, and it is not hard to see how people can be taken in by these con artists. But, remember - if you're not in it, you can't win it! The old folks were right again - you have to work for what you want in life. 

Rondebosch to Khayelitsha

Yesterday I travelled a relatively short distance from Rondebosch to Khayelitsha - it might as well have been on the other side of the world. We were going to one of the schools in the townships, all the way down Lansdowne Road, a familiar landmark on the Cape Flats. We went on and on for 45 minutes or more, leaving behind the tree-lined streets and high walls of the Southern Suburbs.

To start off, the road was pretty good and then gradually became more chaotic – cows were spotted rummaging through garbage on one side of the road, while on the other side, live sheep were for sale. A little further was a big open area where fires were going in drums which had been halved lengthwise, meat on the grill, fragrant smoke billowing into the air.

Here and there patches of green grass with colourful benches and tables hinted at previous attempts to encourage a communal gathering place. Along other stretches of road, shacks threatened to spill over into the road, so close that we could almost see right into their living areas.

Everything could be bought – mattresses piled high next to second-hand furniture, pre-assembled shacks of corrugated iron and wood, haircuts, general groceries and medical care. Streams of school children were making their way home past a billboard warning against the ills of drinking alcohol during pregnancy: “Your child needs a mother, not a dop”. Hooting taxis packed with weary travellers were weaving through traffic. A group of children on the back of a bakkie, passed away the time playing cards.

We attracted stares from curious pedestrians, wondering what our business was. We stopped to ask for directions only to be told to keep going straight ahead. At last we arrived at Chris Hani School where seven young girls were rehearsing for their trip to Sweden to perform in front of HM Queen Silvia. I can’t help thinking that our trip to see them was almost as far as the journey that they will make from Khayelitsha to Sweden!

Not the life and soul

I’m not the life and soul of the party. I don’t know just the right thing to say when at a cocktail party. I envy those who seem to have a store of one-liners which break the ice and start the conversation rolling. I am like a fish out of water, balancing a drink or a canapé in one hand, standing around making small talk. But I am a good listener, and once I get to know you around the dinner table or over a cup of coffee, I can ramble on as well as the next person.

My husband and daughter emit some kind of radar that draws people to them and they engage with ease, beaming in the afterglow of the interaction. People remember meeting them. On the other hand, I am always being told at parent-teacher meetings that my son has much to contribute, but is far too quiet in class, or he could be having more fun if he relaxed and opened up.

As a young boy, my son earned a reputation for himself as being a choosy playmate – teaching me to consult with him before I made any play date arrangements. “I need to rest today,” he would say, “I had a friend yesterday.” I learned to respect that – to give him his space to be by himself. After all, I could identify with that. We are both introverts and don’t need rescuing to come “out of our shells”. We are having fun, just doing it quietly.

At the bookshop last week, I spotted a book on how to make small talk; I picked it up, turned it over, read the back cover, and riffled through the pages. I was tempted to buy it. Maybe I do need to know what to say when introduced to the Prince of this or the President of that – to make a memorable impression. I walked around the aisles with it in my hand before reluctantly putting it back. I knew deep down that this was not something I could learn from a book. But, hey! There must be enough people with the same “problem” for someone to write a book, right?

Sometimes you have to accept the things you cannot change.  But I am free for coffee...