The woman I miss. Africa.
The Ugly Truth About Leaving South Africa
The woman I miss. Africa.
The ugly truth is this. Despite the political and economic chaos of our country, almost all of us will still say the same thing. I love my country. I love it to the core of my soul. I miss that land. The sand. The sky. The nature.
That love doesn’t get cancelled out just because we left.
I haven’t been back to South Africa in nearly four and a half years. I have focused hard on making our life in Ireland a good one. Building. Stabilising. Surviving the first-year wobble, then the second-year settling, then that quiet moment where you realise… oh. This is actually our life now. But some days I sit in quiet contemplation, and I remember what we chose to leave behind.
Being born in South Africa was a privilege. Growing up in that mad, chaotic time of change came with mixed emotions, and I knew from young that I was going to leave Her. I finished school, finished university, and I left. The UK for seven years. But she called me back. She always does.
We were blessed, after years of difficulty, with our two incredible children. I knew, the moment I first saw my miracle boy, red-faced, partly red-haired, feisty but sensitive… I knew, right then, that I was going to leave Africa again. Then, a few years later, I saw my precious girl, and the truth became unavoidable. We could not stay. I had to protect them. I had to give them a better future, no matter the cost to our own lives.
South Africa is Her. She lives in me. She is in my thoughts more often than I wish she would be.
And let me tell you something else that people don’t always say out loud. Moving to another country in your 40s, when life has finally got comfortable, is not easy. Moving with two little ones in tow is not easy. Starting again from the bottom of the ladder is not easy. But we did it. And I count my blessings every day for what we have here in Ireland. I love Her too. I will do a Part 2 about Ireland, because she deserves her own love letter.
But this one… this one is about the woman I miss. Africa.
Tonight, I watched a promo video of Pietermaritzburg, panning across a sky I have known almost my whole life. And my heart broke, right there, in my Irish living room. We can argue over a bottle of wine all night about the future of South Africa. The whole system is a debate. Quirky bunch, aren’t we.
As summer comes to a close in Ireland, I remember spring in South Africa. I smell the flowers in my memory. I hear the return of the birds as the season shifts. I feel the warmth coming back into the soil, the way the light changes, the way she wakes up slowly and then all at once.
She is still mine. Even from here. Even four and a half years away. Even with an Irish sky above my head and an Irish kettle on the boil and an Irish rain at my window.
She will always be the woman I miss.
As summer comes to a close in Ireland, I remember spring in South Africa. I smell the flowers in my memory. I hear the return of birds as the season shifts.
