Your Brown Eyes

Tuesday March 6, 2012

I have naively thrown around phrases with the word “love”;  To guys when I had no clue what love even was, to “family” when it was an expected response, and even when describing an experience or food. Of course I love my family and I love my friends and would do whatever I could to help them in anyway. But it was not until last week when I was rocking Phindlie to sleep. I looked into his eyes as I hummed songs to comfort him. (I would never dear torture him with my singing). I felt a feeling like I had never felt before. 

I was sitting on the ground next to the mat that he shares with two other little boys trying to rub his back and calm him down. Since he was new to the class early last month and is one of the youngest, the teacher let me rock him so he wouldn’t disturb the others trying to rest. I scooped him up in my arms started to sway back and forth. He kept one hand around my neck and the other tightly gripping the back of the shirt. 

After a few minutes of him fighting sleep he was finally out. As I attempted to release from his tight squeeze and lay him on the mat, Sazola made a loud nose and woke Phindlie. He began screaming and huge tears started rolling down his face, he latched onto my neck. When I finally got him off, the teacher told me to leave because there was no way she could get him to calm down with me in the room. As I stepped out of the door to our classroom (a metal container) I looked back and Phindlie was walking after me with both arms reached out crying. I wanted nothing more than to scoop him up and take him with me. 

Everyone joked before I left “Kels, remember you can’t bring any of them home!” and I would respond saying I already planned ahead and brought and extra suit case to bring a few home. It honestly wasn’t until this moment that I realized how hard it is going to be to say good-bye to their sweet little brown-eyes. As I walked down the streets of the township heading home, it all hit me and I began to cry. Not a cry for my pain but for theirs. They didn’t choose this life. They didn’t choose to be victims. They don’t choose to go to bed hungry or to walk barefoot on sidewalks covered with broken beer bottles.  

Things that I would have previously said “Ohh that’s only TV” have become a reality. Kids in the township are being used to run drugs for gangs in exchange for food. To some it’s a “win-win” situation, the kids get food (some only get fed at school and many only come to school for the food) and the gang leaders in a sense keep their hands ‘clean ‘ because if the kids get caught or shot while delivering the contraband it’s no sweat. Parents are upset but by no means can they stand up to the drug lords of the township. 

When I initially found out this was happening it made me sick to my stomach, then anger set in. These kids are just kids. They do not like the peels of apples. They love getting their picture taken and cheer when the flash goes off. They are always without fail, all members of the Clean Plate Club. Bananas are a favorite across the board. Something as simple as bubbles puts a look on their face like its Christmas Morning. Knowing that someone carelessly takes this innocence from children is honestly one of the hardest things I have tried to wrap my mind around. Who is in their corner? Who is fighting for them? 

We all know that kids are sponges and pick up things from their environment and that then transcends into their play. So when after a weekend of people lighting car tires on fire in protest in the township with four casualties, it should have been no surprise to me that the popular game of Monday morning would be “Police and Fire”. The kids were all in the corner of the room when the panic set in, they started shouting in Coosa. When I asked the teachers what they were saying she responded “Sazola just said ‘why did you burn my car you fat cow? I’ll shoot you!” I put the game quickly to an end once it was translated but it still came to a shock. This is their normal. This is not “just TV”. 

I walk a fine line of trying not to come off as disrespectful of their life but at the same time tenderly encouraging them that there is so much more life holds for them other than township life. Education is really the only way out of the township. But some parents struggle even providing food let alone paying for an education (payment is standard for public school, grade 1 through grade 12). I wonder constantly which kids will make it out, not fall victim to the gangs, the violence, the hunger, the diseases.

I know I am only temporary in their life. They aren’t going to remember me. But I will never forget them.  The look in their sweet brown eyes when we play with bubbles, the joy on Vergill’s face when he counted to 10 on his own for the first time, Mary-Ann’s giggles when she swings on the tires, and Wayne’s cheers when its fruit time and he get a piece of banana is something I will carry with me for the rest of my life. This is love.