In township schools there would always be a trusted learner who would note down the names of those who were disorderly while the teacher was out.
When the teacher came back, they would hand out lashings in chronological order of names on the list. Law and order in classrooms were upheld in that fashion.
That was when we first learnt that we can’t all hold hands and take a journey of a thousand miles.
And that not all faces on this journey will have smiles.
When Covid-19 first flew into the country, we relearnt that every breath is a decision to die later.
That every pandemic is destined to displace humanity, often changing the course of history.
With this pandemic, the displacement is towards a new normal.
Staggering and swaggering at the crux of this new normal is a mandatory transformation to a digital age.
On this anniversary of Covid-19, we reminisce on how liquor stores never used to be on par with the house of God. How our pockets are becoming emptier, while mouths we need to feed remain the same or multiply.
How do you stand on your feet when your soles have been cut from beneath you with a scythe?
What we need is a miracle. You can’t buy prayers, we have paid our tithes.
You can’t buy a second chance, we have paid with our lives.
There were 1.5 million grave sites prepared – not in preparation for Covid-19, according to then Gauteng health MEC Bandile Masuku – and soldiers deployed in our streets.
A curfew.
We were never ready. The journey was too steep already.
Pray for kids who are still praying for bread from before you and I prayed for data to fall.
The falling of fees is a thing of legends. A myth that needs to be tackled at a different struggle in their predestined lives.
Their bodies are slums. They have embodied their environment.
Their stomachs have cobwebs, they can’t stomach hash tags, nor swallow trends, neither have a social media challenge for breakfast.
They are broken. They will not be joining the digital revolution. They are disconnected.
permanently offline.
Online schools are the present. They are already left behind. There isn’t even space in government class rooms.
The internet has made us forget that we are hungry.
We are punching above our weight, trying to level up with developed countries.
A month into the Covid-19 outbreak in the country, President Cyril Ramaphosa said this pandemic will pass, but it was up to us to determine how long it will last.
He was only talking about the virus, not the new way of living, that will not pass.
We have moved past that point, whether we like it or not.
We can’t all hold hands and walk this digital transformation journey of a thousand miles.
Not all faces on this journey will have smiles.
The array of complex factors brought about by Covid-19 are here to stay.
But we are hard-wired to survive.
Here is to another year of breathing with masks on. Of elbow bumps, chapped hands from constant sanitizing. Of digitising. Living. Living digitally.