Chapter 1
It seems like yesterday when all glitz and glamour of love filled the air with joy. All the shades of smiles sparkling on the faces of a couple saying I do. He is now gone, gone to a place beyond the grave, a place I could never see and tell him how much I love him. My name is Nokukhanya Zinzie Omens and this is my story.
My story begins way back when I was just a little girl, born in a very wealthy and happy family. We had more than enough as cattle, goats, pigs, horses and a large vegetable garden that filled farm. We had everything in abundance, business was booming. I surely was a farm girl who got everything she ever desired, the family princess.
I was born after 10 faithful years of my parent’s marriage in an underdeveloped town, Luve, in a community known as Mbelebeleni. I was named Nokukhanya which means light, after the dark childless period of their marriage. My parental grandparents named me Zinzie as I had brought calm in the family. I grew up to be mom and dad’s princess and a joy to have in the family.
Growing up in an empire dad had worked extremely hard to build, had its own struggles. I was forced to learn about the family business from a very tender age. My dad started teaching me how to work in the fields and I was taught how to plant my first flower at the age of 6. This was a miraculous moment for me as I was introduced into the family businessat such a tender age.
Dad would always string me along to inspect the fields, milk the cows and even ride horses. I always loved exploring with dad and I would ask a million questions about why things happened the way they did. “Curiosity killed a cat”, he would always say. He loved me and would compete with mom on who loved more.
My parents were always happy and they would always tell me a story of how they met. Their story proved to me that their relationship was one which evidently proved that some matches were heavenly made. It was always a joy for them to take me down memory lane to where it all began. The story always brought painful memories to mom, but they wanted me to know why I couldn’t visit my maternal family.
And this is how it would go:
Dad was a herd boy working in Siphofaneni while my mother was still in high school. He would travel miles to visit her in school so he could walk her home, leaving the herd unattended so he could see her. This kept me wondering how dad never feared punishment or losing the herd for the sake of chasing after love. He was willing to risk an entire
herd’s welfare in his pursuit of love.
Mom always articulated how she fell in love with my father from the first day she laid eyes on him herding cattle. However, she gave my dad that run around so she could test his sincerity to the love he proposed to her. “Uyihlo wayeyinsizwa etinsizweni” (Your dad was unique among other men), she would say.
“He swept me off my feet.”
She fell deeply in love with him and couldn’t picture a life without him. Her friends and family opposed her from accepting the dating request from dad as he was only a herd boy. Surely my mom was in love. Who falls for a herd boy when you are attending private school? Who does that?
My mother was from a well-known and respected family as her father was the headman of the community. She was the youngest of 5 children with four brothers then mom, the family princess. This was in contrast to dad who was from a poverty stricken home with 7 siblings and he was the oldest. Mom was the most loved and protected in the family as she was the only girl in the family.
She fell for this herd boy when she was in high school even though her family never approved of their relationship. Her family planned for her to marry to a family they had chosen for her.Alehandro Dludlu was man set for her to marry after graduating from College. He was an old man who already had two wives and was willing to marry mom to get an heir for him.
“Buhle bendvodza tinkhomo tayo,” is what she was told.
“I loved your father and would not accept an arranged marriage,” she explained. My brothers scolded me, threatened your dad and even beat him up as warning to stay away from me.” Mom would be reduced to tears whenever she told this story. They wanted mom to marry into a wealthy family rather than a herd boy.
She was supposed to be marrying Alehandro when she and dad eloped to the DC offices to get married. She married him without her family’s approval and would later face the consequences of that marriage as she was disowned from home and banished from ever visiting them.
Mom started working for a company called Smart Center as an accountant. Though she worked there for three years, she still struggled to make ends meet. She had married a herd boy who made relatively less than her but was still submissive to him. Dad had not completed school due to lack of financial aid to advance in education. His parents had given him enough education to be able to read and write then he was forced to work so he could provide for his family. His father had sent him to Siphofaneni to herd cattle for Mr. Mzilikazi.
He was an old friend of my paternal grandfather who took him in, fed him and paid him to herd his livestock. Mr. Mzilikazi took dad as his own child and mentored him in farming. He gave dad tips to earning a living through agriculture. When mom got kicked out of home, he took them in and gave them a place to stay. He then allocated dad a small area from his land so that dad could build a house for his wife.
He offered this as a marriage gift and gratitude for being loyal to him for all these years. Dad and mom started building a single bedroom mud hut with a grass thatched roof. He began gardening and selling the produce in the local markets then he increased his produce.
Farming however became unbearable during the time of drought as dad could not produce enough to continue building a home for his family. He decided to take my mother to his paternal home to begin life from scratch.
He was given capital and land for his restart to life. My grandfather was willing to see his son succeed in life so he sold a few livestock for him to have a place for his wife and kids.
Mom resigned from work because of distance to work and had to assist dad in building an empire. “Behind every great man there’s a great woman”, he smiled. They struggled for 5 years before they finally built an empire for us. Dad persevered through storms to get to where he was and with mom by his side, they were invincible both in love and in business. Dad’s pursuit of business opportunities never deterred him from loving his family and spending time with us.
I was 7 years old when my maternal grandmother was laid to rest with my mother unable to attend as she was delivering Amanda, the same day she was buried. Mom had not spoken to any of her family members but uncle Sizwe since she was disowned. He was the one who told her that granny had forgiven her and wished she would have been able to see her before she took her last breath. She got trapped in emotions as celebrations of a new born were held up by the pain of losing a mother.
Dad then took us to meet my maternal grandfather after the funeral. He embraced our visit and was overwhelmed with tears of seeing his daughter for the first time in seventeen years. He just couldn’t hold back his tears as he met his grandchildren for the first time. It was extremely sad that I hadn’t had the chance to know granny. He told me about my grandmother and lamented on how much I looked like her.
Few months after our visit, he too was gone. Mom had lost both parents in the same year of the birth of Amanda, how devastating as Amanda will grow up not knowing her grandparents. As time went by, the family was gifted with yet another daughter to which dad called Nokwanda as girls were now growing in the family. He would make jokes about how much we out-matched him in the house.
The birth of Nokwanda however, was the beginning of trouble in the family as the extended family expressed their disappointment over the birth of three girls and no heir. Dad tried to stabilize the situation and squash the family interference but would be convinced to taking a decision that would change our lives for the worst.
