Biography of Barbara Lawrence Strydom the Aunty of Africa

THE FABRIC OF HERITAGE, MY BIRTH AND EARLY CHILDHOOD AGAINST THE BACKDROP OF APARTHEID

My investigation into Addington Hospital revealed significant construction and an opening ceremony four years before my birth in November. It appeared that, even at a governmental level, there was a sense of preparation for my arrival at this Durban beachfront hospital. The politics of birth there were murky, shadowed by apartheid’s stringent racial divisions.

My mother, Zelda Anderson Lawrence, born to Jessie Harris and David Anderson, never met her mother, Jessie. She hailed from the then-Transkei-Ponderland, near Port St. John’s in a place called Mzwagazi. We recently had the privilege to do our tour home, a poignant journey given that she had never seen her mother, who left when she was merely nine months old. Her father had departed for the Second World War, leaving her in the care of his uncle and aunt, Mary Anderson nee Van Zyl and William Anderson, my Ouma and Oupa. I have coined the term Inkaba Healing Journeys to honour all the facets of joy and pain, unspoken, assumed and uncomfortable to honour the personal story.

The onset of the homelands policy spurred a significant migration to the cities, and they were among the early families forming Wentworth, a “coloured” community in Durban. Thus, I was born into a richly diverse family heritage, with my mother of Chinese and Khoisan descent, and my father carrying the Lawrence- Dickens and Mkhize- Ndlovu lineages.

As the firstborn of six, I experienced profound love and preparation, spending three and a half years as the sole child before sharing my parents with four siblings by the age of eight. My birth is fondly regaled by my parents with an ambulance ride and my birth with Matron Hulley at about 8.30pm. My mom remembers that I was born with a veil, a symbol of luck she says and a tooth. I hear stories of standing by 8 months and walking by 9 with speaking before my first birthday. My parents share my first train ride from Rossburg station to Port Shepstone then on the Goods bus to visit my grandparents on the farm. Not much has changed at 53, I love travel accept that cars, planes, boats are now included in the stories.

A life-changing moment came in 1974 when my father, a twin and one of nine siblings, was involved in a horrific accident. We soon relocated in December 1976 to live on the family farm in Nqabeni and closer to our grandmother, MaMkhize, and developed my interwoven tapestry of our family languages: English, isiZulu, Xhosa, and Pondo, in a seamlessly I never questioned until adolescence. We were all called uMakhi in our village, fondly a shortened word for neighbour and it was so fluid until it was highlighted as very uncommon to all have the same name.

My family left the city to embrace farm life and watching my mom helping dad building a home with no electricity and drawing water from the river. My early school days were marked by a six-kilometre walk each way together with my cousin, igniting a lifelong appreciation for the simple, grounding elements of life, far removed from materialistic definitions of success.

These formative years sculpted my understanding of identity, heritage, and belonging. They set the stage for a lifetime journey outside conventional spaces, notably when my father became a pastor in the Indian community of Langalibalele, introducing us to a new cultural landscape and further enriching my complex heritage. This journey, rooted in a deeply ingrained familial and cultural legacy, has been my guide through the intricate expansion of my life’s experiences, crafting a narrative of strength, identity, and unyielding connection to my ancestry.

Words Ignite: A Journey from the Flames of Langalibalele to the Power of Literacy

Not long after the passing of my grandmother we relocated from our new home in the farming village of Langalibalele, nestled in the scenic hills of the Oribi Gorge area, a landscape of breathtaking beauty dotted with fields of abundant produce. This was a community rooted in farming and fresh food.

From the tender age of three, my father taught me to read, instilling in me a profound love for Bible stories and scripture recitation. My cherished verse, John 1:1, states, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God.” This verse underlines my belief in the importance and power of words.

My dad’s new position as a pastor led to our relocation to our new home and school during a time in South Africa when racial segregation dictated much of life’s experiences. I was classified as “Coloured,” a label that significantly shaped my existence on this beautiful planet. Despite this, I was granted special permission to attend an Indian school, though this meant a delayed start to my education that year.

At this new school, I forged many friendships, learned new languages, and was exposed to diverse foods, traditions, and cultures. Despite the long 10km walk to school, my academic achievements were a source of pride and joy. I relished learning and excelled academically, compensating for my lack of sports accolades with book awards, nurturing my burgeoning home library.

My school holidays were spent balancing household duties with my passion for reading, offering me an escape into worlds beyond my immediate control. This escapism was fundamental, especially recalling a nightmarish event where the serene glow of a candle led to a devastating fire, awakening me to flames and fear, yet miraculously my sister and I escaped physical harm. This incident and a subsequent fire left an indelible mark, transforming spaces in our home into reminders of those harrowing nights.

Now, as an author and literacy advocate, I understand how words and reading shaped my life, igniting a passion born from my rural upbringing. My journey underscores the transformative power of literacy and the importance of nurturing one’s passions and skills.

In the realm of education, every discipline interweaves with words, from the numerical language of mathematics to the musical notes that compose melodies, and the scientific terms that fill tables of knowledge. My story is a testament to the enduring power of words, urging us all to embrace and fall in love with the medium that shapes our understanding and interaction with the world.

FULL STORY IN BIO-MAGAZINE