The Maletsatsi Foundation

One if the things I find most challenging about parenting, in general, is the immediacy of it. Your plans hold no candle to a child’s needs at any time. And balancing one child’s ‘urgent’ needs against another’s is near impossible.

I often find that one child’s meltdown is intercepted by another’s very important question and so regularly find myself feeling that kind of overstimulation that makes your brain burn when trying to work out what to deal with first.

And somehow it’s always in the middle of doing something that I deem important that I’m forced to a standstill by a behaviours that needs urgent intervention. Like this afternoon, where a timeout was needed for a human who’d not made his best choice but I was quite literally in the middle of something I’d carved out an hour to get done (unpack the bus) and mid table coming out of the door I had to run to stop a bad choice….

And well now I’m sat on the floor overseeing a time out with a child who is technically ‘sitting’ in a time out but using his last inch of autonomy to make sure that I know he’s still somewhat in control and is in fact not quite going to ‘sit his bottom on the floor’ because he ‘is in charge of his body’.

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You want to know what Team Zonke is about? This. This right here is it. Rider 265- we are SO PROUD of you, what a phenomenal human you are. Team Zonke might be lighting up the podiums yellow, but we will ALWAYS be about doing the right thing long before we’re about winning.

The real winner of the race yesterday: the boy who chose to sacrifice his entire race for a person he didn’t know, quite simply because it was the right thing to do.

I remember the insult with which I came to the realisation, after our young son died, that the world keeps going no matter what.

The mundane has a way of maintaining momentum miraculously with banality and regularity. It doesn’t matter if your child is dying. Or if you’ve been assaulted and left for dead. Or if you husband just walked out the door. Or you lost the job that keeps the food in the table. At the same time, someone will be complaining about traffic lights or the taste of their coffee and your dog will need to go to the vet. If there’s a war waging across the way, it won’t change your need to file taxes. You’ll see images of children starving and scroll through to get shoes on your school going child. It is, quite simply, what it is. The world, it seems, has little regard for the tragedy you’re facing, no matter how catastrophic or life changing. Life keeps going on.

And it struck me this evening, after receiving an after hours call from a social worker reading to do a dangerous removal tomorrow, that sometimes it’s our own normal that keeps going while another person’s whole world is falling apart.

Today as I walked three little girls safely to my car, was this child being hurt? As I cooked the masses of dinner that were required to feed this army, was she in harms way? The answer is unknown- probably, yes, dangerous enough to need removal. Tomorrow. When the mundane is shifted to fit the removal in with our days.

And so I sleep tonight stressing about a child I’ve never met. Whose gender I don’t know and whose name I have never said. Tomorrow I’lll come crashing into their life. Without them wanting me- tomorrow if they survive the night, they’ll find themselves in our home.

Because the mundane needs fixing tonight. And so removal will happen tomorrow. When the sun is out. And the courts are open. And that’s just how it is.

Another mouth to feed. Another body to clothe. Another mind to educate. We can quite simply not do this without support. It costs an eye-watering amount of money to support our children - and funds are increasingly difficult to secure. Please donate today to support our children & those who were still waiting to hold.

Behind me, a police officer sits slumped in a chair in the corner- chin to chest, cap pulled down. The occasional grunt as he jolts from his nap.

Next to him the clerks black stilettos lay haphazardly on the floor, her bare feet folded into the cold tiles. Her face reflects the light of her phone screen resting centimetres from her nose.

To my right, a bulging pregnant court official sits perched on a torn chair. Her role uncertain. Her exasperation obvious. Her body swaying in and out of consciousness.

The magistrate roars from behind the wooden board above which she is perched. Her unkempt hair whipping around her reddened face. As though a caricature she bangs a file down on the rickety counter top, a cloud of dust enveloping her overwhelmed desk.

In front of her, an unidentified young man perches behind unworking computers looks like his lifeblood is leaving his body.

“Lift your right hand” she beckons to the social worker to my right.
“Do you solemnly swear to….”

A torn poster flaps in the draft from the window that sits ajar behind the broken blinds that clatter against the dirty prefab walls.

Piles of cables hum yet seemly fail to ignite spark to any one of the devices attached to them. The air is heavy with fatigue. The room suffocating.

With the slumber party in full swing and bare feet planted firmly to the dirty floor, with torn posters flapping and tossed right hands floundering, the biggest decision of her life is made without her being present.

“Terminated”
“Adoptable”
“Unknown”
“Two years”

“FWAAAA-DOOOSH!” The stamp slams down with a might whack that wakes the sleeping audience.
Stilettos find awkward path back to swollen feet.
“Dismissed” she hollers.
And we leave with a flimsy piece of paper that holds the direction for the rest of her life.

The unpredictability of our days remain a wild and lively ride for us to hang onto.

People often ask- but HOW do kids get to you?

An hour ago I was sat in court.
My phone ringing off the hook.
Now I’m about to jump back into my car to collect a six year old child who has been through the most.

All alone.
Old enough to understand.
Young enough to be so vulnerable.

With NOTHING. Not even clean clothing on her body. A torn pair of pants. An old dirty shirt. And here we scream off out of our house to collect her without a plan or two pennies to scratch our you know what.

Please help us ensure that she has clean clothes- we don’t have in stores, I need to go past the shops and get her appropriate outfits to wear.

We shouldn’t say yes.
But we must. Because NOBODY else will. The social worker has tried EVERYWHERE. Everyone is full. Nobody can stretch to make a plan.

“If not now, then when?
If not me, then who?”

The Maletsatsi Foundation (a registered Non Profit Company, Non Profit Organisation, Public Beneficiary Organisation with Level 1 BEE) details:

NPC Registration Number: 2020/257077/08
NPO Registration Number: 254-968.
PBO Reference Number: 930070879

Banking Details:
The Maletsatsi Foundation NPC,
FNB 62865881314,
Cheque Account,
Branch Code: 210835,
Swift Code: FIRNZAJJ
Ref: Your email address

He tucked his head into my body, “but who will keep me safe when you’re gone mommy” he asks.

It’s a question our children ask regularly. One I normally retort with a list of the very many humans who love the socks off them and would lay their lives for them.

But tonight as he snuggled into my arm I couldn’t help but be glad that the he dreams of monsters only- because they surely must be teddy bears compared to the savages who roam our streets.

As he tucked his little body into mine I could only be grateful that he knows not what went on outside our borders today.

As I curled around his little body so riddled with shared trauma and interlocked with my own I felt a strange sense of pride at the lie I’d told that I could keep him safe.

Because outside our sanctuary today barbaric acts happened. They pierced too close to our own sanctuary and shattered to holy a piece of our world.

Savage.
Barbaric.
Destructive.
Brazen.

And I fought back against authorities allowing cheating in the small fry space of children’s racing, reminding myself that children who are taught to ignore rules today become men who flagrantly take what they want from women tomorrow.

And as I stood in the shadow of my own thoughts around the depths of our actions today and their impact on the children of tomorrow, as my womb wept with a sisters and my heart bled with another, my phone rang.

“Nine year old. Multiple assaults. She needs counselling for the s3&ual abuse she’s been victim to. I can’t place her anywhere. Nobody will assess her. Nobody will help. Do you have space Tiff? Can you take her?”

R190 in our bank account. How do I even begin to say yes?

Cry the beloved country.
Cry. Cry. Cry.

***as a side note. My soul is tired. I don’t know how much longer I can keep doing this. I love being on the ground. I can weather the emotional toil. But the simultaneous financial pressure is near too much to bear. I know I cannot say yes. But if I don’t who will? I cannot get myself into more personal debt to keep funding this. I will happily lay down my life for this cause. But the rope is only so long. And it’s running out fast.

If you feel in any way drawn to this cause, the one that makes sensational news yet somehow still fails to push the needle, if you can’t be on the ground but want to help in some way- every single cent helps. And we are grateful for every single donation. Our hearts are aching tonight. Our bank account is bare. The options feel suffocating.

The Maletsatsi Foundation (a registered Non Profit Company, Non Profit Organisation, Public Beneficiary Organisation with Level 1 BEE) details:

NPC Registration Number: 2020/257077/08
NPO Registration Number: 254-968.
PBO Reference Number: 930070879

Banking Details:
The Maletsatsi Foundation NPC,
FNB 62865881314,
Cheque Account,
Branch Code: 210835,
Swift Code: FIRNZAJJ
Ref: Your email address

PayPal;

This morning.
On her way to work.
On of our mothers was sexually assaulted and robbed.
She survived.
And was promptly dismissed by the police.
Who told her they couldn’t help until she found her way to the clinic.
Except they’d taken all her money.
And I somehow slept through my phone when she was calling 😭
And with a total of R190 in the foundation account I couldn’t even call her an uber.
At this point, all we can do is fetch her with the fuel in our car, and take her to the clinic.
And pray she’s treated with a tiny degree of kindness.
In a month where we’re preaching we protect women.
I’m here to say that might be conditional to press releases.
Bacuse WHERE IS THE SUPPORT RIGHT NOW?!?!?

When they’re on their bikes, in their neon yellow ninja suits… when their helmets are on and their armour surrounds them… when they’re with their team and covered in mud… when they’re clawing for podiums and chasing the most fun… when they’re there… nobody knows if they witnessed a murder, or if they were beaten within inches of their life, or if they were left for dead on the side of a road, or if they were found in a bin, or if they were trafficked by those who were supposed to protect them, or if they had their life overturned by a family member’s death, or if they’ve fought dread disease, or been born with a silver spoon. And none of that matters.

When they’re on their bikes, they’re just riders. Equal. With no past that has bearing.

They ride with pride.
They ride with ethics.
They abide by the rules.
It doesn’t matter what their past was — they show that being here, right now, is what’s of importance.

That’s what .zonke does. Brings everyone here, right now. Where they are. As they come. Aligned in commitment to keep showing up and doing the right thing.

It makes me prouder than I can express. Because in spite of the fact that behind so many of our riders sits stories that would cripple many- they should up in ways that are so much better than many who have agency from birth.

After Archie died I decided I no longer wanted to associate with people who hadn’t suffered. There’s a depth that suffering brings to humans- a grit and strength. There’s a presence that suffering forces. After you’ve been at deaths door, mentally or emotionally, you see the world in a different way. Maybe that’s why they’re such stellar humans. Who knows. But I’d go to war with these kids. They’re better than almost every human I’ve ever met.

And in their yellow, they get to show up as this version of themselves every time. And boy oh boy are they making an impact!