16 July 2016 is the day that I started working at my previous firm.
Before this, I had been wholeheartedly job hunting for articles for about 4 months with not a single interview. One day I received a call for an interview in Pretoria East and so I drove from Rustenburg with a prayer in my hears all the way. Your girl nailed the interview and started working 3 weeks later. The 16th of July 2016. My first day was a blur of information and when lunchtime came I headed out to sit in my car. I took the opportunity to call my mom and told her everything. I ate. I didn’t spend the full hour outside and then came back in. The moment I walked in, the candidate attorney who was training me scolded me for taking lunch. Her words were, “ you don’t get lunch.” I found it strange but I let it be. The following day I needed to go to the pharmacy at lunch and headed on out. While driving I received a call from the office asking where I was. I confusingly checked my time again just to make sure it was 12 o’clock and proudly said, “it is my lunch time. I am going to the pharmacy.” My supervisor, who was the one who had called, then informed me that I need to tell her if I was going off the property during lunch. I was confused but I realised very quickly that lunch time was clearly not my own. I made peace with this and got into the habit if not taking lunch. I ate at my desk and carried on working. The culture was clearly entrenched in the company that certain employees were not afforded as many rights as previously thought. Fast forward to the two candidates who were training me leaving the company. I took over the work of two people. This was court visits, drafting and general admin. It was clear to my co-workers that I was overwhelmed but as common practice with interns and even more so in the legal fraternity I was here for my articles ad there was nothing that I could do about it. Candidate attorneys are easily replaceable. After a few months of roughing it out alone it was clear that this was indeed the work of two people and another candidate was thankfully hired. She has since become like a sister to me, but that is a story for another day. We worked 7 am – 8 pm on most days during high volume period. Our work was still never done. The two year passed in more of a blur with the additional stress of board exams, evening classes and Masters. I was constantly stressed and the worst was still to come. The Law Society (Legal Practitioners Council) has conveniently never reviewed how much abuse candidate attorneys go through in their time of articles. I constantly say that the most unfair practises and rules are within the legal fraternity. The affidavit that you work towards in order to be admitted as an attorney of the High Court comes at a high price. Usually just your sanity, but probably your liver too. After my favourite co-worker finished her articles the firm did not offer her place to stay. This left me alone, again. At this point though, the department had downsized and the two support staff that we had were either moved to other departments or left the company. In the legal department it was me, my supervisor and my boss. Down from six to three. My supervisor was tasked with the call center management and then I was tasked with the management of the legal aspects of all our clients. This technically meant that it was just me in the legal department doing all of the ground work. My supervisor then went on maternity leave. I began working from 7am up until 10 and even 11pm for over 3 months. It makes me emotional at times that for months I never saw a sunset or sunrise because of my schedule. I would be in absolute awe when I was able to experience these little joys. In the space of one month during the excessive stress from work, I lost both my maternal grandmother and my youngest niece. I broke. For two days I couldn’t get out of bed. I couldn’t even reach for the alcohol that id been using as a coping mechanism. I had gained an excess of 10kgs because I genuinely had no time to cook or care for myself. Luckily the two days that I disappeared from work were right before the weekend and so in theory I was able to rest for 4 days. When I finally returned to the office I was summoned to the bosses office. After explaining what had happened, I was offered therapy. The offer was not to reduce my stress or work load but rather to attempt to fix the broken, well oiled machine who was desperate for her affidavit. I still took the offer though and went to therapy. My therapist immediately advised me after the first session that she was going to book me off work and send me to a wellness clinic because I was on the thinnest line towards burn out. I declined. Remember how I said that the law society has crazy rules? Well, as a candidate you cannot be absent from work for over 30 days. You guessed it, no falling pregnant, no admission to mental health institutions and all of that apparently unnecessary absenteeism that humans are susceptible to. I was then placed on various medication for stress, anxiety and depression. I pushed on until I wrote my last board exam with the firm, because that was my exit strategy. I didn’t pass the exam. The moment that I found out, I made the decision to quit my job. I couldn't do it anymore. I was one exam pass away from admission but I just could not reconcile staying at this firm until 2020 where I could rewrite. And so I quit. This is something that I never do. I am a finisher. I have a high work ethic and drive. In this instance, I just could not carry on. In the process of me serving my notice the department I was in hired 3 people to replace me. I trained all of them and i throw up a little prayer for them every time I think about it. 31 October 2019 was my last day. I’m back to being unemployed but my heart is at peace. I have written my last exam and await the results. Wish me luck.
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The other day I read an article about how we are the generation that is losing out on having hobbies.
In part I agree with this and in part I disagree. I think that a lot of millennials have hobbies, but the way the economy is set up, our hobbies have turned into a side hustle to supplement our main source of income. One cannot simply enjoy doing hair, making earring or painting. It must make money or else you are wasting your talent. I find this very odd and unfortunate, but it is something that I have noticed. Why did I start off like this though? This has nothing to do with what I collect right? Well, let me tell you why it does. When I was in high school I had two main hobbies. 1. Reading 2. Arts and craft/DIY Projects There isn’t much to elaborate on the reading part but the arts and crafts is another story! Let me tell you, I was and am the Queen of Arts and Crafts. Having had been a Sunday School teacher for years on end I could make activities for kids out of scrap and they would enjoy it to no end. I also begged my parents for all the equipment to make jewelry after seeing a television ad that had a box set. Luckily for me, my parents indulged me and after working some odd jobs around the house I got the set! So began my love for making jewelry. At some point I was selling my excess work and doing special orders. As time passed though I got busy with varsity and this hobby fell away. Over the past two years, I have amassed a pretty large collection of earring that I have been buying from various markets and on sale at as equally varied shops. When I was doing a bit of stocktaking at the start of the year, I realised that this is what I collect. I love earring. In fact I love them so much that I refer to them as art. Art for my ears. My childhood hobby reinvented itself into what I now collect. On my hair page I am currently going through my art collection and each pair of earring really does have a story it seems. Follow me on there to read more. Since 2017 I have been big on themes for the year. They usually set the tone for my year even if I forget halfway through. I am certain that this is because speaking into existence your intentions is immensely powerful.
This can be both positive and negative depending on how you look at it. Say for instance you constantly say negative over your body, your situation or even how you are feeling. Your negative energy is being spoken to the Universe as if it is a truth, which it isn’t. The way we speak to ourselves and about ourselves is something that we need to become more cognitive of as the impacts are beyond powerful and telling. It gives others leeway to talk to you in a similar manner. More impactful than that for me though is how those same words that I have spoken negatively about myself come to haunt me at the oddest time of the day. A silly example of this is how I don’t wear jeans. Primarily because I don’t like pants and then finding the perfect jean is not a hunt that interests me in the slightest. Instead of saying this though, I have found myself saying that I don’t look good in jeans. I have said this statement so often that I have come to believe it. I have actively spoken this untruth and negative energy so many times to myself and others that I have come to believe it. I say that it is an untruth because I genuinely don’t look awful in jeans. I just don’t have the patience for them. I enjoy my crop tops and high waisted skirts. This silly example goes to how we speak about ourselves. Which is why speaking positive words is not a luxury but a necessity. It is not an act of been self-absorbed or vain but a manner to guide our path on a positive trajectory. Having had said this, 2020 seems to be a year that everything will be whole given that the number 2020 seems so perfect. My word for the year is self-reflection. I am taking this year to actively seek out becoming more whole than I have been. I am doing the work by taking chances on things that I want. I am doing the work by saying no to things that do not make me happy. I am doing the work by spending time and money on myself and not feeling guilty about it. I am doing the work by constantly reflecting and making sure that I am okay. What is your word for the year? Or perhaps you have a whole sentence? Do share! Now you might think that this statement is a bit wacky because if you look at my picture I am quite clearly of the African heritage. There is however a very big difference to being black and having a traditionally African colouring. The first, being black, has more to do with the manner in which a person acts while the second, being African, mostly refers to the colour of your skin. Now, most of my life I have tried to SOLELY classify myself as African. I mean there is no running away from the fact that I am the colour that I am and I would never want to. I use to classify myself as only African because of my skin colour. To me nothing else made me African. Yes I speak my mother tongue (which is TshiVenda) but a person who isn’t “African” could also speak my language. How often have you been in Jo’burg city and the shop owner speaks all the official languages? Thus speaking my Mother tongue really isn’t helping me become more black is it? To me, being African had to do with skin colour. This was further perpetuated by the fact that ‘black’ people in America are called African American. You see. Solely because of their melanin count they were called African. They didn’t participate in any cultural event did they? Was there initiation school for their young adults? Do they pay lobola? I doubt it. Yet, they are still classified as African. So in my mind I agreed with this. I believed that I was solely African based on the colour of my skin. Then in 2011 I cut off all my hair. You are probably wondering how going bald turned me from being African to Black. There is a bit of a back story to that which I must first briefly explain. When I grew up I was bombarded with the idea that to attain beauty there were certain minimum standards that had to be met. One of those standards that was the most powerful in my upbringing was this ideal that in order to be considered beautiful my hair had to have a certain bounce, a certain silkiness and definitely a certain length. I will embark on that full story another time but for the moment it is sufficient to say that before I turned 21 my views on beauty meant that I would subject my scalp and my hair to chemicals that could dissolve a coke can all because the result would leave my hair straight and silky for a month until I had to do the whole process again. Now here I was. New hair. (or perhaps old hair since this chemical free hair is my original hair). I had to redefine who I was because I no longer fit into the mould that was expected of me as a young black woman who was striving to become a professional person. (Oh the things I could write about the professional world and having natural hair… I might just have to, anyway.) This is where the blackness set in. As I said before being black has to do with a manner of living, how you act and not necessarily the melanin count that you are born with. It was empowering to learn to be proud of not only the texture of my hair but to be proud of my blackness as a whole. It is surprising to me that it is acceptable for me to wear a traditionally patterned skirt on campus and around the streets of where I live all because my hair has changed. Best believe that if I had a weave in my hair then I would be questioned as to whether I was going somewhere special. I know this because I have been that girl with a weave in traditional clothes. Having my natural hair automatically demanded respect from other black people. I had finally embraced who I was. How crazy is that? This experience did teach me something though I slowly started to realise that I had always been black. I may speak with an accent that may have you questioning my origins. I may bring concepts like feminism into the conversation with traditional older people. I may even enjoy reading Dan Brown rather than Steve Biko but I have always been black. My preference in music does not make my skin lighter or my soul any whiter. My blackness is not the same as the next person. However, the mere fact that I don’t slaughter a goat because lighting struck my house does not negate that I am black. I speak my home language. I also speak English and Afrikaans. That just makes it easier to communicate with other people. I enjoy reading weird indie books without feeling bad about not watching the movie even though it may not considered cool to read as a black person. I don’t care that I am labelled a nerd. I definitely don’t care when you say that I am a non-traditionalist because I am a Christian. I don’t like using taxi’s because I was privileged enough to grow up in a family with cars. None of those labels that you think make me less of a black person make me less of a black person. In fact I think that these very things make me a black person. Let me explain. Black people as a race are pretty resilient in life. We have lived through being colonized, slavery and segregation. Somewhere in that we haven’t lost who we are as a people. We can be taught a strange language from across the sea and still stay true to who we are. We can be introduced to sushi but still prefer pap. So the labels you give and that I may try and convince myself are true really aren’t a true testament to who I am. I am African because of my skin colour but I am black because that is the core of who I am. |
AuthorIntersectional Feminist. Hopeless Romantic. Lover of Life. Archives
January 2018
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