AUDITIONING FOR GENERATIONS

In 2005 I was living in Secunda and my mom saw an advert in the newspaper that they were looking for new actors for Generations and other TV shows. The auditions were the following Saturday. We phoned and got an appointment for 11:00 am at the studios in Orange Grove. Angela was the person in charge.

I arrived at the studios, did my audition, and Angela told me I was great on camera. I really thought I’d made it. In the taxi on my way back home I received an SMS: ‘Congratulations, you made it. The camera loves you.’

I couldn’t stop myself laughing and even showed the message to the lady seated next to me. Later another SMS came saying that I needed to register for an Acting Master Class in order to qualify. I should come back with R500 administration fees and R2 500 for a six-week acting course. I was surprised but still determined. I thought if I did the course, they would get me a part on Generations.

My mom got in touch with an aunt in Ennerdale who invited me to stay and offered to pay for the course. I passed and received my certificate. But till today, that acting agency that guaranteed me work if I did the course hasn’t called me for a single audition.

Madoda Ntuli

HUSTLING

Tshaba remembers when he was a street kid in Durban. ‘When I lived on the streets of Durban, me and the boys would make some money at Umhlanga on the Durban beach front. We used to say that Durban is always summer so there are always people swimming. We would keep things safe from mamparas (crooks) when people went into the sea.

In the beginning, we worked as spies and caught the street boys stealing people’s things. So the lifeguards got to know and trust us and helped us get more business. We never said, ‘Let’s start a business.’ But we would go to the beach and see how these mamparas would steal people’s bags when they were swimming. They made us street kids look bad. Not all street kids take drugs and steal. They called us the ‘izimpimpi’ (‘the spies’).

We didn’t want to be chased from the beach. The lifeguards trusted us. They would tell tourists, ‘Those five guys will keep an eye on your things.’ So then these white people started to ask us to look after their things when they swam. In return they would give us R10 or nice clean food, not from the bin. Freshly bought. We did this for months. We called ourselves ‘The Board of Trustees of the Beach’.

For Madoda, hustling is a constant way of life. ‘One Christmas with the money I earned from Vaya I bought 50 very small bottles of Avon perfume. I wanted to create a market in Durban to sell them. Girls I knew said they liked it. I took the bottles home to my mother’s house to store them. But my relatives took the stock for themselves and to give as Christmas presents to friends. My granny took one and applied the whole bottle to her body. That day in the pension queue you could smell her from far and wide.

Tshabalira Lebakeng and Madoda Ntuli

WORK AT A CALL CENTRE

In Joburg everyone is looking for a job. As a young person born and bred in the township, job opportunities are slim. There are no jobs around the townships unless you create one for yourself, so you have to travel to town to look for work.

In 2004 I was desperately looking for work because my woman was pregnant. As a man I needed to take full responsibility by supporting my newborn baby. One day I saw an advert for telemarketing. I called to find out if I could apply. I was told that they needed someone with good English for the job. I was excited because I’d done marketing. I speak good English, so I felt confident.

They told me to come on Monday for an interview in Randburg. When I got there I found lots of people waiting to be interviewed. A guy came and said we were going for training. I asked what had happened to the interview. He said that there was no interview. Everyone qualified. You had to do the training, which cost R300, and you would have the job. I told him I was unemployed and didn’t have R300, but he wasn’t interested. So I went away and borrowed R800 for training and for transport to get from Soweto back to Randburg.

Tuesday, the job started. I was given a desk, a telephone and phone directory. The first call I made was to my mother, telling her I had a job! Then I started calling and calling, inviting clients to come for a presentation on leisure timeshare holidays for couples and families. There was no basic salary. We were only paid on commission.

It was hard work convincing people but I managed to book some clients. But I was told that some of the clients I had booked hadn’t come to the presentation, so that didn’t count. I called the clients and discovered that some of them had come. I asked a lady working there what was going on. She said everyone knew that the supervisors would steal your clients so that they could make a better commission for themselves.

I decided to go to the manager. I discovered I only had four clients out of the 40 I’d booked. He didn’t care. He said the other people probably hadn’t come to the presentations. But I knew that wasn’t true. The supervisor had just taken my clients.

That’s when I realised that I wouldn’t make any money on that job. After two weeks there I had only earned R400. And I still had to pay my transport and the loan of R800. So I quit and didn’t go back.

Anthony Mafela

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