SINDIWE MAGONA LETTER TO MY YOUNGER SELF Cape Town’s Sindiwe Magona, an accomplished author, playwright and public speaker, looks back on her life and shares some words of encouragement with her impatient younger self. As told to Melanie Farrell oung people always want From house-keeping, to a US university to the UN everything immediately and I was just like everyone else Sindiwe Magona, 72, went from being a she has a full schedule and spends her time when I was young. I wanted a poverty-stricken domestic worker living in writing and doing public speaking. Yhusband and babies… not necessarily in Gugulethu to doing a master’s degree in social Apart from her autobiographical works that order. At 19 I had my first child and work at Columbia University and then on to (To My Children’s Children and Forced to when I was pregnant with my third child, working for the United Nations in New York for Grow), two collections of short stories, two my husband left me. 20 years, mainly in radio. She has an honorary novels (Mother to Mother and Beauty’s Gift, At the age of 23, I was a has-been. doctorate and has received many awards. both adapted for the stage), Sindiwe has I had no money, no matric and no Although Sindiwe retired 15 years ago written more than 100 children’s books. prospects. We forget that life is very long. It’s not just five years or 10 years. It’s bigger than we are. I know of people who will do crazy Queens and other bands I would work was much more exciting than I thought things to get a man back but I was so on my next assignment. I was not going it could be. It was amazing to find I had angry I didn’t even try. It wouldn’t have to allow my son to be forced to become wings. I feel as if I became a real South helped anyway – he had no money. a gardener or my daughters to become African then because I wasn’t confined to I would say to my teenage self: Take it domestic workers. That was my goal. my particular ghetto. I met people from slowly. There’s no rush. You don’t have to My aunt, who was a registered nurse, all over the place. Irrespective of the racial find a husband and have children when was a role model for me. She had qualified classification the government had given you’re young. Hurry slowly. as a nurse and I thought that was huge. them, to me they were human beings, just First grow yourself and be the best I give talks to young people today and I like me. you can be. Then when you enter a say to them: Before you have a baby, build Today I look at other South Africans partnership, stay financially independent. an infrastructure. You need a house, you and I want to say to everyone: “If Marriage shouldn’t be about becoming a need money and you need to be able to your circle of friends hasn’t changed child to your husband – independence is educate and care for your baby. significantly since apartheid then there is very important. Young girls today are having babies to something seriously wrong.” In my culture we love children but get the R300-a-month child grant. Do they To the younger Sindiwe: Don’t hold back, we hate women with children. I knew really think that they can look after a baby make friends, meet, mingle, learn from I was responsible for the state I found properly on R300 a month? Have you seen other cultures. Embrace humanity. The myself in and I decided that the only way the price of nappies? more I discovered about people, the more that I could escape poverty was through I like to tell young people the story of I realised that we are actually all the same. education. the ducks. When ducks want to raise a After my husband left me I educated I hated being poor and unable to family they spend a long time preparing. myself and started to live a more conscious provide for my kids. I found jobs as a There’s courting and building the nest life. One where I could grow myself, look domestic worker and studied for my and sitting on the eggs. When they hatch after me and not spend time on him. matric through Damelin College. there’s the job of feeding them and making I’m a scaredy cat and I managed to make One woman I worked for in Ottery sure the ducklings are safe until they are it, despite apartheid. I think people now asked me to sleep in, although she didn’t old enough to look after themselves. I say have a better chance of success (than I DREAM BIG have a room for me. Just a mattress on the to young people: “I’m sure that your brain did). But you have to have a plan. Nothing garage floor. I didn’t blame her for making is bigger than that of a duck. If a duck can is going to happen if you sit and wait. me sleep on the floor. I blamed myself for prepare for parenthood then surely that’s Poor people stay poor because there’s putting myself in that position and hated the least that you can do!” no planning or dream. A plan, with dates – and go for it the poverty that forced me to go through Every time I got an educational attached, is a sure way to make a dream such situations and accept them. certificate my life improved. After I come true. TBI Sindiwe Magona To my younger self: Dream big, dream finished my matric, I did A-Levels through bold, go for it! Find a life before you find a correspondence and then a BA through • Dr Magona is currently working on a writes a letter to man. Set goals for yourself. Unisa. The amount and types of jobs that I children’s book in collaboration with Nina When I woke up I had a five-year could apply for increased and I could pay Jablonski and Lynn Fellman called Skin We her younger self plan and I stuck to it. When everyone else my rent and send my kids to school. Are In, ‘“a celebration of the evolution of the was at the Community Hall in Gugulethu My world expanded. I mingled with glorious human rainbow in South Africa Photo: Kevin Gray Photo: listening to Mahlathini and the Mahotella people outside of the township and life and beyond’. (David Philip Publishers) 30 | THE BIG ISSUE | 25 SEPTEMBER - 24 OCTOBER 2016 25 SEPTEMBER - 24 OCTOBER 2016 | THE BIG ISSUE | 31.