Touchy tips and toes- A look inside of me.

I have problems with my physical self. Do not misunderstand this. I am not taking about my weight. I think my perception of my weight is pretty ok in that I am not illusioned to thinking mine is ideal but looking in the mirror does not traumatise me. In fact I often get distracted and linger to admire.

I am taking about my body in its completeness. Movement. The ability to manipulate my movement and persuade the air around me. To adorn the space. I am mad that I cannot adorn the space.

I laugh at myself sometimes, I tend to take myself too seriously. But humor me for now.

Until quite recently I have been far too flexible for my size or age. I noticed. I like to stretch and stuff. I think I  could've made a great dancer, if I had started early. I still dream about it. In my head I dance. I get upset about it so I usually opt not to think about it at all. How my body has become dumb. Do you believe in physical intelligence? I do.

When I was about 6 I fell in love with ballet and ice skating and gymnastics. I once saw ice skating during the  Olympics and my eyes were glued to the screen every time I came across it on TV.

When I was in grade two I started going to what was considered a "white " school and became one of the few black children there. In my class , Vuyiswa and I were the only two black girls. I found out that the school offered ballet and gymnastics. All the girls in my class took either ballet or gymnastics or both, even Vuyiswa. I asked my parents if I could join the classes but after finding out that I had to pay extra for it, my dad told me we could not afford it. My heart was broken. Its so silly being a child because despite my broken heart I would go watch them after school, everyday peeking through the glass door admiring their elegant little pink tutus, wishing I was in there too. Dreaming that someday soon my father would say it was ok now and that I could join the class. Hoping. Ducking from their instructor so she wouldn't see me and tell me to go away, I would quietly cheer them on. I would ask them about it afterwards.

I think for a long time I have been mad at my father for not paying for those lessons because, that wasn't the only thing he couldn't afford . After a while as my English improved I found out there was music lessons and swimming lessons too. Dad said he had no money so I couldn't take piano lessons or guitar lessons like my friends did. I took the swimming lessons because those were free and after drowning and chocking for four years, I finally cracked freestyle in grade 6. Practiced twice a week for an hour, no other swimming pool access besides school and I was competing by grade 7, however without winning. 

I made the most of what I had but I never got what I wanted. This sounds dangerously too close to my life right now. I am now aware that my father was the sole breadwinner in a family with four kids while funding his own university fees and balancing that with a job and other duties at the same time. It was a luxury we couldn't afford.

When I was 20, doing second year at University, studying Drama and Music (does this seem natural to you? ) one of my lecturers started a ballet class for adults. I went to the first lesson. When I got back at my dorm that afternoon I cried and cried and cried and then never went back to that class again. It was too painful. Physically not as painful as the girls were complaining about. Just painful in my heart, deep down. How do you start ballet 13 years late? It amazed me as we grew up a lot of the girls dropped ballet, one by one, dropping gymnastics. I was appalled actually. My best friend dropped karate just after she became a blue belt in grade 6, I didn't understand why or how people just quit.

I learned how to quit, however. Im not so proud of it anymore. In high school I joined netball and I quit. I joined tennis and I quit. I joined basketball and I quit. I joined squash and soccer and athletics and cross-country and I quit them all! I joined field hockey and my father made me quit claiming that the sport was too rough for girls. Eventually as it took a toll on my permed hair plus I was getting strange migraines after practise, I quit swimming. In my matric year I quit debating too. My teacher got so mad she didn't speak to me for a month so I wrote an apology letter and went back. I didn't want to be there though. It felt good not to be tied to anything, not to be committed. To have choice, the litte that I had. Besides, neither of it was what I really wanted. The one art class I took after school was cancelled because I was the only student there and the teacher was not staying extra hours for just one student. I joined the Art Club instead and painted a huge portrait of a woman outside the art room. It was a copy of Jeanne Hebuterne I  by Amedeo Modigliani.

In university I picked up keyboard studies as an extra subject and I was thrilled at it! I was the second  best in my class. None of us were previously trained. However by third year I had too much work and already taking English as an extra subject, I had neither the time nor the money to take it so I dropped the class. Once again my funny budget defied ny dreams.

Since then I think I gave up on my physical art. My dancing, my singing, my music, performing my poetry. Yet its not dead within me. I have a friend who dances and choreographs and she started at 20. Every time I see her on stage I want to cry. She is so naturally aware of her physical self and beautiful at expressing it! I'm blessed to have friends like these. I have a friend who recites  and sings and raps and chants like she was sent to wake me. I have friends attached to their instruments like they were limbs. It is through these people that I realise myself now.

And maybe someday soon I will find my presence. 

Music that gets me through rough days

My relationship with music has been a whirlwind of falling in love, suffering for it, being ridiculed to a point of persecution for it, abandoning it, taking it back, nurture, neglect, using it and then now a space that I call rediscovering it. It's a difficult journey and an emotional one for me because this part of my life is very personal and if you haven't noticed, my passion for music is a bit obsessive.

Here in rediscovering the power of music to my being I have found certain songs that get me through rough days when I am depressed or stressed or feel like I'm going to lose my mind.

3.  Can't give up now- Mary Mary (Thankful)

When days are dark, what better way to remind me where my strenth is than this song? I know a lot of people who use  this song to reboot and gain strength. There's something about repeating the same phrase over and over when your senses have been numbed and dulled by exhaustion that seems to draw from your depths within certain memories and bring them to the surface to move you once again. That is what the chorus of this song does to me. It is the highlight and the prominent part of the song and for a good purpose. It's kind of like supplication. Repetitive for a reason, purging pain in the process.

2. Song for Turqois- Lexikon ( Sketches in the Mind)

I am so greatful to know Lexikon in my life. She has the ability to word my thoughts so beautifully because I often fail to express my innermost feelings. I've also learned an awful lot from her. This song is from her first album and is dedicated to her daughter but resonates with my being so much. Being away from home it grounds me and reminds me who I am always. It reminds me of my purpose. Reminds me of the invaluable knowledge that I have aquired back home from my parents and people who's match I am yet to find anywhere else. I don't envy other people. I now understand why so many people want a piece of Africa. I carry all those pieces inside me. Inside my head.

1. Nkwenkwezi- Simphiwe Dana (Kulture Noir)

As if a follow up, completing what Song for Turquis brings to my psyche, this song is like a guide giving me direction. It maps the way forward. It also envokes in me stong memories of my beloved Konke and other people that have passed in my life. It gives me hope. It is commemorative. I hope to sing it one day and I can only think of one cousin of mine right now who could match  it with  the emotion I need for it in a duet. In fact I love the whole Kulture Noir album because I think its such a spiritual one and Simphiwe Dana shares so much of herself in it. One of the other tracks on there that I listen to repeatedly is Mayine because I overstand it too. I can only hope to be such an excellent composer one day.

Things that make it worthwhile

I've just come out of burnout phase of culture shock and I'm feeling lighter and more positive about things. Being the only one of my kind as far as I've reached around me can be tough sometimes. My kind being, a black South African girl and I'll go as far as saying Nguni South African girl as my Sotho counterparts tend to stick to themselves as far as I've experienced and I'm not one to pine for attention. The closest I've come to speaking any Nguni language was speaking  Xhosa with a Tswana lady from Botswana that I met at a JICA seminar. She was a much needed breath of air for me.

Anyways, after unpacking from my Taiwan trip I needed to get out so I called a friend and she chose the location. She took me to a wonderful bar, not too far from where I live but forgot to mention I should dress up. No worries though, I wasn't too shabby and I had makeup on (a rarity for me).  The barman was absolutely fabulous. A few days later I find out that he's actually well known all over the country and that the bar we went to is pretty upmarket and popular. That must've all been lost in translation when my friend just told me we were going to a nice bar...

I'm in love with my barman. The one at the place I usually go to. It's the music you see, all that wonderful music that keeps me coming back! Jazz, swing, funk, soul, neo-soul. He has it! I found out recently that he actually spent a few of his younger years travelling the world as a DJ. Im beggining to introduce him to some South African jazz. He's shown me pictures of himself with some other African artists.

I guess this weekend I was reminded why I came here in the first place. I came here to meet people. I think I had forgotten about that. I have a friend who has moved to the States and he said to me that going back home will never be the same again because I will miss the convenience of being in a first world country. That word bothered me a lot and still does. I have no illusions about that although he's talking like I come from the sticks. I know I will miss some conveniences about here but jeepers that's not why I came here. So I guess I feel a bit offended. I told him my heart belongs to the people I left back home.

And I have met people. Wonderful people! As I will continue to meet more. One of my friends called me on Monday evening and we went for drinks. She says I shouldn't feel pressured to go out with her if I don't want to during the week but I don't think she realized that I just missed her. Most of my Japanese friends are much older than I am. I don't know why but they make good conversation.
She says to me that her mother is fond of me. I met her mom and her aunt once. Despite the language barrier I think we had good gesture and eye-contact conversation. We had dinner once (at my favorite bar, once again). Actually my friend introduced me to that place.

I've never believed that verbal conversation is the be it and end all of communication and I'm learning the truth of that while my Japanese skills are still very poor. I find it weird when she says that usually when she speaks to English speakers, they don't understand her. I find her quite clear, despite the bad grammar. And we talk. A lot. It's wonderful. She says she enjoys speaking with me because I understand her and now she can practice the English she knows. I'm flattered. I enjoy having a friend to decipher the menu. I'm kidding, she teaches me a lot about what it is to be Japanese and Okinawan.

I bumped into some students at the beach on Sunday. The boys are just wonderful  crazy teenagers and I really wish I could communicate with them more. We tried to talk. The conversation was  filled with smiles and awkward shrugs from both ends. Now I know they know more English than what they let on but alas, the nerves! Bless them.
On my way to the carpark I bumped into some girls. Shrieks of excitement and hellos and pictures and questions about who I'm here with and all the English they can think of. I love my girls, always making the day seem brighter! Their energy is amazing and I hope I can express that in Japanese some day. But I was by myself and the trip was a meditational one. I just said "sunset " and everybody seemed to understand.

My supervisor helped me transfer some money home this week. We had a long chat where I told her about where I come from and why this is important to me. We had a heart to heart and I found in her  an attentive, kind woman who has many of the same oppinions as I. Whoever thought people could bond over a trip to the post office?

So its these things that I came here for. There's a lot more but this is an important one. When I begin to see God in the actions and words of people. The love in the care we all understand regardless of race, gender, religion, background, economic status or even language. This aspect of my journey here is clear and reminding myself of it makes it easier to get through the rough days.

A fish out of water

Sometimes though, being a fish out of water while you want to feel the sand and taste the air. Can't help but bite the dust every now and then. Flip turned upside down, tossed inside out. It's not the nature of the fish but the spirit of adventure that lives within it. After all, you're a fish out of water and back in the sea you will appreciate the coral more, maybe even the sharks. Back there you will have stories to tell. No longer just a big fish in a small pond but perhaps a fish once dried and a fish once survived.

Over the sunset by the sea

Dressed for the serenity of the sea, I'm doing me. Inside out, pacificity displayed like a prayer in meditative pose out there on the edge of the waters. We are connecting , ocean an me. Like natural lovers wooing each other, she sighs and I humor her, she roars and I turn away. We're like children, easily excited. She splashes, I splash and then she envelops me. Selfishly. Hugging me. Smothering me. It should be hard to breathe but honestly I want to be there, choking as if she has me. Really I'm just flattered she loves me so much, after all we came from the same source. Im just as dangerous as she, drawing people in selfishly to envelop them and suffocate them with my love. It only takes a toe in the waters, next thing you're so excited you're being swept away and life will never be the same again without that water. A thirst quenched by an endless source of water that only leaves you thirstier you can't help but wonder why you ever tried it and if you would've ever experienced happiness had you never gone there. Gone that far. 

I love you Ocean. Now try not to hurt me.