I Honored the Promise I Made to My 16-Year-Old Self 24 Years Ago (part I)
In August 2002, I was 16 years old when I flew to South Africa 🇿🇦 for three weeks. My hometown had organized a trip for a group of teenagers, and we were even supposed to meet Nelson Mandela.
Spoiler alert ⚠️... it never happened. He had been invited to New York for whatever celebration, so our meeting was canceled.
Honestly, I didn't have many expectations after that sad news but I was still excited to discover such a fascinating country with such a complex History. At the time, apartheid had officially ended only about a decade earlier, so its impact was still everywhere.
The very first thing that surprised me after stepping off the plane was... the air.
It didn't feel like the hot, humid African climate I remembered from Cameroon and Senegal. It felt... European.
Then came our first cultural shock:
At the airport, I piled my luggage onto my friend’s cart, climbed on top of it, and yelled to my blonde-haired, blue-eyed French friend: "Drive me!!!" She started pushing me through the airport... And everyone stopped to stare. People looked genuinely shocked to see a White girl pushing a cart with a Black girl sitting on top of the luggage.For us, it was completely normal.For many people around us, it looked unimaginable.That was the moment we realized that "normal" depends on where you are.Our group reflected France: Black, White, Arab, Indian... just teenagers traveling together as equals.
That trip became one of the most emotional experiences of my life.
We traveled across the country, from Cape Town to Johannesburg, Pretoria, Durban, Kruger Park and beyond. We stayed in incrediblehotels, ate incredible food, went on safaris, saw the Big Five, and countless other animals.
We even met Bill Gates.
At the luxury resort in Sun City, I became friends with a South African girl named Andy Meltz. Unfortunately, I lost touch with her after my phone was stolen back in Paris. Andy, if you read this and remember me, please Hola at me! Our tour guide, Joseph, was wonderful. And South Africa amazed me with its diversity. Some places reminded me of the United States and it was pleasant to me to see wonderful malls that Black people had access to. I loved seeing vibrant cities, beautiful shopping malls, breathtaking landscapes, and a country with so many different climates. We also visited Eswatini and Lesotho. We had the chance to visit a few museums like the Apartheid Museum, which broke our hearts, because once again, we were born when the apartheid was still a thing! The history suddenly felt incredibly close.
But South Africa wasn't only breathtaking. It also showed us some of the darkest realities.
But then we also saw the worst: teenagers being kidnapped in front of our eyes in the middle of the afternoon, some people wanting to kidnap us; we visited a neighborhood full of abandoned mixed race kids who suffered from HIV they inherited at birth. We met young women who were r*ped, while we’vebeen told that the average ratio was every 26 SECONDS in Soweto, mainly by someone you know… 😳 (and violence, crime etc. didn't come from the foreigners/ illegal immigrants. Due to its History, South Africa had A LOT OF problems to face and fix).
The country carried deep scars from its history and was still confronting enormous social challenges.
And, somehow, one guy from our group almost managed to fall off a cliff. 🤦🏽♀️
Looking back, this journey completely changed the way I saw the world. It was an emotional roller coaster. It taught me gratitude.
I grew up in a housing project in France, and life wasn't always easy. But after meeting children who had been given a death sentence at birth because of HIV... I promised myself I would NEVER complain about my life ever again!
South Africa made me feel deeply alive. It changed me. It moved me.It broke my heart and gave me life!
And it made me fall in love with it.
As an Afro-European who grew up loving Hip Hop culture, I've always taken the oppression of Black people personally.
Despite everything I witnessed, I also experienced countless magical moments.
And that same year I made myself a promise:
One day, I would come back.
It seems my 40th birthday was the perfect time to honor the promise I made to the 16-year-old Lya, 24 years ago.
The next articles will be dedicated to that promise: My journey through the land of Madiba, Desmond Tutu... and Tyla. 😅
Stay tuned.
Aight, I'm out! ✌🏽🎤🫶🏽
