An African woman recently asked me why I didn’t just call a local, supposedly black company, with feminist credentials to boot, to do what the traditional removal companies — Stuttafords, stuff like that — would charge me a fortune to do when I had to move house.
So I did.
Girls on the Move came in and did it. They are dressed in purple Tshirts, like girls should be, and practical jeans and pretty tough shoes. I stood back, like a man, and watched as they packed up a life of books, tapes, records and other stuff that had been lying around, and loaded it on their backs and on their heads and got rid of it into a massive truck (driven by a man, it has to said).
I was amazed, stupidly, by what they were able to achieve in a few hours. I had only ever previously seen this being done by slovenly, muscular men in overalls, with overtly ugly thoughts, indifferent attitudes and ultimately lewd and vulgar intentions concerning what it was their lot to be involved in –regarding the moving of your house.
It was a revelation that this heavy labour could equally be done by young women whose bodies supposedly had other more important things to do, other more important eggs to fry, as it were, but were willingly, ably lifting and placing boxes, furniture and other weighty stuff with a sense of commitment. I was baffled by their femininity, although they didn’t know it. Their muscularity was a revelation.
The African man generally, histori-cally, supposedly, defines his relationship with the world according to his physical relationship with the challenges of the African continent. There are lions coming any time. The African man slumbers and awaits the lion’s roar, his spear at his side, the smell of mealies cooking at his feet and the expectation of a stew some time in the future, maybe this week, maybe next week.
Women, with their backs bent into the soil, bringing babies into the world and carrying them picturesquely as they continue their daily labour, are part of the scenery.
It’s easy to watch all this transition, thinking this stuff, while thinking about what is going on in the rest of the world.
President Thabo Mbeki’s recent call that the next president of this country should be a woman sprang irreverently to mind. Irreverently because I had to ask myself what he was really saying — either about women, or about men’s relationship with women, or about women’s relationship with men, given recent famous rape trials and hair-raising accusations on both sides, or about the world in general. Or about why it was even relevant for any reason that there was any race or gender issue about who should lead us into the future.
The amazing young women from Girls on the Move should have a say in all of this. Do they? Any of them could be president — given, boxes on their heads notwithstanding, a better education system, a historical understanding of where we’re at and an overall sense of belonging to this wide and bizarre country. But they didn’t utter a murmur as they performed a traditional role, heaving massive loads from one place to another; being the traditional Women of Africa.
The fact is, they are just part of the picture. They lift and carry for you and me, and do it extremely well, and are appreciated for it sometimes, rewarded sometimes, but at the end of the day are not part of the greater picture. They are part of the background.
Yes, I feel guilty as the black male onlooker. We are all there. But we all have a stake in what happens next.
The “what happens next” question then, is, as the president has said, or not said, or avoided saying, who, why or what should the next president be? Who is this person going to represent? Is her or his colour or gender important? How will this person, whoever she or he is, change existing relations?
Will South Africa’s tortured racial relationships move along? Is it important whether they do or don’t? If the next president, as the president has said, is a woman, will women be better off? Will we have less crime? Will water flow, and will oil spring from the ground and be available to all?
I am moved by the patient, powerful women from Girls on the Move, who transferred me from one space to another, more than once, and didn’t ask questions. They looked at me with staring eyes and pretended not to be puzzled.
I don’t know what is going on in their minds. I don’t know which way they will jump in the next presidential election. I don’t know which way I will jump in the next elections, although I guess there is no contest, and there’s only one way to vote.
There are many challenges in the country we live in. The world, suspiciously, is looking at us with rainbows in its fickle eyes.
There is only one way we can go. What can we do, what can’t we do?
We can lift a whole world on our head, or on our shoulders. We’re on the move.
The question remains: whose head, whose shoulders and for whom?