Growing
up I knew one place that I loved being almost every day – and it wasn’t nursery-
It was a walk from my family home to a street that felt like another home. My
family were always hard workers and that’s something I appreciated because it
meant I never went without. Some of my relatives built a livelihood on the street
that created a market that overflowed with eager people who protected
themselves from the sun that illuminated its presence above the tree trunks and
straw roofs that formed individual stalls. The aunties that were immersed in conversations
in Lingala, French or Swahili - back then I had a loud, outspoken mouth that
didn’t know two words of English. There were mountains of oranges, lemons and
limes that piled on top of each other next to the peppers, kwanga and fish, as
you walk through, you would never smell the same thing for too long.
...
Lured
from the confines of my own home to get on the big sky bird that was going to
take me...home?
...
From a livelihood to the inner city hood, I
was free but not as free as in the DRC. My freedom was defined in different
ways now. If you were to ask anyone from Congo, they would tell you how I
should have felt blessed beyond belief. Now if you were to ask anyone who was
where I was, the different perspectives will make you realise that the streets
were not paved with gold but carved with potholes that didn’t make your journey
easy and the cement that paved the way was as heavy as the burden and pressure
that was carried on everyone’s back.
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