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Susan Tseremane - a hero in the true sense
Who is Susan Tseremane. No, not a veteran of the South African Liberation struggle. She did not fight to bring democracy to this great nation. She was not one of the great people who helped the poor and the HIV suffers. But she was a hero in the greatest kind.
Susan Tseremane was, what we call in South Africa, our Domestic. This is the local term for the cleaning lady, or maid. She worked in my parents house for 22 years. As my parents are both professionals, she also had a hand at looking after us children.
She was a single mother who worked so very hard to give her daughter the best she could. Whilst working for us, she also learned how to read and write, to be able to help her daughter when she goes to school.
She was an extremely hard worker, and someone with a very strong personality. She had this weird thing, where she'd decides every now and then that she does not like my mothers (quite modern) interior decorating. When my mother got home at 6, the whole house would be redecorated with all the old stuff we keep in the garage or attic, in very strange ways.
She was a very simple and honest woman, a god fearing christian, who would, when I was a student coming home for holidays, wake me up very early, and give me a stern speech about my bad habits, when I was nursing a hang over from the previous night. But a few minutes later, I could hear her praying for me in the kitchen.
I remember sharing two of her proudest moments with her. One being when she finally got a real brick walled house (which my father had build for her). It was very small and basic, but you would think it was the greatest palace in the world looking at her reaction. And remembering that she lived in a sink shack before that, it was. The second was when her daughter finished nursing college top of her class (no one in her family have ever even finished school before!). I remember then thinking how much clothes Susan had to iron, how many times she had to dust our furniture to be able to give her daughter this opportunity in life.
I also remember the day after Nelson Mandela's inauguration. My father asked her if she thinks things will change now. She answered that they already have. When my father asked her how, she replied �Yesterday, you where my baas (boss, and also a term black had to use when addressing a white man), today you are my employer�
This was a simple woman, who just did her work, always did it with a smile, always had time to stop and talk, always cared, and always would say a prayer for me (she called me Marueti - a naughty monkey). She gave me the love for the traditional African story, used to teach children. She gave our family the best years of her life. And all this to give her daughter a change at life. True heroism
She passed away last night.
Hambla Gathle Susan Tseremane
May the peace be with you now
AH
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“The subject no longer has to be mentioned by name. Someone is sick. Someone else is feeling better now. A friend has just gone back into the hospital. Another has died. The unspoken name, of course, is AIDS.”
“From the point of view of the pharmaceutical industry, the AIDS problem has already been solved. After all, we already have a drug which can be sold at the incredible price of $8, 000 an annual dose, and which has the added virtue of not diminishing the market by actually curing anyone.”
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