Dear Jacques Kallis. In my teens, when I still lived at our family home in the Durban suburb of Newlands West, all I ever wanted to do was play cricket.Sure, I also desperately convinced myself I could sing - an allrounder.However, despite my mother's cheerleading, I knew I really was vocally impaired.I thought I was a decent batsman who could bowl equally as well.I was part of our school team, even though I never was the best. But it didn't matter. I convinced myself if I watched my idol Jacques Kallis bat long enough I could somehow inherit those powers of concentration.I could also possess that watertight defence and that unparalleled cover drive, and would one day score 100 at my home ground, Kingsmead, and lift up my Slazenger V100 bat to salute the crowd, just like you did.I had a friend, Ruvelin Govender, who played cricket for Durban High School. The Govenders were our neighbours and on some weekends we would drive to watch Ruvelin play.The facilities at DHS are some of the best in the country - the sprawling fields, swimming pools and courts were nothing like I had experienced.But Ruvie one day lost interest in cricket and took up golf. It became his obsession.My father told me we couldn't afford the equipment, let alone for me to go to DHS. I had to settle for a Kookaburra ball, which I cherished.Every afternoon after school I'd change and go pound the Govenders' wall as I bowled hundreds of deliveries with that high left-arm action I learned from you (even the grunt at the point of release).When I think of all the Proteas matches I've watched none of them were worth it if you weren't playing.Even though I loved watching Allan Donald, Herschelle Gibbs, Shaun Pollock and Lance Klusener, I had one idol - you.My friends and family couldn't always understand why I loved cricket so much. Cricket was a white sport. What business did I have aspiring to make it in that code, even provincially?Without dismissing his impressive feats, Makhaya Ntini was celebrated among our people for breaking the mould, for showing that black people could make it.So, too, Mfuneko Ngam and Monde Zondeki.But it wasn't enough, so we viewed them as rarities. With over 27000 schools in South Africa, and the majority of them poor and black, what chance does cricket in this country have of growing if it doesn't uplift and develop those black children?Your former teammate Gary Kirsten's foundation was established with that in mind - to spot future Temba Bavumas and harness their potential: to create idols black children could identify with and aim to emulate.Of course, you also have a foundation and its aim is to "change the world of a few more South African scholars". They should be able to count on your vast expertise.But you came out this week and spoke of your "embarrassment" at calling yourself South African.It's embarrassing to think more than two decades have elapsed and blacks are still seeking an in.It makes a difference, saying such, when you can travel the world and spend months away from the inescapable poverty some live with in this country.You spend your time in India for the IPL, in the gorgeous Caribbean, and Australia, collecting obscene pay cheques. You no longer have to deal with the uncomfortable yet necessary topic of transformation. That's because you've earned the privilege of having a "plan B" - an out.Transformation, which has so far been a disappointment post-isolation, is the government's way of telling previously disadvantaged children that they can also aspire to have a plan B - that they can see the world and be whoever they dream to be.That they can make us equally as proud as you made us when you scored those truckloads of runs and took hundreds of wickets.Don't be a grinch. Get in formation...