LAW FOR ALL recently hosted a writing competition called "Write the future, right the wrongs".
The three winning entries are published on LAW FOR ALL’s website. LAW FOR ALL granted LitNet permission to publish the seven other entries of the Top 10 in the coming seven weeks. Below is “When justice meant the world had to stop, so Ayanda could dream” by Sumayya Mohamed.
Picture of Sumayya Mohamed: provided
Ayanda’s eyes fluttered open. The morning sun streamed through her large windows, a morning breeze swishing the long curtains further into the room, just like they show in the movies. Ayanda smiled softly before getting out of bed and padding to the kitchen to switch on the espresso machine, a gift from her mother, who always insisted that none of her children should lose the habit of getting up early every morning. She had worked too hard to instil it in the first place.
Her open laptop still sat on the dining room table, along with some files filled with the drawings that kept populating her mind until she got them onto paper. Ayanda packed them into her satchel; it was going to be a good day. Johannesburg was buzzing. Just outside, she could already hear it coming alive with the sun. Mothers were getting coffee before shopping on the streets; merchants were opening their doors and cleaning their shopfronts. Children were singing as they walked to school in big groups, and taxi drivers chatted and smoked their cigarettes as they leaned against their cars waiting for a fare.
As Ayanda got ready to seize the day, she reflected on the days that had brought her here. The days that were so dark that people had not known whether there would even be a day to seize anymore. It was all so alarming; one day, everyone had woken up and the world had stopped. Those days looked very different to Ayanda. They were dark, cold, damp and crowded. A fractured existence. Mama did not know where the next paycheque would come from, and Ayanda and her sister would always be preoccupied with some plan they had come up with to play their part. Except that there were no parts to play. The world had stopped, and what do you do in a world like that, when you had no place in it in the first place?
Her dreams of being an artist seemed even bleaker than before. They had heard one evening that Raymond down the road had gotten sick with the disease, and there was nothing to do but wait. Everyone spoke about the president’s speech and that there was hope for South Africa, but everything was far too broken already to dare to believe and dare to dream. Raymond could not even go to hospital. The streets were dusty when Raymond died, and no one was allowed to go to the funeral. Ayanda and Lesedi squeezed into last year’s winter clothes as they ate yesterday’s leftovers, and everything was too quiet. No one knew what tomorrow would bring.
It was funny, thought Ayanda: people went into isolation one way and came out another. The world stopped going in one direction, and began to spin again in another. You see, before the blackout, everyone did things a certain way, and if you were not compliant, as old Mr Timer used to say in school, you would get left behind. Ayanda was always left behind, always too different to be acceptable. Too introverted and too contrary, too outspoken and too opinionated, but Ayanda knew how to be by herself. It came in handy when the isolations started. Lesedi asked her once, late at night, as they listened to the unsettling quiet outside their one-bedroom home, whether this was what it always felt like for her. Ayanda laughed so loudly that it interrupted Mama’s snoring.
The thing Ayanda knew, however, was that only one thing could possibly be chaotic in these times, and that was the time when people realised that they had to face themselves.
"They have to slow down, now – everyone does," she told Lesedi. "You have to learn who you are, I think." Lesedi nodded thoughtfully before falling asleep.
She could see it all so clearly. Where others had demons to face, Ayanda had only dreams.
Ayanda pulled on her jacket and closed her door before making her way down to the street, immediately greeted by the colours, sounds and smells of the city. She would get lost in the crowd now with no hesitation. Her keys, no longer held between her fingers like a weapon, now jingled at the bottom of her satchel.
"Ayanda!" Lesedi was waving at her from across the street, bargaining with a merchant for a dress that had caught her eye. She could indulge in her shopping addictions now – they all could. Ayanda chuckled softly as she turned the corner.
The darkness left one night, and, with the rising sun, all of the systems fell. Ayanda was right: Lesedi found that people had to face themselves. The president gave another speech, and they all gathered around the TV with the bunny ears to listen. He said something about a new South Africa and using all of her people to make it happen. It did happen.
When the people came out to breathe in the new day, there was a reshuffling of priorities, just like there used to be a reshuffling of cabinets. And the people came together to lift South Africa up again. To love her again, appreciate her beauty and appreciate that they themselves were enough. And they were, smiled Ayanda, as her students began pouring into her studio for their classes, laughing and exchanging stories as if the plague had never happened. In her own way, Ayanda was glad that it had. None of them would be here if it hadn’t.
"Ok, settle down. Today, I want you to tell a story," she began. Young, fresh and free eyes watched her in rapt attention.
Read an interview with Jackie Nagtegaal on the outcome of the competition.
The winning entry of the competition was: "When I dream of a future" by Belita Andre
The second prize went to "The image of justice: a double duplex", by Nomyezo Mqhele
Third prize went to "The commute", by Sesetu Holomisa
Herewith the names of the Top 10 entries:
- "Exit" by Maretha Maartens
- "Green" by Naomi Meyer
- "Breath of law" by Inga Ntantala
- "Say something" by Harry Owen
- "Brave" by Monicca Rampine
- "When justice meant the world had to stop, so Ayanda could dream" by Sumayya Mohamed
- "Nqo" by Siyabulela Javu
The post LAW FOR ALL’s Top 10: "When justice meant the world had to stop, so Ayanda could dream" by Sumayya Mohamed appeared first on LitNet.