Holding Up the Sky (8 page)

In a heartbeat, I was leaving again. This time I was flying out of the small airport in 'Maritzburg, with Msizi to see me off. The night before, as I sat crying on my bed not knowing where our relationship was going, Msizi reminded me of our ‘no tears' agreement. I had not been able to keep it then, but was determined to appear in control of myself at the airport. When it finally came time to go, he looked at me and said, ‘You'll be back'. I hugged him, knowing that he loved me, knowing I was his first choice and not knowing much else, then left without looking back.

On the plane back to Canada I spent much of the time thinking about the other people I had met in 'Maritzburg: Steve, Gary, Tshidi, Kedrick, Vusi, Fred, Klaus, Big Al, Charlie, many of whom I would not see again. Over the years I heard snippets of news about a few. Gary and Vicky married and Gary took up a parish in Johannesburg. Kedrick went back to Zambia and worked for the Church there. Sadly, Vusi died of AIDS. I also realised how naive and trusting I had been when I arrived, something Msizi enjoyed reminding me of. It turned out that Big Al, one of our real favourites, was not Al at all. Msizi bumped into him on a university campus many years later but he did not answer to his name. He would not be drawn on why he used a false name and what, if anything, we knew about him was true. Things happened during the apartheid years and people had to do what they had to do. Another volunteer at the centre was in fact a police agent. But he was also a young man in trouble and Steve had done everything he could to help him. He disappeared shortly after Steve confronted him about his real identity and we never heard from him again.

On that fight, I realised that you either trusted no one or you put your trust in people until there was cause not to; these were the only two choices. I knew my nature was to believe the best about people and if I lost that, I would lose something intrinsic and valuable. I also knew that staying open meant I would be hurt. The choice I made then was to stay open and take each person at face value–and live with the occasional broken heart.

RETURNING
TO CANADA WAS HARDER THAN I HAD IMAGINED. MANY OF MY FRIENDS FROM THE SUMMER SEMESTERS WERE NOT RETURNING IN AUTUMN. THIS TIME, I HAD TAKEN A ROOM WITH A YOUNG COUPLE WHO LIVED RIGHT NEXT TO CAMPUS—WITH HINDSIGHT, I SUSPECT LIVING ON CAMPUS AMONG OTHER SINGLE STUDENTS WOULD HAVE MADE FOR AN EASIER TIME.

I did make one new close friend, Elaine, with whom I kept in touch for many years. When we weren't in classes, Elaine took me to see the highlights of Toronto, had me over for meals at her parents' house and took me out into the country, generally helping me to feel more at home.

Other than studying and spending time with Elaine and a few of the international students, I marked my time by Msizi's letters. In the top corner of each letter would predictably be: ‘From a place in the heart'. In one letter he wrote: ‘I have now realised how much of me was in you and how much of you was dug deep into my heart. It is painful for me to think of it'.

What struck me from time to time was how he could open himself up so much to a white person of any nationality, given that he had spent his whole life keeping clear of them. It's no small miracle when intimacy develops between two people, but when one represents discrimination and pain to the other it feels like a such delicate thing.

When writing, we were careful not to talk about the future as that was still so unresolved but kept each other up to date on small events and the emotional highs and lows of our current existence. Nevertheless, the undercurrent was clear: a decision was coming that neither of us was going to be ready for. It hung around me as a mist, colouring my days in shades of grey, like the coming winter.

I also exchanged a few letters with Steve. He had decided to go ahead with his plans for the youth organisation, to be called Sizwe Youth, and was busy fundraising with his old contacts back in the UK. He invited me to consider joining the organisation, if the appropriate visas could be arranged. My work visa would need to be processed outside South Africa so he suggested I should apply in Australia and fundraise there while I was waiting for approval. We both hoped that our time in Lawaaikamp would not prejudice the application.

As I finished the semester, the rich colours of autumn faded and winter descended on the beautiful city of Guelph. I had never lived in a city in snow and as the days got colder, I wasn't sure I wanted to. My Australian body was ill-prepared for even the November weather in Canada, let alone full-blown winter.

My flight home took me via Vancouver and I spent a few days exploring the city on my way through. I also found a production of the South African play Bopha by the Earth Players Theatre Company, hosted by the Vancouver East Cultural Centre. The Zulu word bopha means to hold, or in the current context, to detain. The play explored, in the powerfully emerging style of black theatre, the stories of young black people striving for a voice in South African society. The thing that, for me, most captures Africa as her true self is her music. African theatre is full of powerful singing that cascades over you in resonating harmonies, its rhythms transforming your emotions so completely that you feel the joy and sorrow as if they were your own. While in Canada, I had read many of the biographies and books that were banned in South Africa at the time. These stories increased my understanding and further galvanised my commitment–but the music and characters of the play lifted me up so that I felt, for a moment, part of the struggle itself.

My hiatus in Vancouver also allowed me some time to read over my travel diary and refect on the year. It was hard to believe that all my experiences had been squashed into a ten-month period–it felt like years since I had left my parents at Sydney airport. I remembered my naive self walking into Harare airport, imagining the next few months more like a safari than the awakening it was. Growing up in a quiet Sydney suburb and spending my teenage years in the church youth group, the worst I had seen of people was a little vindictive gossiping. Neither I nor my world view were ready for what I experienced in South Africa. Perhaps my response to it was sharpened by the contrast of the two worlds.

One evening, I asked myself whether I would have left Sydney if I'd understood what was to come. In the end, it was a rhetorical question, as at some level I felt that Sydney had not been enough for me, could not engage my passion nor my adolescent ideology and that I had always been looking for something more. What struck me was how different I was to my own brother. Despite our identical upbringings, Jon was still in Sydney focusing all his attention on building what would become a powerful career, only travelling overseas for work or holidays, and struggling to understand why I would not do likewise. He told me many years later that he was proud of what I had done with my life, though I don't think he always understood my motivation.

By the time I left Vancouver to fly home I was confident about the choices I was making. I was looking forward to Christmas with family and to my return to South Africa.

I
DIDN'T REALISE HOW MUCH I HAD MISSED MY PARENTS UNTIL I SAW THEM—MUM WAS HOLDING A 'WELCOME HOME' BALLOON AS SHE EAGERLY SCANNED THE CROWD. I HAD LONG SINCE OVERTAKEN MY MOTHER'S HEIGHT—SHE WAS A RESPECTABLE 160 CENTIMETRES TALL, OR 161, AS SHE WAS QUICK TO POINT OUT. IN THE PAST WHEN WE HUGGED, I TRIED TO TUCK HER HEAD INTO MY SHOULDER AS SHE STOOD ON TIPPY TOES TRYING TO EVADE ME. TODAY, SHE DIDN'T OBJECT AND WE CLUNG TO EACH OTHER AND CRIED AS WE HAD TEN MONTHS BEFORE.

I spent the rest of the day chatting to Mum and Dad, unpacking and just enjoying being home. That night, Msizi phoned and told me he was having a hard time settling back in, now that he was home in Grahamstown himself. He said that he and his mother were arguing a lot, which wounded him terribly. He felt they had both changed over the course of the year and didn't understand each other as well as they had done. I hoped I would not find the same problems awaiting me. Msizi also told me that his friends were ridiculing his feelings for me. They felt he should take what he could get and move on, rather than pining over a future that couldn't exist. The good news was that he had been offered the job with the Council of Churches, to start in February. I suspected he wished it would start straight away, leaving him less time to mull over his feelings.

Once my own initial homecoming flush subsided I also found myself on an emotional roller coaster. I was still waiting for a letter from Steve, formally stating that I was being offered employment with Sizwe, before I could submit my visa application. Then it would take at least three months to process, assuming all went smoothly. I was anxious to get started with the work in South Africa and found the limbo of waiting difficult to manage. Realistically, I couldn't proceed on the assumption that I would get there eventually. If my visa was refused, I would have to change direction completely. I believed I could do anything I set my mind to–so it didn't sit well to know there was nothing I could do to influence the outcome. I had learnt to focus my attention, to work hard for what I wanted, but I had yet to learn patience.

When I was with friends I was happy and distracted, glad to be back with people who had known me for years. But when I was alone my mood would crash and I would sit, brooding with uncertainty. This was my first experience of mild depression, something I would struggle with again in the future.

Msizi's letters and calls, as always, helped me feel connected to the world I had temporarily left behind. Not long after his first phone call, he found some work that kept him busy up until February. I think I gave my father a few grey hairs with the size of our phone bill over that period, but knowing Msizi was happy and settled somehow helped me to find my way out of my own inertia.

Finally, after more than two months of waiting, the letter from Steve arrived and I was able to flle my visa application. Because of the Christmas break it had taken longer than expected to process the legal registration of the organisation. The next period of waiting began then, but at least I felt I was one step closer to my goal. At that point, I decided to begin fundraising for the Sizwe. Steve and I agreed that funding my own salary would be my contribution to the establishment of the organisation but I was confident that, like him, I could also raise seed money to help get the work started. I estimated I would need $150 per month in order to support myself. My local church kindly agreed to put in part of the money and two friends offered to match it. We agreed that I would have funding for the role for the next two years. I was incredibly grateful for their generosity as it meant that any other fundraising I did could go directly to the work. I approached a number of Australian aid agencies and church organisations and managed to raise enough money, once it was converted into South African rands, to make a meaningful contribution. A visual arts company also agreed to produce a promotional video free of charge to help us with our fundraising efforts.

At the end of April, the South African embassy finally issued a visa for me to return. I was excited to be moving on, but very aware that this time I would be gone for years. My fight was booked for early June when Steve felt the organisation, and the property we were to live and work on, would be operational.

During my last two weeks in Australia, I spent all my spare time following my mother around. I wanted to make sure I told her everything I needed to say before distance and phone bills made our conversations short and unfulflling. I reasoned that if we were in each other's company, I could share thoughts as they popped into my head before they were overwhelmed by the long list of things I needed to do. Mum and I had always been close. I had never felt the need to put up a protective wall around myself to keep her out. Mum was always there to listen but never to judge. From time to time this was annoying as she would never tell me what to do even if I wanted her to. She gave me the freedom to live my own life and make my own decisions. At that time in her life she was always on the go, making the most of every minute. She and Dad ran the bookshop together six days a week, she played golf, was widely read and had a broad circle of friends that included her sister and cousins. Despite all this, she somehow made me feel that she always had time for me. I suspect everyone who knew Mum felt that. So, tapping into Mum's unconditional ear in those last weeks was top of my ‘to do' list.

A week before I was due to depart Mum, her best friend Scruffy and I went to see the movie
Beaches
. Mum told us she would use the movie as practice for the airport and not allow herself to cry. True to her word, she remained dry-eyed while Scruffy and I almost had to be carried from the cinema.

Despite her impressive practice run, though, she was a weeping mess in the departure lounge. My father finally managed to drag her away after the third attempted farewell. ‘Now, this time, I'm really going', I assured her–but it was I who kept turning back for one more hug. Mum told me years later that this was the hardest period of her life, as my brother moved to London for work two weeks after I left. Though we were both grown, the loss left her heartbroken. Being so self-absorbed at the time, I hadn't thought about how she might be feeling. So I boarded the plane full of ideas for the future, thrilled about being able to work in my beloved 'Maritzburg again and thrilled at the thought of seeing Msizi.

My parents returned home to find a letter that read: