Church Chronicles: Part 2

One: A Good Deal

My parents were pastors at a methodist church, back home in Stutterheim so it was understandable that they were excited when I told them that I had found a church to fellowship at during my student years in East London, at least I wouldn't have to go home every other weekend.

My father was very strict and had a dark unpredictable side to him that I doubted people knew. When I was young, he left us. Us being mom, my sister and I. Three years after he left my sister got sick, and no we tried all we could to take her to doctors and hospitals but she gave up a year later and we buried her, utata engekabuyi. I later found out that because of the situation at home, and maybe peer pressure, she had gone into prostitution. I was always quizzical about how she got her money because we never lacked. Right after dad left, it took her a year to carry the family on her shoulders. Whenever money was needed eskolweni either for camps or civies, she would promise me that I'd partake and she would deliver on that promise, I just wasn't aware that she was selling her body to carry us and I only found out about that after her death. That hurt, that hurt so much and it didn't help that my mother was an introvert who didn't see a reason to have sex-talks and any other talk in fact with us.

I remember how the people in our community gossiped about my sister, and how we were doomed to die of hunger because umama wasn't working, she was a hawker but her daughter's death hit her so hard that she also fell sick and I had to man up.

"U Nopinki kaloku ebethengisa ngomzimba, I wonder bazothini ebhubhile nje,"

One woman said to her three friends at the taxi rank, I was right behind them but they were too busy to recognize me.

"Hayi Siziwe suxoka, kuthwa nje ebeklina kweza hotele zase Monti" the other answered.

"Hotele? Hay suka wethu, wena xa umjongile u Nopinki ebeyindidi yophangela ehotele?"

"Iyucu iyucu lakwabani... Phofu ke uyise wabo naaankuya ekhethe uyokuhlalisana eKokstad ebashiya bezimbhacu zase Angola apha"

"Akanantloni ke u Ngqoloba, yintoni le ayenzayo imbi kanje? Akasabuyi kengoku nangoku sekubhubhe intombi yakhe?"

"Uzobuyela phi? Kulentsokolo uyibonayo nawe ibhalwe kula heke uzigqithela? Hay wethu khaniyeke u Ngqoloba onwabe,"

That day, I went to the Pakistani in our area and asked for a job, he said I could work on weekends and he'd pay me with groceries, which was cool. So my weekends were booked, I then hustled for an everyday job to do after school but that was a struggle, so instead of working weekends at the Pakistan shop, I worked weekdays, and then on weekends I would put up my mom's fruit and veg stand. That was me, aged eleven up until I was seventeen.

That's when my father decided to come back home, and what angered me the most was that he also came back home, sick. I had already lost my sister to sickness, my mother had gracefully recovered but she wouldn't work because they amputated her left foot and now my dad also rocked up looking frail and sick. I decided I'd stop working and hustling altogether because anyway I was in matric and I had good grades so I had applied at Forte University to study psychology and my application had been successful. Seeing that my mother welcomed my father with warm arms, without asking questions, I figured they would then hustle for themselves. The man of the house was back, right? I didn't have to hold that fort anymore.

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Six months in varsity, I got a call from home that dad had gotten a job. That was exciting obviously, but six months later, I failed all my modules so my bursary got cut. I returned home, having lost all hope but my dad said I should go back to school the following year, he would pay for the tuition and I'd have to hustle money for rent and food but mom said she'd give me money for food/groceries, I just had to hustle a bit for rent and that was motivation enough. I wasn't the head of the house anymore, dad was, and he was taking initiative.

I got a job at KFC, and a weekend job at a hotel by the beach, Kennaway Hotel. For fourteen months, I worked two jobs and I did well at school but I had days where I suffered from fatigue and exhaustion so instead of going to church, I'd just sleep right through and whenever I woke up feeling better, I'd bury myself in my books.

This went on until my third year when a Pastor by the name Michael Ndizi came to preach at our School Christian Organization. He handed out flyers for anyone who didn't have a church to go to, the flyers had his contact details and the church address. It took me three weeks to actually visit his church and six months later, I quit my job at KFC because now I had gotten a better one: I was a keyboard player.

"So Mandi, kuphi kokwenu?", Mrs. Sikhona Ndizi asked once I accepted their dinner invitation as they wanted to get to know me better, outside the church walls she had specified.

"Kuse Stutterheim ma'am,"

"So you're renting here?"

"Yes ma'am, bendihlala e res when I first got here but I failed all my modules so the bursary stopped paying then I had to hustle my way through"

"Yhooo mani. So how do you manage ngoku?"

"I work two jobs, every day after my classes and then one for the weekend"

"Yhu Haibo, uyaziqoba"

I laughed at that, it wasn't as though I had a choice. I had to do whatever I possibly could to get my degree, it was my only hope for a better future.

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A month after I met them, I was called to spend the weekend at their place and I was told that "we will secure your rent, you can drop one job and focus on your studies", I obviously didn't believe it. Who comes into your life and then a few minutes later offers to pay your rent? Phi? Emonti? I didn't believe that but guess what? They delivered, consistently so.

"So what's the catch?" I asked Mike as we shared lunch at a cafe.

"Mh?"

"What's the catch? I know your wife might be doing all of this out of the goodness of her heart, but you? I don't buy it, what's the catch?" I asked looking straight into his eyes.

He laughed and answered: "Well, I might need a favor or two from you, but other than that, there's really no catch,"

"A favor you say?"

"Yeah, it's nothing you're not familiar with. Relax,"

"I see"

I might have appeared to be homosexual on the outside (I wore skinny jeans, I was loud and chirpy, I had a sense of style, and I was a neat freak with the whole sanitizer package always in my bag, and that wasn't considered manly.. For some reason) but I would have loved to believe that I was just closer to my feminine side. Not necessarily gay.

But he introduced me to a whole new world that was filled with excitement, fear, and did I mention excitement?

"Does she know about this favor?"

"She doesn't have to know everything, as long as you know your boundary we should be fine," he answered sternly.

And just like that, a small favor became an entire affair. But I couldn't really tell my parents that now could I? All they needed to know was that I had found a church, and scored myself a good deal. That was it.

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