Noble Intentions

NOBLE INTENTIONS

A novel by

Minenhle Mbuso Nene

Copyright © Minenhle Mbuso Nene

Smashwords Edition 2013

Print edition available from

Quickfox Publishing

Editor: Frederick de Jager

Cover designer: Vanessa Wilson

Acknowledgements

I thank my wife, Ntefeleng Nene, for believing in the idea to write Vuma’s story; my mother, D. Z. Nene for having imparted her literary wisdom to me; and my daughters, Zamathenjwa and Sibahle for having allowed me to write instead of play with them.

Chapter 1 Every Parent’s Dream

It was a rather cold day in winter, but people were celebrating. On this Saturday in May, nobody seemed to feel the cold because of the vivacious mood! The hall had been full to capacity since ten in the morning. People were coming in and going out of the main hall, but it remained full irrespective of this fact. You could hear people ululating half a kilometer away, tempting outsiders, with no clue of what’s happening inside, to come closer to witness the source of all the excitement. Mothers and even old grannies made the most noise, cheering. Unfortunately, the security personnel made sure that only people with invitation tickets had access to the hall. If you were one of those that didn’t have proper entrance tickets, then, to get a sense of what was going on inside, you had to peep through the window.

Of course, it was a big day; Vuma was graduating with his Bachelor of Paedagogics degree – a qualification that took him straight to those naughty learners, to a school called Newlands Heights Secondary School, 19 km north of Durban. Vuma’s mother, Dudu, was heard saying wadla bheseni, wadla ungasaqali, siyakubongela Jobe ka Matshana omuhle, praising her only son for his achievements – and everyone who knew the young graduate did the same without any dubiety. Without forgetting the fact that there were many deserving others graduating, being called on stage, and following one another very closely to receive their certificates, when Vuma’s name was called people cheered the most. Vuma Sithole’s popularity with both fellow students and lecturers was immense; fourteen distinctions, after all, was the highest number called on that day.

Vuma would soon be teaching in a school outside Durban, after being recruited by a principal who knew his results from the previous year. He himself attended Vuma’s graduation ceremony. Mathematics and physical science teachers are scarce in South African schools, and Vuma did not only excel in those two major subjects, but he was also very good with life skills in general. Everyone who knew him seemed to know he was going to make a very good teacher. The principal, Mr. Ravi, was in attendance because Vuma had impressed the whole school – from the Principal himself and the other teachers to the learners – when he did his teaching practice at that very school. He was liked by almost everyone at the school because of his sense of humour (apart from being naturally intelligent). Those who did not like him were considered jealous, or thought to be pursuing witchcraft, maybe. Vuma was gentle, and humble and was liked by most girls at varsity, though he chose to focus more on his studies than on chasing after girls – like many of his buddies did. Even Elmina who was known to have been ‘saved’ had to put her ‘born-again philosophy’ aside; she too was gunning for Vuma, in vain.

Elmina reminded him a lot of the many other born-again ladies at the university where he studied. There was one born-again lady who was very popular because of her principled and holy behaviour. Sarah was a role model for other girls: well mannered, humble, polite, good-hearted, and as beautiful as one could find on campus. She didn’t have a boyfriend since she was born-again, and maybe, more so, because she would from time to time testify when guys began to pursue her. Sleeping with a boyfriend, in particular, was perceived to be against Christian beliefs. There was this strong message that was engraved on all the born-agains’ brains: sex before marriage is prohibited. And, they all seemed to abide by that imperative and emphasized that view when guys decided to chase after them. As human beings, most of those born-agains would trip and fall, as they would fall pregnant – and this, when everyone thought they were not ‘getting it’. But the born-agains would pick themselves up and continue with life as born-agains; however, this time around, with a little bit more consideration for other people’s ‘unholy lives’ –as they have done what ordinary humans have also done. Sarah’s predicament was even worse as she took off with her best friend’s husband-to-be to Cape Town, where they immediately married! Those who knew better said that Sarah’s stolen husband had also converted, and was now a born-again and they were happily married.

Vuma’s mother had organized a little something for him at his home in KwaMashu that evening, and it was not surprising…the guy really deserved it. All his cronies were there that night. They seemed to have started enjoying themselves since earlier in the day, showering in brandy and whisky until very late that night. His other friends were themselves partying in their respective homes as they also graduated that Saturday. The music was loud and it was easy to recognise the faces of some girls from varsity, the ones who would not miss a bash for anything. Only God knows who gave them directions to Vuma’s place, as they came in their own car. They made the party alive. Being already tipsy, all they could do was dance – sort of.

A lot of people attended Vuma’s party and, interestingly (for him), others came very late – the ones who got lost along the way. They were very lucky to have escaped being mugged, or something worse, that night. One wondered how all those people would be transported back to wherever they came from; only three cars were parked outside Vuma’s yard. One car belonged to those varsity girls and the other one belonged to the guy who was hired to play music and nobody seemed to know who the driver was of the last car. It was suspected that it was driven by one of the crew that nobody recognized; the kind of crew that is believed to be from another neighbouring section of a township, who will hear music playing loudly and drive towards the music and then make themselves comfortable – without having to be known by anyone. The prudent thing to do under those circumstances is to provide them with meat and drinks, if there is a surplus, otherwise they will be very quick to spoil everything. The upside is that if you treat them well, they will remember you, and protect you and your family from other common criminals, as they keep a database of all the township’s criminals in their heads.

After ‘Bra Vuma’, as they had later called him, had given them some meat, they drew their own bottle of brandy and drank quietly, only talking amongst themselves and not bothering those loud girls from varsity. It all made sense when they started crushing their marijuana and, even then, they were very respectful towards Vuma’s family, going outside to burn their thing. Maybe it is true that the ones who smoke do not see eye to eye with chicks. One varsity boy claimed that he had overheard one of them saying, whilst crushing his weed, he would only talk to the ladies the following day, when sober, without realizing that the girls would be long gone. One of the ‘Omabhiza’ members, as they were later called, was believed to have said, hhayi suka bolova, sheyizelani labo nondindwa, suggesting that the guys should just leave ‘those bitches’ alone. After having finished their bottle of brandy, they left quietly whilst the music played on.

Most of the guys had to sleep at Vuma’s. Unfortunately for Vuma, he had his own back room instantly occupied by about nine guys. As for the girls, one of them, who did not drink, managed to drive off in the early hours of the morning. It could be assumed that they arrived safely, wherever they went to. Other people, who were part of the party, simply vanished into space, like steam leaving water. Fortunately for Vuma, no reports came in of anything bad having happened to the people who attended his party.

When the sun rose, anyone could have deduced that there was a big bash at Vuma’s; a lot of empties from ciders and beers lay all over the place. Within a few minutes, all the trash had perished with the assistance of the guys that slept over at Vuma’s – though they were all complaining about terrible babalas. Vuma was very generous to give them the previous day’s left-over meat. They then contributed a few pennies and managed a case of cold beer from a neighbouring joint. After some minutes one of them sighed loudly as he had been healed from the terrible babalas.

After all the excitement had subsided, another new year was starting and the schools were about to be re-opened. Vuma was gearing himself up for his work as a teacher at Newlands Heights Secondary School. During the very first day of schooling, Vuma would normally gather his learners together and prepare them for another long, but surely successful, year. He had different approaches to teaching; he was a recently graduated teacher, compared to those who would boast of having taught for more than two decades! He would start his day by engaging learners on some general social- or life-skill … that would end up taking the whole day. This session included, amongst other things, the following: learners shared their experiences about social activities during the festive season, challenges they had faced, and how they had surmounted those challenges and lessons – learned from those activities. They would also talk about how they had been useful at their respective homes in helping their parents with a variety of activities, like fixing a door handle, a kettle, a falling rooftop, a detached wardrobe door, and other general household chores. Obviously, there would be those few learners who would not be that useful in the exercise, like this one boy who boldly claimed that he had assisted his father in finishing his bottle of brandy over Christmas.

He would then ask learners to identify skills and knowledge, acquired during their previous year of schooling, which they had applied in solving some of those challenges. These included using science and technology skills, and knowledge about science and technology, to solve everyday problems within their communities. Vuma would then reflect on what the learners would say as a basis for his ensuing lessons, linking learners’ previous grades to their current ones. By the time learners attended their second school day, they would be highly motivated because they would have already started to realize the benefits of their hard work and of schooling.

Contrary to Vuma’s approach which had been adopted by other fairly young teachers, who were willing to learn, was the approach of teaching right from the first day of a school calendar, adopted by the old crocks – claiming, and boasting, to be very effective in their pedagogy. At the end of the day, raw content never cut it for the learners who had been exposed to outcomes based models of teaching. The best thing the die-hard teachers could do was to mourn and bemoan the fact that they were no longer able to exert corporal punishment to those learners who ‘lacked respect’, since it was outlawed. Fair enough, Vuma himself, when talking with his colleagues, would testify that schools were safer when he was a learner than they were today. In those days, bringing a knife to school was a punishable offence and the offender would receive not less than ten strokes on his bum, and that was probably why, he contended, one would hardly hear about a learner who stabbed a fellow learner to death. Nowadays stabbing is also for teachers, a taboo previously, so they have to guard against being lunged at – instead of worrying about getting learners educated.

In the same breath, Vuma acknowledged the fact that some of the offences didn’t really warrant a hiding, like being beaten up for having arrived late at school no matter what the explanation. The reality of the old system was that learners would be beaten for every little bit of senseless behaviour, like smiling or talking while the teacher was teaching – no matter how valid the point was that a learner wanted to make. Back in those days, no learner was allowed to disturb a teacher by asking a ‘silly’ question, seeking some clarity, whilst the teacher was busy explaining, ‘to the rest of the class’. Some teachers would not even teach; they’d simply read from their book and instruct learners to take notes, as having a book was a luxury in those days. A learner would even be asked to memorize an Afrikaans poem, so that it could be recited the next day. And if they struggled to do so, they’d get a hiding. But those who manage to recite it word for word were safe; and they would have been praised for being ultra-clever. Whether one understood what the poem meant was another story altogether. Even Vuma contends that he still recalls lines of an Afrikaans poem, of which, still today, he doesn’t know the meaning. This is mainly because he had no passion for Afrikaans as a subject, and pursuing it beyond high school was not an option.

In juxtaposing the old with the new schooling system, it’s learned that there are advantages and disadvantages in both. The critical merit of the old system was that a teacher would have taught freely, without fear of intimidation; which is a ‘demerit’ in the new system. Now, teachers teach learners that carry not only knives but guns to school, and they are expected to share their pure knowledge with these very same corrupt rogues. Apart from weapons, the same learners would be high on drugs, as woonga and dagga were everyday snacks. Learners would go for lunch break and come back smelling sweetly of dagga. The poor teacher was expected to teach those learners successfully. The old system encouraged rote learning which disempowered learners in that they could not think out of the box. Most teachers didn’t bother to explain how they arrived at a particular answer because it was assumed that when using a defined formula or principle one would always arrive at the correct answer. But though the old system might now seem flawed, the new outcomes based education (OBE) model also has its own demerits; it takes longer to teach one theme in an OBE method because all learners have to be involved at every step of the way.

Today, learners are very difficult to control in a classroom and Vuma recalls a time when learners were swearing at each other while he was teaching and that that behaviour seemed normal to them, then. He had to pretend as if he didn’t hear expletives, only reprimanding those who were unbearably noisy. When he asked one girl not to chew gum whilst he was teaching, another girl said quite literally, as if without being aware of the shame she should’ve felt, You are right, Sir, gum is the bitch’s meat. Oh the old days…when an educator would not have to suffer slang. But no matter how difficult it was to control unruly learners, Vuma would always find a way to bring order to a classroom – and most teachers did not understand how he managed to do that.

Chapter 2 The meeting place

The university year used to start early in January to accommodate those who were writing supplementary examinations and first-time entrants, the amafresha as they were normally called. Vuma was one of the many students around at that time, because he was selected to be part of the new entry students’ orientation programme. At this time of year, most people would be missing from campus; but some of those who had no roles to play, especially gents, would then find themselves roaming varsity streets in search of potential relationships with amafresha. That was how most of the guys found girlfriends at the time. Unfortunately for many, those relationships would not last, for amafresha would nearly always realize that they had made a mistake by getting involved with some guy; especially when they saw the wide range of choice as the year progressed. But on the very same note, some guys were very lucky to retain such relationships.

Vuma was one of the lucky ones that year; although he was liked by a lot of girls at varsity, he preferred one new-entry. Vuma was in his third year when he met his lover, who was enrolling for her first-year Bachelor of Commerce degree. As the year progressed their love grew stronger and most of the guys only realized then that Sindi Mkhize was actually full of beauty. When she arrived at varsity, many guys thought she looked like a typical farm girl, with no style. All the beauty, though, was hidden – under long dresses, a strange hairstyle that resembled an ‘alien animal’, and a long zebra jacket, which she wore almost daily. Hence, the guys called her ‘Idube elimthente’, which refers to a zebra. It took just three months for Sindi to transform her looks. Her friends influenced her to look like a modern township girl! And that is when guys started to go after her but, unfortunately for them, Sindi loved Vuma. Although she might have changed her looks, her inner self remained the same – she was well grounded, focused, and very respectful.

As days went by, Vuma’s relationship with Sindi became stronger and stronger, resulting in an early pregnancy during her second year. Although she didn’t know how to present her situation and her story to her parents, she had Vuma’s full support. He could be seen accompanying her to every place imaginable, including her lectures. It was almost normal at varsity to see a lot of young ladies falling pregnant; one would have thought that getting pregnant was linked to winning the lotto or something. There was this naughty guy who said to a pregnant student that lecturers should have taught her a core module on HIV/AIDS, which would have included lessons on how to use a condom. She was very angry as she didn’t understand why this guy chose her to pick on, for there were a number of pregnant ladies around. Pregnancy was almost a fashion statement during those days; some would even show their big tummies for the rest of the university to see.

Sindi was very lucky not to have one of those extra-sized tummies. Most people didn’t even know that she was pregnant until they were told by someone who was close to her. Even to this day, no one knows how Sindi explained her pregnancy to her parents because her parents believed in traditional values and they were very religious – as a woman who knew Sindi’s home-life testified. Obviously they believed in the concept ‘no sex before marriage’. Sindi’s father could be heard saying, uziphathe kahle ntombi yami, asking Sindi to take good care of herself. Sindi’s father didn’t forget to mention this a number of times, specifically when waving his hand on leaving her campus after a visit.

Sindi’s academic programme was fortunately not disturbed because she gave birth to a baby girl in January, before the academic year started. She was only seen in March, attending lectures as if she had never fallen pregnant. Vuma was very happy about the fact that Sindi gave birth to a baby girl, because he always wished to have a girl when he finally started a family of his own. Although it can be said that he didn’t anticipate having a baby that soon. They decided to name their baby girl Zamajobe, as ‘Jobe’ is the clan name for ‘Sithole’, Vuma’s family name. So the name Zamajobe proudly announced the beginning of the family that Vuma had always wanted.

His family was very happy that he had had