Before the school gates

The First Battle started long before private school.

Before rich friends.

Before comparison.

Before I even knew different worlds existed.

As my mind drifts back in time, I remember the January summer breeze of 2006 touching my skin.

I remember.

A time when a little version of me was about to tackle the world for the first time.

Just like the warriors I would later become while re-enacting scenes from my favourite movies, the same movies my father used to hire from our local movie store.

There I was.

About to step into the unknown.

A place every child eventually has to face.

School.

I remember the smiles on my mother and father’s faces that morning as they took photographs of me wearing my first school uniform and carrying my red school bag after watching Takalani Sesami.

Then off we went.

To my first battlefield.

The local school in my hometown.

The First Battle Begins:The First Battle

The first day felt wild.

Seeing my parents hand me over to my teacher, my new parent for the day, was the first time reality truly hit me.

My heart started racing.

I had no idea what to expect.

As she walked me towards the other children, my new peers, boys and girls my age, I felt everything at once.

Excitement.

Fear.

Joy.

Curiosity.

It was a completely new world.

As the months passed, Grade 1 gave me my first two real friends.

Best friends.

I’d visit their homes.

They’d visit mine.

Eventually our parents knew one another.

Our friendship brought strangers together without any of us realising it.

There was a strange power children had back then.

Break-Time Wars: The First Battle

At school something else happened too.

The Grade 1 gang of black boys would unite during break time and declare war on the white boys.

Sometimes even the older white boys.

Whenever we were outnumbered, we’d recruit reinforcements from Grade 2.

“Majita Makgoa!”

And suddenly the recruits would arrive.

Then the battle would begin.

Punches thrown.

Punches received.

Running.

Shouting.

Pure chaos.

The strange thing is that we weren’t fighting because we hated the white children.

And from what I remember, they weren’t fighting because they hated us either.

That became clear one day at Wolfdolf.

My father and I were waiting for our fish and chips order when one of the boys from school walked in with his father.

As our parents stood there unaware, me and the boy looked at each other.

We both raised our fists.

Then we smiled.

And carried on.

Looking back now, that memory stayed with me far longer than any playground fight.

Because it never made sense.

At school we were enemies.

At Wolfdolf we were just children.

I still don’t fully know why the black boys and white boys fought each other back then.

What I do know is that it didn’t feel like hatred.

It didn’t feel like racism.

It felt like something else.

Looking back now, I realise moments like these often reveal how children absorb ideas, identities and group behaviour long before they understand them.

Many of those patterns form inside the wider environment that raises us… explored deeper in South African Upbringing.

Something none of us really understood.

But at the time…

it was fun.

I used to look forward to school the next day just so break time could arrive again.

The World We Built: The First Battle

One of the biggest advantages of growing up in a town like Orkney was that your friends’ houses were all within walking distance.

The furthest you would probably walk was around fifteen minutes.

Most of the time it was closer to three or five.

Meaning after school you could go home, change clothes, eat quickly, then head straight to your friends.

As a gang of boys, fun was simple.

Back then we didn’t need the distractions many friendships in later years would become dependent on.

No money.

No fancy plans.

No social media.

Just imagination.

Off we went, allowing our creativity to run wild like a group of devoted business partners preparing for the biggest merger of their lives.

The first thing we would do was gather at the house of whichever friend had the biggest yard.

But more importantly…

the most sand.

Sand was everything.

We would carve roads into the ground with our hands.

Build intersections.

Create highways.

Design entire neighbourhoods.

For those few hours we weren’t children anymore.

We were civil engineers.

Transportation planners.

Town builders.

Each of us had a role.

Once the roads were complete, the next phase began.

We would collect bricks and use them as cars.

Suddenly the town came alive.

Traffic moved.

Deliveries happened.

Businesses opened.

People travelled.

At least in our minds.

Looking back now…

it’s funny how little we needed to create an entire world.

And looking back now…

I realise those moments were never really about sand roads or brick cars.

They were part of the wider environment that shaped us growing up in a small South African mining town… explored deeper in Growing Up In Orkney.

My First Experience with Diversity

Let’s zoom in.

From all my friends back then, I had two very close friends.

Best friends growing up.

One lived about five minutes away.

The other lived around fifteen to thirty minutes away, too far for a Grade 1 child to walk alone.

So naturally, I spent most of my time with the friend who lived closer.

What was interesting was that he came from a completely different background.

His family was from Mozambique.

Back then I didn’t think much of it.

He was simply my friend.

But whenever I went to his house, I experienced things that felt different from what I knew at home.

Especially the food.

When his mother cooked for us…

my word.

The food was incredible.

The ingredients weren’t necessarily different.

The cooking style was.

The taste was.

The experience was.

Looking back now, I think moments like that planted a small seed inside my mind.

A seed that whispered:

There is more than one way to live.

More than one way to do things.

Looking back now, those early experiences exposed me to the diversity that has always been part of South Africa’s cultural story.

More than one way to experience the world.

I didn’t have those words back then.

I was only a child.

But the seed was planted.

Maybe that’s why today I enjoy exploring new ideas, new challenges and new experiences.

Because somewhere in those early years I learned that life wasn’t limited to what existed inside my own household.

My friend also introduced me to something else.

A PlayStation 2.

At the time I didn’t even know what a PlayStation was.

All I knew were the games on DStv that you could unlock with airtime and play until the time expired.

Suddenly there was Need for Speed.

Action games.

Entire worlds living inside a television screen.

For hours we’d sit there playing together.

Competing.

Laughing.

Getting completely lost in it.

Then the next morning he would stop by my house.

On the way we’d already start eating parts of our lunch long before break time arrived.

Then we’d stop at the petrol station.

There was a lady who worked there who was always sweet and funny.

Whenever she saw us, she’d pretend we were cars running low on fuel.

She would place her hand against the side of our waists and tell us she was filling us up with petrol before sending us on our way.

Then off we went to school.

Looking back now…

it’s funny how little moments like that stay with you.

Some friendships leave a bigger mark than we realise at the time.

Years later, I would come to understand how deeply those early relationships helped shape the way I saw people, loyalty and life itself… explored further in The Friends Who Shaped My Mind.

The First Battle at School: The First Battle

School itself never really grabbed my attention the way it seemed to grab some of the other children.

I remember one day being kept after school.

The teacher gave me extra work and told me to write A, B and C neatly on the lines in my workbook.

Simple enough.

But after a long day my head was pounding.

I was tired.

And for some reason something inside me just switched off.

Instead of writing neatly on the lines like I was told, I completely did my own thing.

I ended up stretching one sentence across an entire page.

Not out of disrespect.

Not because I was trying to rebel.

I honestly don’t know why I did it.

Something inside me simply refused to follow the instruction properly.

When I finished, I walked outside and waited for my parents.

I remember my teacher speaking to them.

Words were exchanged.

But to be honest…

I wasn’t really listening.

I was a child.

I was already somewhere else in my imagination.

Then the school year ended.

And while everybody else was preparing for the next grade…

something happened that I never expected.

Because in my mind I was supposed to be going to Grade 2.

Instead…

everything changed.

The Test That Changed Everything

Maybe three weeks before schools opened, my parents dropped a bombshell.

They told me they were planning to move me to a private school in Klerksdorp.

To be honest, I didn’t really understand what private school meant.

I don’t think I fully understood what they were telling me at all.

Looking back now, if I had to guess, I think my teachers believed I was struggling academically.

Maybe they thought I was a slow learner.

Maybe they thought I wasn’t suited to the normal learning environment.

Whatever the reason was, my parents weren’t ready to give up on me.

They believed there was another path.

Looking back now, I understand that decision came from the same sacrifice, belief and determination that shaped my earliest years… qualities I reflect on deeper in The First Builder In My Life.

And they were willing to try it.

The interesting thing was that the private school didn’t simply accept new students.

Before admission, we had to go through an assessment.

And alongside me was one of my closest friends.

For about a week we attended sessions with a wonderful teacher who evaluated us through games, activities and exercises.

At the time I thought we were simply playing.

I had no idea we were being assessed.

One morning his parents would take us.

The next morning mine would.

And before long the results came back.

We both passed.

We both qualified.

And just like that…

my path changed.

Or at least I thought it would.

The Beginning of Two Worlds

Then came the morning I’ll never forget.

My friend arrived to collect me for school, just like he always did.

Only this time my mother stopped him.

Then she said something that completely changed the direction of my life.

“He doesn’t go to school here anymore.”

I stood there watching my friend leave without me.

My heart broke.

Not because I was scared.

Not because of private school.

Because for the first time I realised something important.

Life doesn’t ask for permission before it changes.

Then another surprise arrived.

I wasn’t going into Grade 2.

I was going to repeat Grade 1 at my new school.

At the time it felt confusing.

Unfair even.

But looking back now…

I think that was the exact moment my life started moving between two different worlds.

One world was already behind me.

The other was waiting for me in Klerksdorp.

And I had no idea what was coming next.