Extra-ordinarily Ordinary

For a very long time, I've had this nagging feeling, ever-present at the back of my mind (and sometimes so much at the forefront that it drowns out every other thought): nothing about me is extra-ordinary.

People's eyes widen in disbelief when I tell them that I was a quiet child (I have a really big mouth now and I'm not afraid to share my opinion). Not necessarily at home, but at school and in social situations I was sufficiently awkward.
I changed primary schools a lot - never spent more than two years at a school. I had always been an above average student, but I was nothing special or outstanding, never attracted attention, and I envied those children who had countless friends and popularity, and who excelled (whether at academics, sport, arts, or just socially). I found my voice at high school, became more confident but still flew pretty much below the radar and was never asked to represent the school for anything.

While I was never bitter about these things (in fact, I was the leader of the cheer squad for all my peers who took part in competitions and quizzes and sporting fixtures), I can admit to myself now that I was disappointed to be overlooked and excluded. Every child wants to belong and fit in, yet at the same time, they also want to be special or great at something that is uniquely them. And because of the constant changing, I did not have the time to settle into a school, which I feel probably contributed to slowing the development of my confidence and personality, and the discovery of any talents.

I'm happy to say I've grown into 90% of my personality - I say 90% because I believe in leaving room for improvement - but even now, I cannot really say that there is one thing really outstanding about myself.

However, I can do many things well, and am always surprised when I successfully acquire a new skill. While these seemingly ordinary talents may not affect the world at large, I have seen them positively impact on some - well, no, many actually - in my small world.
And that's pretty extra-ordinary to me.

Z is for Zeal

“Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm.” ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

I don’t have many ‘great’ achievements, but I try to generally live my life by this philosophy. I have a zealous approach to all things – be it work, relationships, leisure. It does tend to exasperate most - even my best friend sometimes tells me to dial it down a bit– and usually elicit one of the following three reactions: people are either annoyed, or find me naïve, or take liberties (especially at work, coz I get shit done).

But I can’t help it. And I’ve stopped apologising for it. I am an upbeat person. I also live by my mother’s teaching, which is, “If you do something, especially for others, do it properly and because you want to, or don’t do it at all”. So, whether it is cleaning a kitchen, teaching a class, organising a party, studying for a test or nursing a sick parent, I do it readily and cheerfully.

My enthusiastic nature and MO may not have resulted in greatness, but it has brought me many achievements and happiness.

Y is for YOLO

“We all have two lives. The second begins when you realise you only have one.”
~ Tom Hiddleston

This may be the first time where I will disagree slightly with Mr Hiddleston.

We have one mortal existence, for sure. Unfortunately, there are people who take this to mean that they can just do whatever the hell they want, regardless of the consequences and of the people it affects. I am in complete agreement with the first part of his statement.

However, I do believe in an actual second life – the eternal life after death.

This belief is a very important article of my faith, yes. I was born into my religion, but there comes a time, I think, in everyone’s life where they have to decide on it for themselves. The words of one of my lecturers still resonate with me today – you have to decide whether you want to follow your faith completely.

I’ve been very fortunate to have been able to pursue religious studies for a few years. It didn’t add to my professional qualifications but it gave me clarity and conviction in my religion, and particularly, in the existence of a Hereafter.

We cannot be here, go through all our trials and tribulations simply for the hell of it. Logically, there must be a purpose to our lives. And with this conviction came a consciousness with regards to how I conducted my life. As a child I was taught how to pray, how to fast, how to dress, how to live, but I was never taught why. And for three years, I learnt why.

We do have two lives, but we only have one shot at this life on earth. And I choose to try to live my mortal life in preparation for the next.

X is for Xerox

Sometimes your job forces you to acquire some odd skills.

The year I started at my current workplace, I was employed in two capacities:

First, I was the assistant to the librarian and my duties were to give media classes to Grades 1-3 and to assist with library maintenance. Secondly, I was to assist the school secretaries with their administrative tasks, and the one machine I became very intimately acquainted with was the Xerox machine.

Every single day for almost five years, there was something I needed to photocopy. Classroom activities, parent communication and circulars, examination papers – you think of it, I duplicated it. I spent so much time in that small room, I became able to detect malfunctions by the smell and sound alone, and the sound of the machines became like a soothing lullaby.

I don’t think I ever want to look at another photocopier ever again.

W is for Who am I?

I was born during the last decade of the Apartheid era, was eight years old when Nelson Mandela was released from prison and was twelve when we had our first democratic elections. I did not feel the effects of this dark time the way my older siblings and parents did, and therefore feel that I cannot claim to be a child of the struggle.

South Africa is in its twenty-first year of freedom, but unfortunately there is still lingering effects of Apartheid, mostly in the form of racism. Law does not dictate it anymore but you still find people grouping together based on race and ethnicity, and you still find quite a lot of intolerance.

Now this may spark outrage and controversy, but for me, the worst thing that has happened in the last twenty years is that the indigenous people of my country have confused their identities.

I find it very disconcerting when I walk past a Zulu person speaking English with a British accent to a fellow Zulu, instead of their own language, or when I talk to Xhosa and Muslim learners at school and they do not know their own culture. It’s almost as if they are afraid to outwardly express the uniqueness of their cultures and faiths, and are all striving to become the same thing.

I was like that too. And there came a time when I had to ask myself who I was – a question I can now answer:

I am a Muslim, Indian-Cape Malay hybrid, South African woman.

And I am so grateful that time, circumstance and experience have steered me to where I sit comfortably in my skin and wear my identity proudly.

V is for Virtue

As an unmarried thirty-something year old female, I am constantly bombarded with comments and questions around my state: “Why are you not married?” “What kind of guys do you like?” “You’re too full of shit.” There are many others I can’t readily think of now (they have become like this incoherent hum, and my brain now blocks most of them).

But the most colourful question I have been asked (recently by a colleague) is whether I’d like my future husband to be a virgin. I laughed, and will admit that I did not quite know how to answer this question because it’s the first time I’ve ever been asked. I mean, I opened my mouth and nothing came out. Literally nothing. I don’t know of any woman who has been asked this question (if you have, I’d love to know what your response was).

Do women think about men’s virtue? I did not actively before this week.

Could it be because virtue is sneered at? Or because we still live in a patriarchal world where a woman is expected to maintain her virtue but a man is not (whoever wants to argue this point, ask yourself why a man is admired when he can ‘get’ lots of women but a woman is labelled a slut when she does the same)? Or could it be that despite the labels, more women are adopting the attitudes of men, and saying, ‘Screw it. I’ll do what I like.’

So my response to her was this:

It is difficult to answer because we all make mistakes and people’s circumstances are different (I mean, if I were to marry a divorcee, I couldn’t very well expect him to be a virgin). Ideally, yes I would like someone completely virtuous, because that’s what he will be getting if he marries me. But we do not live in an ideal world. And so I would be happy with a person who has virtuous ideals.

U is for Useless Colleagues

Work has been kind of miserable the last six months or so because I have been cursed with useless colleagues. One would expect the children and their parents to be the ones who are difficult – and some of them are, but my biggest challenge at work are the people I work with.

They are divided into three:

First, you get the ones who are just downright lazy, will do nothing for themselves, refuse to learn or acquire new skills and expect others to clean up their mess; the ones who think they know everything there is to know, and who are threatened by your ability to work; lastly, the ones who are so vindictive, that they make every effort to derail your projects or attempts to affect positive change.

I do not need to be defined by a career or money – I do not chase titles or positions, nor do I covet millions. Work should be legal, enable me to pay the bills and allow me enough time to devote to things that do define me – family and other interests.

When it comes to my career and workplace, I ask only for the following: that you do your work, allow me to do mine, take responsibility for your successes and failures, and remain professional at all times.

You don’t need to like me – I have friends – but respect, boundaries and WORK ETHIC is imperative.

Sadly, I seem to have ended up in a place where these are appallingly lacking.

T is for Twilight

For those of you rolling your eyes, I am referring to the books, and not the film adaptation (which, despite the fact that the books are way better, wasn't too bad either - don't pretend you didn't watch it and that you didn't like it).

I was introduced to Twilight through the film. A good friend of mine allowed me to gatecrash her cousins' movie date and I was pleasantly surprised at the film - vampires, romance, hot guys; all my favourite things in one film, and I left the cinema quite happy to be in love with Edward Cullen.

Anxious to know how the rest of the story unfolds, I went and bought myself the books.

Life is so serious and sad, and for my sanity, I escape into the worlds of movies and books. I have my preferences when it comes to my entertainment, but I have only one rule: the less of reality in it, the better. I wish I could read the Twilight series for the first time again, because it would be so amazing to experience those emotions all over again. 

Not only am I drawn by the romance (and not just of the lead characters, more so, in fact, of all the peripheral couples), but by the way Stephenie Meyer has managed to show us this dream world. She is, in my humble opinion, brilliant at her craft.

I read all the books a week (I spent a whole day in pajamas reading Breaking Dawn and finished in less than 24 hours, only getting up twice to use the facilities) and it was as though I had a cinema reel inside my head - every word played out behind my eyes as I read them.

However, the two greatest things that this series has done for me: it led me to my best friend and led me to writing. 

And inspired me to set an actual goal for myself. Hopefully one day I will be able to create something just as magical.

S is for Sagittarian

I’m not one who follows the Zodiac – in fact, I usually think it’s a lot of hogwash. But my bff sent me this email, which shares seven characteristics of Sagittarians. I laughed at how spookily accurate the following were, pertaining to me:

1. It’s always funny to see how uneasy they can be with compliments/flattery, even though they love it. (yup, me in a nutshell)
2. It’s not that they’re blunt and don’t care, they just say what everyone else is thinking. (My filter is a work-in-progress)
3. They love meeting new people…who think and act like them. (Hahahahaha! I totally do!)
4. You’ll be surprised at how “easily touched” they are. Yes, they are sentimental…sometimes. (Big mouth, small heart – that’s me)
5. Their sarcasm will crack you up, especially when they’re mad. (Don’t say you weren’t warned)
6. They make great sidekicks. They like to have fun and do new shit. (I am THE wingman…winglady…wingperson)
7. To really make them understand something, use logic. They don’t really care about your “emotional revelations”. (It’s not that we don’t care – we just don’t always understand that language)

R is for Reality TV

This is a phenomenon that I just have not embraced. Yes, people might tell me that these shows depict how the world and people are today. And they would be right – the world is a weird place right now, and is getting weirder by the minute.

But we have only ourselves to blame for this because we sanction weird behaviour by watching these shows.

How can we consider physical struggles (sickness, hunger and exhaustion) of a group of people marooned on an island as entertainment, when there are an obscene amount of people in the world who experience these struggles for real every single day?

Who in their right mind would want to televise their quest for love? It is hard enough to find it without an audience. These people are deluding themselves into thinking that they’ve found real love after going through what is essentially a catalogue.

What frightens me most about reality TV is the rapid rate at which it has grown – because we watch it. It’s become normal to throw random people into a house and watch them deteriorate. It’s become normal to publicize people’s dirty laundry. It’s become normal for teenagers to fall pregnant at seventeen. It’s become normal for housewives to beat each other up in front of a camera.

This is the result of reality TV.

Times move on and societal norms and customs do change. But does no one worry about the fact that we have regressed to a point where unacceptable behaviour has become accepted? Does no one worry about the effect it will have on the generations that will come after us?

I feel like the world has now become the forty-floor building from the novel High Rise – and like those people in it, we are racing towards our own decline.