It is a legacy of pain, of homes and of families split up and separated, that remains with us today, of apartheid’s continuing brutalisation of South Africans.

These complex and conflicting issues that we as a family, and we as a nation, should deal with may still yield some measure of peace, if that is at all possible, given the weight of the past.

My experiences growing up here, there and everywhere have been a convoluted scattering of disjointed places, of half-remembered faces and of many a restless night spent contemplating the questions of identity, home, belonging and of what anchors a person.

Perhaps, there are reasons for the times when that vagabond, exile blood gets restless and that itch, that impatience, that urge to move, to flee, to re-join the nomadic community surfaces. And perhaps, there are reasons too, for my ability to suppress the sometimes-fiery urge to trade quiet suburban stasis for the unknown path of the unnamed exile.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Afzal Moolla is a young, gifted South African poet. Born in exile in Delhi in 1972 to ANC stalwarts, Moosa “Mosie” and Zubeida Moolla, his poetry and reflective writings capture the broad contours of the South African struggle for national liberation and freedom. It’s not just what he says but how he says that stirs the imagination. His love for poetry stems from the works of Mirza Ghalib, Ram Prasad Bismil, Faiz Ahmed Faiz, Kaifi Azmi, and other progressive poets whose writings were revolutionary and humanistic at their core. His father had stirred in him the embers of the appreciation of poets such as Pablo Neruda, Nazim Hikmet, Keorapetse William Kgositsile, António Agostinho Neto, Amílcar Cabral, Langston Hughes, and the current Poet Laureate of South Africa, Mongane Wally Serote.       

Afzal Moolla's Book "Struggle, Exile & Love"  is available for purchase and pick-up (for those who have paid via EFT) on Tuesdays and Thursdays between 10h00 and 14h00 at the Ahmed Kathrada Foundation.

The price of the book is R120 per copy.

Ahmed Kathrada Foundation EFT Details:

Bank: ABSA

Account name: Ahmed Kathrada Foundation Trust

Branch: Lenasia

Account Number: 4072797524

Branch Code: 632005

Swift Code: ABSAZAJJ

Site Code: 8144

Please add your name and surname as the reference when doing the payment and please send the proof of payment to: shaheda@kathradafoundation.org

Ahmed Kathrada Foundation Physical Address:

Signet Terrace Office Park,

Block B,

Suite 2, 

19 Guinea-Fowl Street, 

Lenasia, Gauteng,

1827