His day normally involves going to school, kicking a soccer ball around afterwards, then going home for a meal and bed. It’s typical of the teens living in the rural village of Oribi, south of Pietermaritzburg.
Orphaned at the age of nine, when both parents fell ill and died, Nzuzo Mnikathi and his 12-year-old brother live with their grandmother, Ivy, who does what little she can to see to their needs. They are surviving, but far from thriving.
But earlier this month, Nzuzo was completely whipped away from that reality when he became the youngest black person to reach the South Pole, the southern-most and remotest point on our planet.
The 19-year-old matriculant was part of a six-man team of SA adventurers who set out to ski 111km across Antarctica as part of The Unlimited Child expedition to the South Pole. Their trek started on January 9, after being flown to 89° latitude, and they had 14 days to complete the crossing to the South Pole.
Nzuzo suffered excruciating frostbite on his fingers and nose, but he pushed on relentlessly. In the last few days, however, the pain was so intense that he had to stop skiing and travelled on the back-up team skidoo for the remaining leg of the trip.
Yet he had the admiration of every member of the team that included leader Dave Pritt, team doctor Peter Berning and founder of The Unlimited Child, Iain Buchan, who said Nzuzo’s tenacity and resilience was “truly incredible” under the circumstances.
“This is a youngster from a disadvantaged background who has never travelled, never been away from home for this long, lumped together with a bunch of older, experienced white guys and having to learn fast how to camp, ski and pack a backpack – things he’s never done before.
“It was a massive shift for a young man, yet he was champing at the bit all the way, and when we decided he should stop skiing, he teared up. He wanted to carry on,” said Buchan, the man who identified Nzuzo as the ideal ambassador for his non-profit organisation, which promotes early childhood development by providing crèches with educational toys and training for caregivers.
Chatting on the phone from a hotel room in Chile before he flew home on Friday, Nzuzo said he’d been given some tablets for the frostbite, then immediately began enthusing about his adventure. “I’ve never camped. I’ve never seen snow in my life. I’ve been away from home for two-and-a-half weeks and it’s been so exciting.
Luck
“I’ve learnt so much, and Iain and Peter were like father figures to me. It’s been the greatest experience of my life, my eyes were wide open,” he said.
Nzuzo came to Buchan’s attention because the teenager’s aunt worked for him. It was a stroke of luck that snatched him – however briefly – out of his meagre circumstances. “Oribi is a poor area. There’s a lot of drugs and crime there,” he said.
When he was invited to participate in the South Pole expedition, Nzuzo said it took a while for him to get his head around it, “but I realised it was about my challenging myself. If it wasn’t really extreme, it wouldn’t be such a huge achievement”.
To prepare, Nzuzo had to follow a tough training regimen, which involved walking for hours on end, dragging truck tyres to replicate the sledge and sitting in a commercial freezer to acclimatise to the cold.
He received support and encouragement from the other team members, including renowned adventurer Sean Wisedale,the first African to have climbed the Seven Summits – the highest mountain on each continent, including Mount Everest.
Said Wisedale: “A journey of this magnitude is a huge challenge for anyone, let alone a young man who has seldom travelled beyond his hometown.
“The mental and physical strength that was necessary for him to complete this crossing should be a tremendous inspiration to all South Africans.”
In supporting The Unlimited Child, Nzuzo said he wanted to show anything was possible.
“This is the hardest thing I’ve ever done, but I did it. And on the last day the temperature was –50°C, with high winds.
“As soon as you take your hands out of your gloves, your fingers freeze and they stay frozen for the next 20 minutes. It’s really painful,” said Nzuzo
By the end, though, he said he was missing home. On his return, he will enrol at the University of KwaZulu-Natal to study environmental science.