Shosholoza

There's a girl on campus who grew up in Nairobi Kenya. I've been seeing her a lot lately.
She gets it. I don't even know what it is.
Nor do I profess to "get" Africa.
But something that connects Africa. and poverty. and our souls. that's what she gets.
and she gets my confused pain.
undirected Feelings. or something.
Today, she broke out Shosholoza, and I started singing it back to her. It was the greatest thing.

shosholoza. shooooosholooza,

Ku lezontaba

Stimela siphum' eSouth Africa

Wen' uyabaleka

Wen' uyabaleka

Ku lezontaba

Stimela siphum' eSouth Africa

and how poverty isn't a lack of food. or lack of money.
its parents working so hard, and coming home fried.
its kids being abused.
raped.
by relatives and friends.
its rampant alcoholism
its destroyed family units

its [willfully?] ignorant elite sitting on the money that could save us all.

its 13 year old girls who choose statutory rape because they get a cell phone from their 20-30 year old "boyfriend" who has so many other girls on the side.

its sexual abuse happening regularly IN the schools.

its not the shacks. its not individual choices.
its an endemic quality of life.

and its not easy to solve.

and it felt like there was nothing I could do, for so many of those kids.