See it through her eyes

When reminiscing, Nandi Tshabalala never fails to mention the incident where one of her best friends, Boitumelo Senganga, climbed the bicycle art display. This is just one of the crazy things that Nandi has done since being here at Rhodes, although this is not the girl that entered Canterbury Annexe at the beginning of the year. In fact, there is a vast difference between the woman who sits in front of me and the one this very lady claims she was when the year started. Her favourite comment “I was wet behind the ears” constantly springs up the during our conversation, not forgetting how much she appreciates friendship as it was her friends who helped her survive the hard times that first year can throw. “Rhodes has always been my first choice”, she says as she grabs the Hunters Dry and gently places it on her lips, taking slow sips before continuing “when my father and I came here last year, I thought I had made the wrong choice. The place was dead.” That was the only disappointment she had with regards to applying to Rhodes. When she got here, though, it was easy to realise that the students really make the life considering that it is a University City. Having been born and bred in a small town, Nandi never wanted to live in a big city such as Johannesburg when in university, although she admits that Rhodes, and especially its students, are no different from Wits and UCT, for instance. A tiny grin appears on her face as she describes her first day at Rhodes, the long drive from Potchefstroom to Grahamstown allowed her to reflect on the choice she had made, and the decision indeed proved to be an excellent one especially after listening to her father, a Britney Spears fanatic, singing the whole way.

At the tender age of seventeen, Nandi had never even dreamt that leaving home and living all by herself in another Province would come so soon. As a girl who was once told by an external moderator that “she speaks Afrikaans as if she’s from Potch”, Nandi delighted in the fact that Grahamstown would appreciate a well-ground lady, whose Afrikaans is immaculate, such as herself. In surviving first year, one is often pre-warned about seal-clubbing, what one does when they are raped. This talk is especially emphasised in girls’ residences as society reflects that women are more likely to become victims in rape incidents. What sub-wardens and the likes cannot do, though, is give one a manual on how to survive the social stratification one may experience in their first year; and although there may be counselling centres that one is encouraged to go to, the counsellors will not always be there with you when you really miss Tracy and Sipho, her younger siblings, as Nandi did in her first term. The friends she has now are not the ones she thought she would have as, during her high school days, she made friends with a specific group of girls that always stayed in large numbers.

As she turns to walk out of the room to get a glass of water, I witness a flash of leaves in her hair, black marks on her hair and a blaze of camouflage. Nandi is indeed a survivor in this first year craze. Adaptation is a necessity, and is something she has achieved. It’s interesting to see how many people get homesick and depressed when they leave home. Fear grips an unsuspecting teen and never ceases. Needless to say, everyone is familiar this detachment from reality, only a few survive.