The Read Aunt Mzansi

Unfortunately, to most, Alexandra is popular for its many shacks and filth; many of us don’t even give this place a chance that there is more that can happen or come out of it. I remember thinking to myself that, ‘Maybe I have a hang of this adulting thing if I can eat and walk in the streets of Alexandra’. Having to breathe in a stench air owed to the water that is always flowing in the streets or the garbage that couldn’t be PikitUp-ed and eat (because you’re late) on your way to the local library is not ideal. This is me on my way to discovering the gem that is Mongane Wally Serote’s To Every Birth Its Blood. I haven’t been this immersed in a read in so long! I remember talking to a friend some few weeks ago and him saying, “Alex is the one place where you can be yourself without fear of judgment”. With the kind of work he does that has people demanding his attention every now and then, it is in Alexandra that he is able to be himself and not worry about being watched or seen....