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Nothing is as difficult as trying to write about your own life. It is easy to look around and find something or someone to write about, as long as it is something other than the person you spend every waking moment with. Writing about your life forces you to pause and look back and try to summarise what you know is beyond summarising. This mammoth task is also a great risk because you might misrepresent yourself or worse still come across as a bit cocky and earn yourself a legion of enemies. For these reasons and others, I am nervously stroking the keys of the keyboard, hoping that my end product will not miss its mark completely, which is to offer hope to many young Batswana out there.
As I find myself waiting to venture out to Stanford University this September, I cannot help but wonder what would happen if time travel was a possibility and I could ride its invisible waves back to my primary school days to whisper into the ears of the little girl clad in a sky-blue Galaletsang Primary School pinafore and Bata shoes that in a few years she would be heading to one of the top universities in America. I doubt she would comprehend the significance of the revelation because it is something that was beyond her imagination.
I always imagined I would go to Mosele-wa-Pula Community Junior Secondary School (CJSS) then to St Joseph’s College and then finally the University of Botswana, but a call from the Principal asking me to join the Maru-a-Pula School student body changed all this. Since I had obtained a merit in my Form three examinations, Maru-a-Pula wanted to pick up where Mosele-wa-Pula CJSS had left off and further educate me. I was very excited, but at the same time petrified. My loving parents had always provided me with everything I needed, but now I was bound for a school with children who had almost everything they ever wanted. I knew that the transition from Tswana medium to English medium was not going to be seamless, but it was a transition that I had to make. It was not always easy because there were days I doubted I deserved being among such great, gifted and well-off people. My mother sternly told me that I should focus on my education and to judge people based on their behaviour and not on what kind of car they had or their famous last name. Somehow this advice penetrated my thick skull and helped me enjoy Maru-a-Pula School.
I grew up as an individual and as a writer during my two years at this amazing school. I won many writing contests and even published a Setswana book, Ngwanaka Re Go Rileng during my final year with the help of my Setswana teacher. I was proud to publish a book in Setswana even though I was at an English medium school.
My teachers at Maru-a-Pula noted my achievements and awarded me a scholarship to Deerfield Academy in America at the end of my form five in 2004. Life in America accelerated my growth tenfold. I was confronted with race, sexual orientation and economics issues on a more magnified scale than in Botswana. When I eventually allowed myself to embrace these diverse issues and celebrate difference, instead of fearing it, my life became enriched immensely. I made friends from all walks of life and discovered their amazing cultures and tasty cuisines. I fell in love with Asian-American dishes. I would urge Batswana to rush to the nearest Chinese restaurant, contrary to popular belief that they will serve you dog meat. They will leave you wishing you had discovered their food sooner.
My year at Deerfield flew by. Prom and graduation were only a second apart and lasted only a minute, but I appreciated having the opportunity to experience proper American culture. The over-used adage that there is no place like home proved true in my case also. There were teary-eyed phone calls to home when my homesickness peaked. Tears over simple memories, like taking my little sisters to buy ice cream at a nearby friendly store.
Deerfield Academy helped me get into Stanford University, a school that admits about 1, 000 students out of a pool of approximately 2, 200 applicants each year. I feel ready to waive the Botswana flag high at Stanford University. My interests lie in the sciences and writing, but I still have some years to decide whether I want to be a doctor, an engineer or a writer and hopefully, I will make a good choice. Whatever I choose to be, I hope to contribute towards a better Botswana.
Dr Dithapelo Medupe
Maru-a-Pula School Alumna (2004)
Originally published in Echo Newspaper
*Dr Dithapelo Medupe (04′) has since graduated from Stanford University and is currently on internship at Letsholathebe II Memorial Hospital in Maun. During her time at Stanford University, Dr Medupe was inspired to invent Temalo Code and Decode, an educational game based on the interpretation of ditaola (divination bones used by traditional healers), which she demonstrated to MaP students in September 2016. Read more here.
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Maya Angelou once famously said, ”Try to be a rainbow in someone’s cloud.” One such rainbow, Ms Lebani Mazhani, who was the highlight of the evening, gave her moving account of surviving cancer of the salivary glands. She pointed out that as a result of the medical procedures, she has to live without saliva and a bottle of water with her most of the time. Despite the heart-wrenching battle with cancer, she concluded by pointing out, ”My life is honestly better than it was before my diagnosis.”