I stopped by the traffic
light as it turned red. I saw on the sidewalk a young boy. He wore a torn,
checkered shirt; the black shiny grit on it suggested that it hadn’t been
washed in a while. The short pants he had weren’t any better. His buttocks
protruded from his backside, garnishing the holes on his pants. Dust clung to
his long, stick-like legs and cracks covered his hard feet. He tapped on my
window and as I opened it, in a cracked voice, through dry lips, he muttered: “Uncle,
may I have R5 to buy some food?” The breath from his mouth was, at the least,
repulsive. He smelled of the streets on which he lived: dry, rotten and ugly.
His appearance was the personification of his surroundings. As he spoke to me I
put on as best I could a pretentious smile, feigning welcome, and yet betrayed
by my eyes which held him in judgmental disdain. I looked at him and saw
nothing more than a delicate frame, enfleshed with mere scrapings of meat
embedded onto a shaky skeleton. Something about the way he stood spoke of his
tiredness no less than his great sadness. His body spoke of a weariness that
embraced him and cut deep to his very soul. I looked at his feet. Those cracked
feet told the story of a boy who has been through a lot.
They speak of the distant roads on which they had to walk, comfortable in shoes
at first, which sooner than later had to be traded for food. They speak of
gravel roads and spiky stones. They speak of bush paths and foot trails. They
speak of long, winding, hot tar roads. They speak of hiking days and cold dark
nights under starless skies. They speak of momentary relief in the back of a
truck. They speak of dangers they had to flee from and dark, terrifying alleys
in big city streets. They speak of suffering, hurt and pain. They speak of a
journey in which a boy became a man. They speak of a journey they wish they
never had to take. They speak of all the things his eyes have seen.
I looked right into his bloodshot eyes and knew that the story of his feet was
true. I saw in his eyes the pain that lay deep within. I saw the sleepless
nights and the tears shed. I saw the land in which a son became an orphan and
parents became a memory. I saw the fear within a boy as he crouched in hiding,
afraid of the iron hand that crushed his squatter camp home. I saw the devils
that razed his home and the inferno that gobbled it up as they ‘cleaned up the
city’ and ‘took out the trash’. I saw his home burn and I saw him defeated and
crushed; then I saw him cry his heart out. I saw him like at birth, pulled from
his hiding place and shoved into a truck. I saw him in a reserve, sleeping in
government tents with twenty other people. I saw hundred of tents with
thousands of people. I saw soldiers bully him and I saw him hungry and in pain.
I saw him run and run, tears in his eyes, pain in his heart, nothing in his
mind and no future in his sight. I looked into his eyes and tears flowed out of
mine. The light turned green, I rolled up my window and drove away. I left him
standing there: open hand, cracked feet and blood shot eyes. (Scholastic Bro. John
Nhlanhla MHLANGA in Networking Cedara,
February 21-27, 2011)
