I Am a Girl from Africa

by Elizabeth Nyamayaro

  * * *

  A year after Amai sends me to live in Harare with Aunt Jane and Uncle Sam, she shows up at my school unannounced. I see her standing outside the school gate one afternoon after the final bell. She has a big smile on her face and is wearing her best red dress, the one with the big white buttons, now slightly faded from the sun. Her brown canvas shoes are so worn in places that a hole exposes her right little toe. I don’t want the British children to make fun of me because of Amai’s clothes, so I walk away from her. After all, she left me twice, and I am not yet ready to fully forgive her.

  “Hello, Lizzy.” She chases after me, still smiling. I have not seen Amai since the day she abandoned me for the second time.

  “What’s wrong?” I ask, bracing myself for the worst. It seems that every time Amai comes back into my life, everything gets turned upside down without explanation.

  She dances around the question, asking me about school, about my favorite subject, offering me a boiled egg from her bag which she should really be selling for extra money. She tries hard to be nice to me, but then finally says, “Eeee, Lizzy, things are tough. Us, we need you back home. Us, we need help searching for money,” her words landing like a punch to my stomach.

  Not this again! “What about my school?” I am caught off guard, and I speak sharply.

  “Don’t worry, Lizzy. It will not be all the time. You, you can stay here and go to school. Us, we just need you in Epworth on the weekends so you can help me with the house and the children while I search for money.” She rests her hand on my shoulder and I quickly shrug it off. How can she upend my life again? I have to study on the weekends! I have promised Uncle Sam that I will earn good grades so that I can get into Roosevelt Girls High School, one of the most highly competitive private secondary schools in Harare.

  When I explain all this to Amai, she says, “Eeee, Lizzy, your baba and I don’t yet have enough money to pay for your secondary school fees. Please, Lizzy.” I feel a pit in my stomach. If I don’t get into a good secondary school, then it will be difficult for me to get into university, and I now know that I must do this so that one day I can work for the United Nations. I have worked so hard at school! And now Amai is asking me to suddenly change course?

  “I can ask Aunt Jane and Uncle Sam to continue paying for my fees.” I offer what I think is a reasonable solution.

  Amai is quick to respond. “Us, we pay for your fees now, Lizzy. Your aunt and uncle contribute, but your baba and I, we pay half.” I didn’t know this; it is just one more thing Amai never explained. I feel trapped, and also immediately guilty. Amai and Baba should not be paying fees for me to attend a fancy private school when there is barely enough money to feed Osi and the children. What is Amai thinking? Why didn’t she just leave me at Epworth Primary School, which is a lot cheaper? Or, better still, why didn’t she just leave me with Gogo? Then we wouldn’t be having this problem. Gogo could have taken care of me; she had been doing so since I was a baby.

  I feel my body go hot with anger, and then I blurt out all of my thoughts and frustrations to Amai. She is quiet and looks sad, and after a moment she calmly says, “Lizzy, you, you are our responsibility. Your aunt and uncle help, but it is our responsibility to give you the best education. Us, we want more for your life. We want you to have the mukana that your baba and I never had.” I am moved by Amai’s words and truly grateful for the mukana. I do not want to be a burden. I will do my share.

  The following Friday I catch a bus to Epworth after school. Once again, I am in charge of taking care of the house and the children while Amai travels to nearby communities selling rabbits and chickens. In between my chores, I help Amai search for money, braiding women’s hair and selling tomatoes, onions, and mangoes from the vegetable stand at the bottom of the yard. I am happy to be back, to see Osi and the children, but just like the first time I returned to Goromonzi, everything feels exactly the same but I see it differently now. It fills me with sadness that Osi and the children still live in this small, dark house with no electricity, no toilet, no bathroom, and no proper kitchen, while I live in a nice house in Harare; they still sleep on the cold concrete floor under the same worn-out blankets, while I sleep on a soft bed with clean sheets; they wear canvas shoes while I wear shiny leather shoes. The guilt consumes me at night as I struggle to sleep. I think again about my dream that crystallized during my recent trip to Goromonzi, when I made a promise to God to become the girl in the blue uniform. I still want more than anything to be just like her, so that one day I too can make life better for my family.

  * * *

  In the morning, my old school friend Jeri from Epworth Primary School comes to visit, and I find my joy again. “Uuuu, Lizzy, many girls stop coming to school. They are pregnant-pregnant. Me, I don’t want to be pregnant-pregnant. Me, I still want to be a nurse,” Jeri says.

  I think of Aunt Jane. “You can also be a doctor, Jeri. If you want.”

  Jeri’s eyes are wide and disbelieving. “Huhhh, a doctor?! No! Me, I am a girl, Lizzy. Me, I can just be a nurse.”

  “Yes, Jeri! Yes! You can be a doctor! My aunt Jane, the one I live with in Harare, is a doctor.” I am beaming with excitement, remembering my own surprise when I first found out about Aunt Jane’s occupation. I had never seen a female doctor in any of my textbooks at school, and it was an even bigger surprise when Uncle Sam told me that Aunt Jane wasn’t just an ordinary or average medical doctor; she is in charge of the largest HIV/AIDS clinic at the leading medical center in Harare, Parirenyatwa Hospital.

  I want Jeri to believe me, to believe that she can do more with her life should she choose to. “Yes, Jeri, you can be a doctor! My uncle Sam says you can do any job you want if you work hard at school,” I say again.

  Jeri holds her chin in one hand, looks at me out of the corners of her eyes, and says in a disbelieving voice, “Aaaa, you Lizzy. You, Harare has made you crazy for real-real now.” She bursts out laughing, tossing her head back. I laugh with Jeri until tears roll down our cheeks and our stomachs hurt. It is as if I know deep down that this is the last time that Jeri will come to visit, the last time I will ever see her.

  * * *

  One evening when I’m back in Harare, having adjusted to my new school and settled into a familiar daily routine, Aunt Jane says, “Elizabeth, there is an HIV and AIDS crisis going on in our country right now.” We are sitting with Uncle Sam at the kitchen table, having just finished eating supper together, which is very rare, because Aunt Jane is always at the hospital working and almost never at home. “Zimbabwe now has one of the world’s highest prevalence rates,” Aunt Jane continues. It is 1988, and she explains that already half a million people have been infected by HIV and that it will only get worse. I am curious to learn more from her.

  Aunt Jane is Gogo’s eldest daughter. She has a serious round face with two small eyes, one of them slightly lazy, which Aunt Jane calls her “useless eye,” but she pays no mind to it. Her hair is short and curly, so she doesn’t have to worry about braiding it. “I don’t have time for that kind of nonsense,” Aunt Jane says matter-of-factly, wanting to be efficient with her hair just as she is in the rest of her life. Because Aunt Jane is proud of her hair, I too wear my hair natural, unlike some of the African girls at school who use a special cream to straighten their hair so it looks silky and flowy like the British kids’ hair.

  When Aunt Jane was a teenager, she won an academic scholarship to study medicine in Poland, then after graduation moved to Germany, where she worked as a medical doctor. It was during this time that she met Uncle Sam, who had also moved from Zimbabwe on a scholarship and stayed in Germany, to work as an economist. After Chimurenga and Zimbabwe’s independence, they returned home together in order to give back to our people, because that’s what Gogo says we should always do.

  “You must come to the clinic after school so you can learn for yourself what is going on in our country. Bring your books with you so you don’t fall behind on your schoolwork,” Aunt Jane
adds, to my surprise and delight.

  “Thank you, Aunt Jane,” I say, excited to finally learn more about her work, and about an illness which has caused so much suffering to sekurus and ambuyas in Goromonzi. What I remember is that the sekurus would leave Goromonzi for the big city of Harare to look for jobs and money for their children, and they would be gone for a long time. When they finally returned to the village, some of them brought more than money with them; they brought back a shameful disease called HIV/AIDS, which Gogo and the ambuyas called “Satan’s illness.” Gogo told me never to speak of or ask questions about this illness, and so I didn’t. But when I went with her to pray for the sick sekurus in their homes, I saw what the illness did to them: it made their heads small like a child’s head and their eyes bulge. Their bodies were so thin that their clothes were practically falling off. At some point they were no longer able to walk, or stand, and finally they couldn’t even sit. They slept all day and all night, defeated by Satan’s illness, as helpless as small babies, unable to lift their heads from the blanket, or turn their necks from side to side, or eat food because of the painful pink sores that covered their mouths and noses. Gogo prayed and prayed for the sekurus to get better, but Satan’s illness would always win, taking their souls and often leaving their wives and young children, who were now also infected by the illness and facing the same grim fate.

  Finally, I will be able to ask Aunt Jane all the questions I have about HIV/AIDS. The following week I join her at the clinic, volunteering two afternoons a week. Inside Aunt Jane’s small but functional treatment room, I sit to one side of her desk, waiting for the next patient to enter. A green curtain partially hides a green examination bed. A cream metal cabinet stores patient records and medicine. Between the metal cabinet and the examination room is a small metal chair, and that’s where I sit.

  I am surprised to see that most of the patients do not look as terribly sick as the ambuyas and sekurus in Goromonzi. Here, the patients are young women and men dressed in nice city clothes. Even the older, more impacted patients, with sunken faces and skinny limbs, look healthier than those in Goromonzi. When I ask Aunt Jane about the differences between the patients here and those at home, she explains that Parirenyatwa is a very expensive hospital, and that only those with money can afford the service and treatment. I feel sickened by the thought that the sekurus and ambuyas in Goromonzi don’t have the same mukana to receive treatment and relief simply because of where they live and how much money they have.

  I listen closely as Aunt Jane explains results to a new patient, watch as the patient sobs at the news, and observe as Aunt Jane offers consolation and explains the treatment plan. I learn a great deal about how to deliver the most difficult news in a factual way, but also with compassion and kindness. Gently but firmly, Aunt Jane will say, “You have taken an important step today in finding out about your status so you can best protect your loved ones. HIV no longer has to be a death sentence. There is treatment that can help.” She encourages the patients to share their status with their spouses, recommending that they also get tested. She provides them with leaflets offering daily tips on how to manage the disease, as well as information on support groups. Aunt Jane works hard to make sure that every patient feels supported and that nobody feels shamed by their status. Her compassion is a force of good in an otherwise dark and lonely moment for her patients.

  I pay close attention to every detail, writing down notes about how to help patients with the disease: how to speak to them; how to prescribe treatment and how to comfort and console; how to assuage as many fears as I can. Gradually, my knowledge and expertise grow, and when I have questions I ask Aunt Jane for answers. When I turn fourteen and start secondary school at Roosevelt Girls High School, I keep volunteering at Parirenyatwa Hospital until one day Aunt Jane says, “I must do more,” and takes an additional job at the HIV/AIDS clinic at Gomo Hospital. This hospital is on the outskirts of the city and within walking distance of the main Mbare bus station, which services all the surrounding villages in Zimbabwe, including Goromonzi. She keeps her job at Parirenyatwa, but also begins providing services to patients from underprivileged communities, including those who travel from rural areas seeking treatment.

  I follow Aunt Jane to Gomo Hospital, where she works two afternoons every week; there, the patients look much more like the sick ambuyas and sekurus in Goromonzi. They are skeletally thin, their bones simply hangers for their clothes; their eyes are large and sad. Inside Aunt Jane’s treatment room, I listen and watch as women hold up their hands with embarrassment, trying to cover the weeping wounds around their mouths and noses. I watch men with wilted hair slump over with despair. I watch sick young girls hold tightly to their dying babies, and see a terrible pain overcome their faces as their bodies refuse to recover, worsening day by day. When Aunt Jane throws her arms around her patients to comfort them, I look away and shield my eyes from the pain. Sometimes it is simply unbearable to witness.

  At some point, Aunt Jane comes to understand that because more and more patients are flocking to both clinics, there is no longer enough medicine to treat everyone, and the little that is left is very expensive—much too expensive for most. “I must do more,” Aunt Jane says, and takes a third job at the Blair Research Institute, where she works two mornings a week with other doctors to successfully manufacture HIV medicine that is affordable for Zimbabweans.

  Eventually Aunt Jane realizes that HIV infections continue to rise because people don’t want to talk about the disease. “I must do more,” she says again, and takes a fourth job, as a radio doctor at the Zimbabwe Broadcasting Corporation, where she goes on the air for an hour once a week to give medical advice to all Zimbabweans around the country about how to prevent the spread of HIV. I help Aunt Jane by being her eyes and ears with young people my age so that she can better understand what we think and feel about the disease. Some mistakenly believe that young people can’t get infected, and some are adamant that the disease is a hoax invented by Westerners. On the radio, in a calm and straightforward voice, Aunt Jane separates fact from fiction, calling on young people and communities to openly talk about HIV/AIDS in order to end the stigma and change their behavior accordingly.

  When Aunt Jane realizes that she is still not reaching the most underserved communities, she says, “I must do more,” and opens her own private HIV/AIDS clinic in Epworth, which I now understand is one of the most impoverished areas in Harare. I join her in Epworth, spending my weekends at the clinics, registering patients, helping the nurses clean the patients’ sores, and administering medication.

  I see more intense suffering at the clinic in Epworth than in any other clinic. I see the suffering of grandmothers raising as many as twenty grandchildren after AIDS takes the children’s parents; the suffering of HIV-positive orphaned girls and boys living alone in the slums of Epworth, begging for food at the clinics; and the suffering of patients dying every day simply because they can’t afford treatment. I bear witness to all of it. I also see Aunt Jane’s own suffering, devastated by the pain of her patients, wanting to do more for them, as she starts handing out free medication and food, gradually turning her clinics into free clinics, using up all her savings to save her patients, doing everything she can to help. Despite all her efforts, we are not able to save everyone.

  * * *

  One day Nyari, a young patient, bursts into the clinic, hysterical and shouting something about her baby, who is strapped on her back. Nyari is roughly twenty years old, with a sweet, round face, long, braided hair, and wide brown eyes. “Mwana wangu—my baby, mwana wangu—my baby,” she screams, untying the sarong around her waist.

  I am in the clinic in Epworth with Amai, waiting for Aunt Jane to arrive from Harare. When Aunt Jane told Amai about how important it was for patients to be greeted by a person they could trust, Amai said, “I can help.” This is Amai’s community and she is known and respected here. She welcomes each patient warmly, making sure they feel no shame about seeking he
lp and treatment.

  I run behind Nyari and gently but quickly take the baby from her back. “What happened?” Amai asks, trying to calm Nyari, who will not be calmed. I rush into the empty treatment room with the baby and place her on the treatment bed.

  “Hurry, Lizzy, please take Nyari outside,” Amai yells, pushing me and Nyari out of the way as she shields us both from the baby, who lies lifeless on the bed.

  “Mwana wangu—my baby,” Nyari screams, then collapses on the floor. When Nyari regains consciousness, she explains to Amai that her child was born with HIV. I throw my arms around Nyari just as I have seen Aunt Jane do. I fail to console her, because I know as she does that consolation is impossible. I break down with her, and the two of us weep over her child, who does not survive. It is the first time I witness a baby die in front of my eyes, but not the last.

  After the death of Nyari’s innocent baby, I work even harder and more diligently, together with Aunt Jane and Amai, to spread real knowledge and facts throughout communities in Epworth. We encourage community and religious leaders to take the lead in addressing HIV/AIDS in their community. We tell the truth: that the situation will not get better—in fact, it will get far worse—if the disease is not talked about directly, and the stakes could not be any higher.

  * * *

  “This way, madam,” a cheerful young woman says, leading me down a carpeted hallway of the United Nations project office in London. She opens the door and I step inside. The narrow interview room overlooks the south bank of the River Thames. I sit across the table from Dr. Julia Cleeves, a United Nations senior policy advisor. I am thrilled to be finally meeting her. She has a firm handshake, a posh British accent, and a beautiful, perfectly tailored suit. This is the most important interview of my life, and I planned to look as confident and beautiful and capable as the girl in the blue uniform appeared to me all those years ago. However, the blue tweed men’s blazer, cinched at the waist with twisted blue yarn, and the streaky blue-and-gray flared skirt that resisted my attempts to dye it completely blue—both from a charity shop—fall short of the impressive image I planned to project.