My name is Joseph and I am 27 years old. I have always been a quiet person. Even at work. I work as a technician. I am so quiet, that two of my fellow workers, Jordan and Sphamandla, one day asked me about myself. They asked me about my life, wondering, “Where is this guy from? He is so clever, but so quiet.” They were so curious about my schooling and my life story. So, I decided to tell them my story during our lunch break. I told them, “I am going to tell you the story of how I grew up.”

I was once a kid that lived with his father and mother. My family was very poor and we lived in a shack in Mhlabunzima. We slept on the floor. We had no electricity, so we had to use a primer stove to cook and boil water for bathing and other things. Our life was very hard at that time. My family depended on me because I was a very clever kid at school. They had hope for my future.

I studied at Sithengile Senior Secondary School. I always knew, growing up, that I wanted to be something. But, it was difficult. I had no lunch at school. I only had a friend named Phila that was helping me buy lunch. I was doing Grade 8 when we met. We met in the first term, during break time. I had no money, no lunch. I was just standing and looking at other kids eating. I wished I was them. Phila came up to me and asked, “Why aren’t you eating. I told him, “I have no money, no lunch.” He said, “Come with me, I have money. I can buy you a fat cook.” After that, we became friends. But, some kids were calling me a freak because I was so quiet, poor and only had one friend, who had many friends. Some of his friends talked to me, but only a few times. People loved Phila. He was rich; everyone in his family was working and earning a lot of money. I kept asking him why he was studying at this kind of school if his family had so much money. He explained that his father and mother had studied there and he wanted to be just like them.

One day, Phila invited me to his house. It was very nice. Everything looked like it was new, all shining. Then, we went to a dinner table that was so big and long. The food was all over the table, even things I never thought I could eat. We ate sushi, apple pie, lasagna, pizza, donuts and buffalo wings. There were so many things, drinks and other things. I ate and ate and the food was delicious. I said to my friend, “This is so much food!” He said, “It is always like this!” I said, “Wow! You eat a lot of food. We just eat a dish a day or every two days.” His parents drove me home after eating. Going home to the shack made me wish that I could have stayed in Phila’s house forever.

That night, I slept thinking about all that food. My stomach was very full, for the first time ever. I had never eaten that much before. It made me sad to realise that I was living in a shack and my family could not eat that kind of food. I wanted things to be different. That is when I realised that I must study hard so that one day I could buy my family a big house in which we would get to eat that kind of food.

At the beginning of term two, the school had a competition that whoever got in the top five would win a bursary to a private school. They were going to announce the winner at the end of term 4. They were using our results for our term 3 exams to choose a winner. It was for grade eights only. There were only five bursaries. Our principal announced it during the morning assembly, right before we prayed. After I heard this, I said to myself, “This is a chance to achieve something with my life.” I was happy and overwhelmed. This was my chance.

When I got home after school, I went and told my parents. They felt like they had won the lottery. Right away, they said that I must get that bursary so that I could go to a better school, get into a nice university and get a good job so that we could leave our shack and live in a house like Phila.

So, I was not going to blow my chance to have something. The exams were coming soon, so I had to study like never before. I never even left the house. My dad was telling me to take a break from studying. I never listened to him at all because I wanted the bursary very badly. I said to myself, “I’m going to do everything in my power to get this chance at success.”

During term two, I went home one day and saw my father outside crying. I ran, trying to get into the house, but my father stopped me and said, “Don’t go in, son.” I asked him, “What’s going on, Dad? Where is Mom?” My father said, “You must go inside and sit down so we can talk.”

The next day at school I was not talking to anyone. I only went to school because I was trying not to think about my mother’s death. I needed a distraction. I needed to keep my mind busy. I was quieter than usual. Phila came to me and asked, “What’s going on?” I told him that my mother had passed away the day before. He asked me how she died. “Heart attack,” I said. After telling him, I ran into the toilets. I cried and cried because me talking about it reminded me about how when she was still alive.

A few days later, my heart was still broken but it was crying less. I was just thinking that it would be better for my mom to be alive while I would be writing my exams. She had always been there for me. She always helped me. I needed help through the hard times. I wished she could help me with studying and homework. The thing that kept me going was my mother and father’s words: “You have the ability to move us to a better house, a better life.” I told myself that just because my mother died, I mustn’t give up. I was not going to let this distract me.

Term 3 arrived and the day came for me to write the exams of a lifetime. Phila was also writing exams. He was also helping me study. On the day of the exams, he said to me, “Now is time for you to start a new life.” I was so nervous to start the exams. I had studied so much, but I was still nervous because if I failed I would no longer win a bursary and I would not have a chance to change my father’s life and make my mother’s wish come true. Our first paper was mathematics and our last paper was Natural Science. The way I wrote my exams. I was happy because I was receiving the chance to change my father’s life. Since I had studied so much, I felt very prepared. I did not feel as nervous as I had expected. After I finished the Natural Science exam, I felt so relieved.

Two weeks after writing, the election day came. They made the announcement at the morning assembly. Some students in my class were afraid that they might not get elected. That’s when I realised they didn’t study anything at all. Since I had studied a lot, I wasn’t as worried as them, but I was still nervous because I thought of what would happen if I did not win the bursary. If I did not win it, my father would be disappointed in me. If I did not win, I would lose his trust and I would lose the chance to change our lives. The principal came to the stage and read from a list. My name was announced as the second place in the top five of Grade 8. While they were giving me the bursary, I felt like I had won the lottery. I said to myself, “A new beginning has started.”

When I got home that afternoon, my dad kept saying that I’ve done well with my life. “Your mother would be proud,” he smiled. That night, I went to sleep happy and smiled at myself. I finally got a chance to make my family’s wish come true.