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Live by Design is a weekly News24 column by Dr Helena Dolny and Mapi Mhlangu on mortality and the conversations around it. This week, guest columnist Bhekisisa Mncube makes a case for respecting the will of the departed, for their last wishes carry the weight of their life.
It's done! Yes, my work on this earth is complete.
My late big brother’s daughter, Zama Mncube, has fulfilled a prophecy, a dream, and a joint plan we had with my late best friend. She wrote this week to the MaMlambo family WhatsApp group: "It's official; I am graduating with my master's degree (management sciences) this year."
My heart leapt with joy. Yet, I remained seated, contemplating how something discussed by two dreamers in the early '90s could be achieved by a second generation.
This week marks 23 years since my brother, Bhekuyise Wilfred Mncube (1969 - 2001), perished on 10 April.
I didn't cry when he died. I wanted to, but there was no time; I had to organise a funeral, yet I was broke, and my father, now deceased, perpetually never had money for his children, dead or alive. By a stroke of luck, my brother's then lecturer in history, Dr Catherine Burns, was aware of a student's life policy linked to the former University of Natal.
My brother was pursuing his master's degree there when he died. The policy swiftly paid out R10 000. My brother's coffin and transport from Durban to Ulundi, 250 kilometres away, cost a mere R2 000. The rest of the money was used for funeral expenses at home, and I got some change, perhaps R2 000.
I have been flipping that R2 000 to educate my brother's kids.
Some money was ostensibly used to buy a cow for the upkeep of my brother's children. I do not remember what happened to that plan; it was my father's scheme. The true tale centres on my brother's final wishes.
Furthermore, he said I must help Nelisiwe (our younger sister) acquire a university education.
Sadly, Zama, set to graduate with her master's degree in May, was effectively abandoned as a child. The intention may not have been deliberate, but the outcome was the same. She grew up without a father or access to the paternal side of the family. Raised by her single mother, who is also now deceased, Zama's maternal grandparents died when she was young. Adding to the trauma, by the time she sought her roots after completing matric, my brother had long died.
Thus, she struggled emotionally, and her first foray into university was a disaster. She disappeared from my life for a few years. One day, my late mother phoned, always cool as a cucumber. She said: "Zama is here (Ulundi); she wants to return to varsity." I tried to explain that I couldn't, but Mama said, "xola" (forget the past), and I did.
Zama returned to university, coinciding with the period when I was unemployed. We both struggled, but hers was worse; she stayed in an informal settlement in iNanda, north of Durban, with relatives who turned out to be the worst form of human beings due to nothing else but jealousy.
She persevered and passed her first year. We struggled through undergraduate levels together, including her dealing with a sex pest who wanted sex in exchange for a room on campus. I hounded the sex pest out of Durban University of Technology (DUT), and out of Durban.
Perhaps during her second year, she asked permission to join the leadership of the student movement. Before I knew it, she was the student representative council president. Both her late father and I had done the same things at varsity. Since then, she has been a servant to the people and has enjoyed her life, which she "lives in service of humanity.
She is now the president of the DUT University Convocation. For me, it is comforting that she (Zama) can call "bullshit" by its first name because that's what a university education allows one to do.
We managed to bring Nsiko home earlier. Despite the odds against her, including having to repeat matric, she successfully completed a TVET course in farming management. She now works in the retail sector as a deputy supervisor for fruit and vegetables at Boxer supermarket stores.
The third child, Professor (largely supported by his mother), is currently in his third year at Rhodes University studying economics and is a top student there, despite having dropped out of medical school a few years before.
My younger sister, whom I supported through undergraduate studies, Nelisiwe, holds a Bachelor of Commerce in business management and information systems, as well as an honours degree in supply chain management. She works at the University of KwaZulu-Natal's National Institute for Theoretical and Computational Sciences as the acting PR and marketing manager.
I am not anxious about my so-called biological children; my eldest son, Wandile, needs no support as he is a candidate attorney. My youngest daughter, Nonku, is in her second year at the University of Cape Town, studying for a BA degree in English literature and computer sciences and thoroughly enjoying her life there.
My anxiety was always about my brother's children and his last wishes to assist them and our younger sister. I am glad it all came to fruition in 23 years.
Anyway, I cried for my brother every year for 10 years. I didn't leave the house on this day (10 April) for many years until I sought professional counselling. I never thought the day would come when I say it is done.
I cried while writing this column because I still miss my brother. There is no death in the family that cuts deeper than the loss of my best friend. We dreamt of obtaining degrees, raising our children, and getting married, but most importantly, we wanted to provide a soft life for our dear mother, uMaMlambo (now late), who lived under her husband's thumb.
Anyway, before this becomes a sermon, I say, "If I perish, I perish. I have run my race. I have kept the faith."
- Mncube is an author, an award-winning resident columnist for The Witness, and a regular eNCA commentator on politics.
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