"Hey, white kid." A kid, with a thick zulu accent called out to me as I walked by the playgrounds. I turned my head slightly and a short boy with a clean shaven head and a mischievous grin faced me. He irked me but I could tell he meant trouble and to bother me so I brought my gaze back to the ground and marched awa.
"Umlungu!" He shouted again and I stopped dead in my tracks. I clenched my jaw so hard I swore my teeth would break and the scowl on my face contorted hideously. Seeing he'd affected me, he and his friends began to shake with laughter while pointing at me which made my fists ball and I squeezed them painfully. I slowly raise my gaze and glared directly into the boys eyes with all my rage which just made him laugh harder.
In case you're wondering what that word he shouted was; it means "white kid" or "white man" in zulu. It's used to essentially shame and torment any and all people with just a slightly fair complexion, even if you weren't actually white. It was a heavily racist and weaponised word used in South Africa.
Growing up in South Africa, where Apartheid, which was essentially where white people had sole power in our country. If you weren't white, you were characterised as "black", you were segregated into living and only associating in certain areas of your own race. Indians only stayed in an Indian neighborhood and so on. You couldn't get on a bus with a white person, couldn't walk on the same road as a white person. If you did, youd likely get beaten or end up in jail. Only white people were allowed to vote so this went on until 1994. There was also a history of slavery.
People in mass have a tendency to hold a grudge and something like that, that went on for decades to centuries maybe, I don't know exactly how long because I never paid attention to this stuff, is not easily forgotten. It reflects in the next generation because of the parents who won't let the past rest and project their resentment, discrimination and prejudice to an entire race onto their children and fill them with the same hatred they feel. Amongst other things, children who can't really think for themselves and view the world in a black and white perspective and keep that world view throughout life and practise their hate contribute towards this.
Sure, they're rage is justified and it's expected but there is no justification or logic in continuing a cycle of oppression especially when you know and comprehend what that kind of subjection was. I especially hate the newer generation of black people who think they are entitled to do the same because of the colour of their skin when they weren't even alive to experience Apartheid.
These were things that regularly flowed through my mind at the tender age of eight. I'd developed my own opinion on the situation and I saw the illogical and irrelevant ways of their behaviour.
Growing up in a school of children where you were the only male with a light complexion subjected you to severe discrimination and racism. No one wanted to speak to you and no one wanted to acknowledge you otherwise they'd just have an entire school of seven hundred plus children against you.
Want to know what the wort and most frustrating part of it all was? I wasn't even white. I am bi-racial.
"Say that one more time." I growled through gritted teeth to the boy. I planted one foot forward, tears beginning to accumulate at the lids of my eyes but I refused to let them flow. I could feel every part of my body tensed, ready to pounce as soon as he uttered the word.
Then he said it; "Umlungu", he said with great delight, clearly pleased with himself. The moment he finished forming the word, I had already shot forward. The boy turned on his heel to try and escape but I reacted too fast for him to do anything. I roughly grabbed the collar of his shirt and his momentum in the attempt of trying to run forward caused him to be abruptly stopped and he fell on his arse harshly.
Grabbing the front of his collar with both hands, I roughly shoved his back up against the scarlet brick wall and a wicked delight erupted in me when his head bounced off the wall and he painfully groaned. I then adjusted my grip to be tightly wrapped around his soft, tender throat and I was transfixed by how simple it'd be to squeeze, and squeeze till I eventually snapped his neck. The temptation was overwhelming. It consumed me.
I peered sadistically into the coal black pupils of the boy and I could tell he was petrified which only made me tighten my grip at the thought of what was running through his mind. My gaze fell to his glistening checks and it occurred to me he was crying.
I don't know why but that made me stop. I couldn't go further with anything. I just stared at his tears and an urge to just stop and apologise came over me but I wanted more than anything to bury my fist in his face. To make him feel the way he and countless others had made me feel for the past three years since entering this school. I wanted to make him look as ugly as how everyone depicted me.
But those tears seized any notion of me going through with that.
I released his collar and the boy fell to the ground with a thud before hastily and clumsily climbing to his feet and dashing off.
It occurred to me I was likely to get reprimanded.
