Accidental Tourist: You can go home again

Seventeen years on and still things haven't changed

Through the back window of Tasmente's van, I try to get a better view of my dusty village, Swartkopfontein.

Tasmente is one of the few villagers who own vans, which transport my people from Moshaneng village to Swartkopfontein and vice versa.

Growing up, my villagers were regarded as dull and backward by the Setswana-speaking people of Moshaneng and other surrounding villages. In a way, this only encouraged some of us to excel academically and in everything we do, to prove that we are not what they perceive us to be.

Now work and other commitments have alienated us from our true homes. Only serious family gatherings such as funerals manage to bring us together again after decades of separation.

That's how I first went home, after my grandfather, Isaac Thambe, was buried. A noble and respected man, he was the chief who forfeited his chieftaincy to his younger brother. He was first in everything though: first in the queue for pension payouts, first to vote in 1994.

The second time I went home again was for the burial of Siye Gura, my grandfather's first-born.

I saw almost everyone I had grown up with, my friends and classmates. They reminded me of my childhood nickname: "Radipotomane" (Mr Strong Calves), as the hills and mountains of Swartkopfontein had turned me into a formidable machine.

I ran long distances after cows and donkeys better than the best Comrades marathon runner.

I asked if there were still students walking 60km to high school as Swartkopfontein does not have one; if there were still people selling firewood on donkey carts; if Moshaneng, 60km away, still served as our marketplace for groceries and other necessities. It tore my heart to pieces to hear that my people were still living in the same poverty after 17 years of freedom and poverty alleviation programmes.

These comrades are betraying us, my friends. Every time we ask about service delivery they say things are still in the pipeline - but how long is this pipe?

I saw most of my old friends jobless and toothless from senseless fights at liquor houses. I saw brothers I had once respected bent by the hardships of this life .

I saw my childhood sweetheart in such a sorry state that I surreptitiously wiped away my tears with her scarf as I embraced her .

After the funeral, I went to our dilapidated three-roomed house. As I walked around, many of my childhood memories came alive: all the laughter round the fire every night, my parents, my grandparents, my brothers . and my tears just fell.

I then went to my grandfather's yard. No one lives there now and all the houses that were once there have fallen.

Strangely, my grandfather's favourite is the only one still standing, the door tied with rusted wires, the roof gone.

Next I went to the family cemetery, gathered some stones as is the custom, then went to Isaac Thambe's grave. There I told him why I had come, where I was living now and closed my visit with my clan's praise poem.

I then returned to my aunt's house, where it warmed my heart to see that nothing had really changed - they still remember to pray Ubawo wethu osemazulwini (Our father who art in heaven) every night before they go to sleep.

• Thambe is a playwright and actor