In a copper- nickel mining town, where black smoke from the mines greeted the mornings and the blast of dynamites shook the town to sleep every evening, Ujeura stayed with his grandmother.
Uje’s mum was never around, she stayed at Jubilee Mental Hospital and people treated him differently because of that. They whispered, some pitied him but others said it to his face, that he is the son of a ‘mad’ woman and they stopped their kids from playing with him. Although this always sent him home in tears, he never allowed his grandmother to see him cry because she was already worried about his mum.
But at school when other students said bad things about his mother or sang ‘mad Jeta, mad Jeta’ when he passed by, he punched their faces. As a result, he was always at the principal’s office being punished for hitting other students. Uje couldn’t understand why he was called a bully and not those students who sang ‘mad Jeta, mad Jeta’ when they saw him. This made him hate school and he performed poorly in school work.
One day, the teacher gave them homework to write a composition about what they wanted to be when they grow up. A boy seated behind him whispered loud enough for Uje to hear, that he is the reason his mother stayed at Jubilee. Uje wanted to punch him, but what he said scared him so much because he wondered if it was really true that it was his fault his mother was sick.
Uje could not ask his granny whether he was the reason for his mother’s sickness because she never really told him what was wrong with his mother except that his mother was not well but she would get better soon. So, he went to his aunt who worked at the hospital to ask for the truth. He wondered whether he was a bad child. Was that the reason his mother never seemed to recognise him even when they visited her at Jubilee?
At the hospital, his aunt explained to him that he was not the cause of his mum’s sickness and that his mother was not ‘mad’ but she had post-natal depression. He could not pronounce the name so she wrote it for him on a piece of paper. But what confused him was that if he was not the reason his mother was sick then how come she only became sick after he was born? He felt like a bad child who made his mother sick. The piece of paper in his hand, he read the name again and knew then what he wanted to be when he grew up.
In class, the teacher asked some students to read their compositions to the class and Uje stood up.
“Uje? You want to read your composition?” The teacher asked surprised.
“Yes mam.” He answered in a low voice.
She looked at him for a moment then said,
“Ok, go ahead Uje.”
The whole class started whispering and he felt embarrassed. His hands were sweating and shaking so, he grabbed his exercise book tight so it wouldn’t slip from his hands.
“Whe…when I grow up.” He stammered
“When I grow up, I want to be a doctor and, and heal…” the whole class laughed at him, even the teacher looked at me with shock
“Shhh!” The teacher silenced the class
“I want to be a doctor and heal my mum, so that she will smile, play with me, take me shopping to buy new clothes, a lot of toys and cook nice food for me and granny.” Uje continued reading
No one believed a grade C student like Uje could become a doctor but his granny believed him, so he stopped punching their faces even when they sang ‘mad Jeta’, instead he took his aunt’s advice and thought about good things, like what he would do when he becomes a doctor. So, he would write at the back of his exercise book, in capital letters, over and over again until he felt angry no more; DOCTOR UJEURA, SON OF JETARERA.
Glossary
Ujeura – helper/saviour
Jetarera (pronounced Yetarera) – The Heavens/sky is a witness
Read – Silent Master – A Children’s Story by Temani Nkalolang, Botswana
