Amidst ink and blood

Friday saw the beginning of the end of my high-school career. It’s funny how, for ten months now, I have been expecting and looking forward to this moment. I am still a high-schooler until November 25th; thereafter, I am changing my name, address and frankly anything else tying me to the last eighteen years of my life.

I remember expecting high-school to be something crazy and intense full of jocks and nerds and bullies and so on, like in every American film set in a high-school. What I found to be was completely the opposite. The school I attended was a small independent/private school that had just opened the previous year. Classes were small. I think we were seventeen learners in Grade 8; bear in mind that public schools have classes with over forty learners on average, with attendance being as high as sixty learners per class in some schools. It was a strange sensation that took a while to get used to as I had come from a class of forty learners the previous year.

After a month or two, COVID-19 came along and did what we all know it did. Schools closed, all of them. Except ours. While the doors were locked and the security guard was at home, learning continued. We were the only school that, thanks to private funding, could actually implement distance/online-learning. This gave us a massive edge over our peers in other schools. The South African Department of Education is a crumbling entity that appeared to be breathing its last, struggling breaths under the “leadership” of Angie Motshekga, so it took them over a year to get close to what we had. (They also embezzled an unholy amount of money sanitising empty classrooms.) My Grade 8 year wasn’t my best academically, or, by any metric, in fact. I remember feeling very alone and unwanted, as most teenagers do at that stage.

When the world began turning back to normal the following year, we attended classes in-person again. There was the odd outbreak that saw laptops being dusted off and connections being throttled, but, for the most part, 2021 was normal compared to 2020. I remember this as being my most difficult year in high-school, primarily due to COVID, but also due to a change in Mathematics teachers. More on this soon.

For the next part to make sense, I will need to briefly explain how the South African education and qualification framework thingamabobble works to those not from here. Grades 1 to 9 are compulsory; government will make a plan for you to get a Grade 9 report no matter what. They achieve this in no small part by frankly damaging rules, such as no learner being able to fail a grade twice. If I failed Grade 6 for instance, I could literally get 0% for every subject the following year, but government would still promote me, as I wouldn’t be allowed to fail twice or be older than 15 and in primary school. They have also been known to manipulate the weighting of assessments in order to achieve the highest possible pass rates. Anyway, Grades 10 through 12 are thus considered “Further Education and Training,” or, FET phase. This sees some subjects being changed out between Grades 9 and 10. That’s the only real change other than you now having an NQF level. That’s basically a system to gauge someone’s education. Level 1 is Grade 9 or anything deemed equivalent to that, and level 10 is reserved for those who have doctorates.

The whole reason I mention this is that being promoted to Grade 10 meant that I could legally leave school and work. I never seriously considered that, because I have been quite academic my whole life, but it was such a good feeling to know that all of the studying was contributing to a point on a strange, magical system that made me more employable each day.

Grade 10 saw my first foray into watches. The previous year, I had bought, with some help from the parents, my Casio Fishing Gear watch. It took me a year to acknowledge the need for something more sophisticated than blue resin, which saw me get a Casio Edifice chronograph. I still smile some days reminiscing over the fact that I wore that watch and loved it, until I found vintage watches and 42mm suddenly became too big. I don’t think I’ve worn that watch this year. Well after school had closed that year, I met the one and only Mr C.A. Koetsier, the man who I have spoken about countless times on a variety of platforms, referring to him as “the watchmaker.” I honestly think that I would be dead or in a cult if it wasn’t for him. On the very last day of the year, not long before his shop was due to close, I bought my Camy Club-Star and a brown leather strap. That watch went on to be my most-worn watch of 2023 and my most valuable possession to this day. I plan to have it engraved soon.

That watch means more to me than anything. Mr Koetsier believed in me when no one, not even myself, did. With watches, I was alone and in the dark. While I never had the opportunity to go into his workshop and be tutored by him one-on-one, he gave me advice and many, many spare parts when I needed them. When everything in the world seemed to be crashing down, when the odds were against me, I would visit his shop. Even when my motorcycle licence expired, I walked to his shop, just to chat and ask about battery. I can only hope that I have done half as much for him as he has done for me.

Grade 11 was when I realised that the wheel had started turning. I was closer to university and freedom than ever before. Talks of emigration popped up at some point, but, for better or worse, they slowly withered into nothingness. South Africa is a bad place, but I say that only because I live here and for dramatic effect. Every week the newspaper tells me who killed who and what sewerage pupe burst where. Electricity is the result of prayers and water pipes are better suited as cake toppings than things used to transport water. With all of this in mind, I don’t know if I could ever leave. By all measurable metrics I am living in a hole (I have more colourful words to describe South Africa, but I’ll refrain from using them.) I don’t want to go. At the end of that year we took a short holiday to the Cape. Wow. The Cape has always been sort of a slice of the Mediterranean nestled between arid grasslands. Sometimes, I even spoil myself and listen to Toto’s Africa on repeat while at game reserves. The aesthetic, the smell, the taste, the colours and the people of this country are so beautiful and unique that I would need a lot of convincing to pack up and go forever. It’s easy for us to say that SA is a rotting, festering pile of maggoty meat, but I could never climb on a plane and accept that Black Label isn’t on the shelves, rugby isn’t on the TVs and Patrice Motsepe isn’t doing something with coal mining and struggling football teams.

Now we arrive at this year. In January, I was fresh-faced, optimistic and had the “go-getter” attitude to such an extent that I would have been able to storm the beaches of Normandy with two sticks and a rock and erect a flag by sunset. Now that it is October, things have changed. Motivation is hard to come by. I am almost always tired. I am almost always angry. I came extremely close to gaining a dependency on alcohol. Some days I feel hopeless. Many days I am. Final exams are around the corner, and I feel that little voice in my head readying me for the coup de grâce. If I maintain my results, a cheque for R10 000 is mine, along with a laptop or two and possibly a R14 000 reduction in tuition fees. All I can say is: bring it on.

Friday was the Principal’s Tea. Starting last year with our first batch of Grade 12s, the staff all gather for a feast in celebration of us making it so far. Being there myself, it felt like the Last Supper in a way. Believe it or not, no tea was actually served, but we were treated to alcohol-free sparkling wine. Our beloved Computer Applications Technology teacher, let’s call her Ms H, did all the cooking, which included lasagna, salad, panna cotta and a sort of pastry stuffed with cream. Being passionate about cooking myself, she blew me away. I know (kind of) just how much effort goes into preparing such stuff.

At the table, once we all had some food and one staff member got a bit too merry with the champagne, we started giving speeches. All of us learners thanked the teachers for their efforts and we meant every word. Teachers are criminally undervalued in society. They do so much and get such little credit. I would be nothing without the teachers I have had, both those in the classroom and those outside of it. The biggest shock for all of us was when our Mathematics and Physical Sciences teacher gave his speech. I have always been close with him, Mr T. He has a very unique personality that makes him sort of a Marmite character: learners either love him or hate him. He is known by most as being very strict and very hard on his learners, so hearing him give us some heartfelt words of appreciation and encouragement was a melody like nothing else. Since Grade 9, he has pushed us to the limits, making us the best Mathematics and Physical Sciences learners that we can be. I will always remember his words after he marked our September exams, “Learners, I don’t like your marks at all. They are too high. Department is going to think we are cheating.” Even though our marks for the year (apart from final exams) are set to be declared null and void for that reason (being too high,) I wear that as a badge of honour.

We ended with some words of the principal. She is a veteran teacher and keeps the school running smoothly. I realised then that school was home. The great big beige building that I have walked into religiously for five, even six days a week for most of the year was so much more than what it appeared to be. We are six learners in Grade 12. We are all extremely close with one another. This really does make us a family, as, never have I not felt at home or felt uncomfortable. This school has been a beacon of hope in some really trying times; standing strong and facing whatever the world brings.

I really don’t know how to end this post. To be honest, I don’t think it can end. There’s always something more to say. Maybe I can compare it to how I felt in 2020, when this all started. I felt alone and unwanted. Now, to say I feel alone would be a lie. Yes, I get that feeling sometimes, but then I think about the people who care for me and root for me. I am wanted by those people, even if some of my supposed flesh and blood still regards me as unwanted. When November 25th rolls around, something will die. Something will be born too, but I can’t shake the feeling that a part of my soul will be embalmed and confined to the realm of memory forever after. I can’t wait to experience the gift of true freedom and autonomy, but I would be lying if I told you that I wasn’t scared to the point of browning my trousers.

Once more, from the bottom of my heart, with everything that I have, thank you, my dearest teachers, Ms N, Mr T, Ms H, Ms M, the other Ms N and Dr G. My thanks also go out to all of the staff members of the school, many of whom I have had the privilege of forming bonds with. I will also thank my parents for giving me the opportunity to attend such a wonderful school. It was a wild ride and it hasn’t been easy for anyone, but I did it all with a smile on my face thanks to all of you.

Here’s a little gallery of some of my memories. I have cropped out the faces of my classmates and teachers to maintain their privacy.