Magoleng wa Selepe
This poem carries though a very similar message to the last blogpost. - The Baptism.
My name: the thing one carries as a sense of identity and a sense of pride. Your life is what is attached to your name, it is something that represents you and who you are to those around you. Without a name you are just human, you're just a body, but with a name... you have depth.
The poem stuck deep to me when reading though this, as I have had my own personal encounter with a similar story.
Let me share this story with you: this is a safe space.
There is a beautiful women that works for my family. She has been around for almost 15 years, if not longer.
She is as close to me as my mother is and as support as my father.
She would arrive every morning at 7:15am sharp. The doorbell would ring and there she would be helping me button up my grade 2 school shirt. pulling up my brown school socks and dusting off my navy blue cardigan.
Eating breakfast, she would always help to pack our school lunches and force us to finish just one more mouth full
one more mouth full and the clock hit 7:45am.
Time to leave for school
Mom came down, thanked her profusely and we jumped into the car and another school week would commence
However, the entire 15 years of knowing this brave and empowering woman, not once did she utter the to me as a child that her name was Tandi. Because she me, she was Sylvia.
Sylvia, a name that she no doubt chose for herself, as she filled in her application forms for work in the white suburbs of South Africa.
It makes me feel ashamed that as she was getting up at 4am to get ready for 5am to catch the taxi at 5:30am to be able to take the train at 6am so thats she would be able to wash my sleep out of my eyes with a lukewarm face towel before school. Her children had to dress themselves, and for 15 years, she was Sylvia, not Tandi, Sylvia..
I know who Sylvia is, but who is Tandi?
This poem helped me to remember that each person has a name sacred to them and to who the are. This needs to be respected at all times.
My name: the thing one carries as a sense of identity and a sense of pride. Your life is what is attached to your name, it is something that represents you and who you are to those around you. Without a name you are just human, you're just a body, but with a name... you have depth.
The poem stuck deep to me when reading though this, as I have had my own personal encounter with a similar story.
Let me share this story with you: this is a safe space.
There is a beautiful women that works for my family. She has been around for almost 15 years, if not longer.
She is as close to me as my mother is and as support as my father.
She would arrive every morning at 7:15am sharp. The doorbell would ring and there she would be helping me button up my grade 2 school shirt. pulling up my brown school socks and dusting off my navy blue cardigan.
Eating breakfast, she would always help to pack our school lunches and force us to finish just one more mouth full
one more mouth full and the clock hit 7:45am.
Time to leave for school
Mom came down, thanked her profusely and we jumped into the car and another school week would commence
However, the entire 15 years of knowing this brave and empowering woman, not once did she utter the to me as a child that her name was Tandi. Because she me, she was Sylvia.
Sylvia, a name that she no doubt chose for herself, as she filled in her application forms for work in the white suburbs of South Africa.
It makes me feel ashamed that as she was getting up at 4am to get ready for 5am to catch the taxi at 5:30am to be able to take the train at 6am so thats she would be able to wash my sleep out of my eyes with a lukewarm face towel before school. Her children had to dress themselves, and for 15 years, she was Sylvia, not Tandi, Sylvia..
I know who Sylvia is, but who is Tandi?
This poem helped me to remember that each person has a name sacred to them and to who the are. This needs to be respected at all times.
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