Grade 8, Africa House College
There once was a girl named Thingoluhle who was dark in complexion. She was bullied because of her complexion, and she had no friends at all. She lived with her grandparents, because her parents passed away when she was young. Her mother passed away when she was giving birth to her, and her father – no one knows how he died because they found his body in the river.
It was so painful to Thingoluhle, but what was more painful was that people did not love her because of her complexion. Her grandparents told her that she was beautiful, but she did not believe them; she thought that it was a nice way to make her feel better. Above all she was a smart girl and could write and read at the age of five years.
She was also a fast learner. Her teachers loved her, but Thingoluhle wanted to be loved by other children. As they continued to bully her, she wanted to kill herself. After school she bought rat poison to kill herself.
When her grandmother saw the poison she wondered what was it for because they had no rats. Later that day, Thingoluhle’s grandmother asked Thingoluhle what the rat poison was for, and she did not answer her grandmother. She asked again, “Answer me Thingoluhle, what is the rat poison for?” Thingoluhle started to cry and told her grandmother that she wanted to kill herself.
Her grandmother told her that she was beautiful, and that she should continue going to school because she was a smart girl. She listened and continued going to school, and she passed the matric very well. She started her own school for dark and beautiful girls so that they would never go through the same thing that she went through.
When she was twenty-eight years old she met a guy who loved her with her skin complexion. They got married after five years. Two years down the line, she was pregnant with a baby boy.
She lived happily ever after with her family.