Monday 17th November 2008, 00:42The loss of a hero I spent last week in South Africa. You can’t help but feel the sense of expectation as this country, the hope of Africa, starts to make the transition to a new government next year. I have been so impressed by the people I have met, all sharing as single vision for the future. This great nation stands tall in Africa but the burden of expectation hangs heavy.
After all of my meetings had finished on Tuesday I decided to take a walk to clear my head. The weather was warm, ahead was a mighty thunder storm which would light up the skies all evening. I found myself catching a coffee shop before it closed and sat opposite the man across the table from me. He sat tired and restless. His eyes fixed on his shoes. He had no drink, the table in front of him vacant. Shifting and running his hand through his hair. I concentrated on finishing my coffee and getting back to the hotel. Slowly I became aware of the sound of muted tears, shoulders hunched and shaking. My fellow diner was sat, head in hands, bereft.
Feeling uncomfortable and British I did not know what to do. Should I allow this man to have privacy in his grief or should I seek to hold out a hand to someone in need. Suddenly he looked up, apologised and started towards the door. Outside he just stopped and lent on the window of the coffee shop and sobbed deeply into his chest.
Outside, I stretched out my arm and sought to offer the simplest of comforts. This seemed to have the effect of releasing the emotions which had built up for weeks.
Later, when he was able to talk he told me how he had worked for many years, loosing his job due to a mining closure. Moving to Johannesburg he thought work would come his way. Repeated attempts had left him unemployed, dispirited and broken. Hanging on for the employment he needed to support his family living in rural South Africa. The hanging on also meant that he had been away from his family for many months, but with nothing to show for the sacrifice. Leaving a family is never easy, even the strong weaken in the absence of regular contact.
Eventually he was able to tell me what had been the final straw for him this day. He told me that he had always looked up to his father, a strong man, respected in his village. His father had been his hero. He had cherished the time with his father and boasted of his strength of character to his friends at school. He had studied and worked hard so that he could follow in his fathers footsteps, so that he too could earn the respect of others and elders. He wanted to provide for his family and provide the home to his children to allow them to grow and aspire. Unfortunately since loosing his job he had struggled to hold his own head up, never mind providing for or inspiring his children. His son had greatly missed the guidance of this unemployed Dad and had drifted into trouble and crime. Now serving a lengthy sentence, this man had been able to visit his son today.
The visit was a real shock. Gone was the youth of the boy he had fathered. The smiles replaced by a drawn tired stare. The dreams replaced by nightmares. The lifeless body showed no interest in his father. The son took no comfort and no chiding from his father, just blank stares.
The straw that broke this man’s back was “loosing my chance to be my son’s hero, as my father was mine”.
I wanted to record this pain, lest we of all people ever forget the tragedy that is unemployment. As this man shuffled off into the night, I felt so low; I knew I could do nothing. Soon when we open our programmes in South Africa, this man and many like him will have somewhere to turn for hope. Every man deserves a job and every Dad the chance to be his child’s hero.
Thanks for making hero’s dreams come true every day in the work you do to help Mums and Dads move back into work.
Thanks
Roy
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