DM: What’s it like being a young woman in South Africa and the world today?

Moyo: It’s very, very, very easy. It’s very easy, but it goes with a person, how she faces her facts, how she wants to live her life. Because one way or the other we have enough opportunities to be whatever we want. Yet we are the ones who are taking those opportunities and putting them in our pockets.

Like whatever that is holding us back – (for example) teenage pregnancy – it cannot be a mistake. Even though it can be a mistake, you can get up on your feet again. It doesn’t stop anyone. That’s why I’m saying it’s very, very easy. We cannot complain and say “the government this, the government, the government”. Why cannot we do what the government cannot do? Help the government because either way we are the government.

Maila: I have a different view. I think that it is difficult to be a young women in South Africa because we face many challenges, challenges that are beyond your control. For example, we live in an impoverished community. I know that there are opportunities and that cannot stop us from reaching our fullest potential but I think that sometimes it demotivates you to come home, not having anything to eat, and then on the other side you are expected to perform very well at school. Those things they affect you.

And the other issue of alcoholism that we face as learners. There are learners who bring alcohol to school. It affects all of us because the teacher concentrates on them and they are neglecting all of us.

And our parents. Not all of our parents are able to be there daily and support us. Some of our parents are absent parents. Like you literally see them once a year and they do not know what’s going on in your life, but they still expect you to do everything you can to improve your life. It’s not easy.

Phinzi: I think it’s easy because we have a lot of opportunities. Now, women in South Africa these days we’re given huge attention because we’re not oppressed like we used to be before. At schools we’re now equal. There’s nothing like “boys are supposed to perfect only”. We’re given equal positions, equal attention.

How do you think your lives might be different to perhaps how your mothers’ or your aunts’ lives may have been?

Maila: I think that our experiences and our lives are very different because most of our mothers got married at a very young age and it was never their choice. Now we have our own choices and we can make our own decisions. You have opportunities. For example, you can get bursaries and then your background does not necessarily define who you’re going to be in the future. As a person you can do whatever you want to do. These days we can follow any career path, like for example you have women working in mining whereas in the olden days our mothers only had certain careers that were reserved for them. Most of them became nurses or teachers but it was not their choice. It was because of the situations they found themselves in.

Moyo: And culture.

Maila: Most of them were not educated and it’s not that they did not want to get educated but because they had limited opportunities, but we have greater opportunities beyond those of our parents.

Moyo: Before, every women like our mothers they lived under culture, they listened to their older parents who say: “You are not supposed to be what a man is right now. You are supposed to be a mother and all of that.” But right now we get the chance to be anything that we want. A guy can be a fire fighter and I as woman can be a fire fighter right now.

DM: Do the women in your family tell you stories about this sort of stuff?

Phinzi, Maila, Moyo: Yes!

Phinzi: They saw men as better people than them. Men were supposed to go to work and women were supposed to stay behind and look after the children, do all the household chores. They shouldn’t argue with men at home, things like that.

Moyo: They were supposed to marry men older than them because they were forced. And after they got married it was a fact, and it was a point, and it was that part where you have to have a child whether you like it or not and you have to be a mother. Either way you stay home, whether you like it or not.

DM: There are still lots of challenges facing women today. There are still challenges of patriarchy, including gender-based violence and challenges in the workplace. Women are still under-represented in management positions and only about 30% of judges are women …

Moyo: The good part about it is that 30% can encourage other women. From 30% it can increase. That’s why they’re busy giving us, the youth, the opportunity to be whatever we want and reach whatever we want.

DM: But do you face challenges as young women?

Maila: Yes we do. We do face challenges. At school there are boys that abuse young girls and most of the time the young girls do not report it because they think people will judge them and say it’s their fault. For example, if older people always see you playing around with boys once you get raped it’s not easy for you to come out because most of the people are going to say you deserve it, it’s what you always wanted.

And young girls who fall pregnant after being raped they’re not always believed. Most of the people believe “no it’s they’re fault, they had sex at an early age”, not knowing that those people were raped, not wanting to be in that situation. Maybe sometimes they want to abort the baby but their parents tell them it’s the consequences of the choices you made.

DM: What other challenges do young women face?

Phinzi: Sexual assault at school. You see when you’re thick at school boys look at you, boys spank you, call you names. But when you report it at school they won’t believe you because they think maybe we enjoy what they’re doing.

Maila: It has also become sort of a norm because most of the girls you can see boys spanking them at school but they do not report it because it’s like they are used to this life. They are not aware it’s actually sexual harassment. Even if people call them names they’re not really aware so they do not report it. They just take it lightly. At the end of the day it’s going to happen to someone else and it’s not going to happen in the same way. That guy is going to do it to another girl.

Moyo: Another problem is that we girls lack love. A lot of girls date because they think that it’s a good idea to find love from other people instead of loving yourself. Either way you have to love yourself before loving another person. In other ways, guys are just there to play with you. As a young teenager you just know that guys are just there playing with a trend: “If you don’t date a chick you are not man enough, you are not cool enough.” To them it’s something to play with but to us as girls it’s something that’s so important. We lack love for ourselves so we start giving it to someone else and start forgetting ourselves.

DM: Changing direction, do you have mentors or idols you look up to?

Phinzi: I once had a role model but at the present moment I don’t because I haven’t seen someone with the qualities I desire. Most of the time the people you look up to are the ones who disappoint you in the end. And then you’re surprised and you think this is not the kind of person I want to become in life and then you shift your direction. I’ve just become self-motivated and I’ve told myself I don’t have to look up to anybody else but I know what is right, I know what is wrong, I can make my own choices. Maybe even though I do not have a role model I know what I am expected to do, I know what is right, I know the consequences of the choices I make.

Moyo: Me too. There’s no one who is my role model because I am my role model. I do something different in my life because in my family my sister had a lot of opportunities. She had the chance to go to university, she had the chance to do whatever that she wants, but she fell pregnant. She fell pregnant and either way I didn’t stop my life and say: “Now I have to fall back and have a child and join her.” Instead, you know what, I’m the one who’s raising her child. She doesn’t even live where we live. She lives somewhere else. I’m the one who’s raising her child and guess what – I’ve reached my Grade 12. Where can you find those kind of people? So I’m my own role model.

Maila: I do have one, Lesego Tau, this guy who has programmes empowering my community, making sure we value education, making sure we get hungry for education, not choosing careers because I’ve got no choice, but doing it with love, being passionate about what you’re doing.

DM: It makes me wonder, two of you don’t have icons and one of your role models is a man. Are we lacking in women who set a good example that you want to emulate? Do older generations need to do more to provide a better example? (After listing prominent female leaders in society) Do none of them inspire you?

Phinzi: I think they do.

Moyo: It also starts in you. You have to motivate yourself before you say whoever is motivating me.

Maila: They do set a good example to society. They do set a good example to young women. The thing is that we do not aspire to become like them. They are really good leaders. They motivate people. But they do not serve the standards that I personally want as a role model. I think most of the people I think should be role models are our unsung heroes.

DM: What are your dreams and ambitions?

Phinzi: I really want to go study after schooling. Because I’ll be the first one in my family. No one went to varsity. Okay – my sister went to college but now she’s sitting with the qualifications, nothing to do. So I really want to be the one who leaves my name in the family. I’d like to study media.

Moyo: I don’t know how to say this, but marriage is an obsession for me because I really, really want to get married and be a mother. I want to be a mother, yet I want to be a teacher, yet I want to be a journalist. But the biggest thing to me is I want to be a mother. I want to be that women that when my kids look up to me they say: “This is my mum. That’s my mum everybody!” I want to be that woman who gives her child the love, encourages them and shows them the right path and lets them experience what to live for. That’s me.

Maila: I want to study law because I’ve always been interested in debating and stuff. It’s my passion because I enjoy subjects like English and history. The only place I see myself is in university and I’ve also applied. It’s just that sometimes things do not go as you’ve planned. I’m just planning to get a bursary so that I can study because my parents cannot afford to send me to university. DM

Photo: Grade 12 students Puseletso Maila, 18, Kagiso Moyo, 17, and Grade 11 student Phindile Phinzi, 16, at Constitutional Hill Johannesburg. (Greg Nicolson)