AIDS Foundation – “Africa Alive Foundation” – Part I

My religious education classes taught me that the road to heaven was smooth, straight, and paved with gold, but until 53 months ago I had thought that if there was a God, she must have a weird sense of humor because I was definitely not into it. path. Or maybe in this incarnation he accidentally handed me the wrong road map. My life had been a series of sporadic events, twisting paths, and numerous unrelated dots scattered across time. Then suddenly a ferocious whirlwind swirled around me, spinning and spinning until he carried me 10,000 miles from home. What I didn’t realize was that these events were all interrelated and were tightly woven into the very fabric of my being.

My name is Getrude Matshe. I am 39 years old and I was born in one of the most fascinating continents in the world. Africa is a tough continent that can rip your heart out of your chest and turn it to dust, and the sad thing is that no one will care. This is life; nobody will care

My book “Born on the Mainland – Ubuntu” it is a memory and an awakening. It’s a reminder for people like me, people who were born on the mainland; to remember where we came from Unfortunately, when most of us succeed and leave the continent, we forget where we came from, we have very few memories of what we have left behind. For once your stomach is full and you are no longer hungry. The impulse to help those who are still hungry fades. I hope my book invokes some memory of the homeland and all that we have left behind.

For those of you who have visited Africa, or lived there before, these memories are for you too. Scattered Africans in the African Diaspora should remember that we have survived one of the worst pandemics the 21st century has seen, the disease called AIDS. To have survived this is nothing short of a miracle. We are in the middle of an undeclared war, a war that has left Africa devastated with disease and disease, and you and I are the survivors. We have survived for a reason.

My personal mission in this life is to try to make a difference for as many people on the continent as I can. If I can only sow the seed and leave my mark on the sands of time, my life purpose will have been fulfilled. I have survived to help those who could not help themselves: the sick, dying and orphans of HIV in Africa. You too could make a difference to at least one person in your life. It can be a relative, a child or an elderly grandparent who has been left in the care of three or four or five or sometimes ten grandchildren because his parents have died. You know they’re out there, you know them by name, and that’s the reality where we come from. Like soldiers on the battlefield, we must now take up arms and fight. Fight hunger, fight poverty, fight the lack of education and, most importantly, fight the lack of medicines that is killing our people every day.

I don’t think our meeting is a coincidence. I think you are reading this article for a reason, or maybe because it just reminded you of Africa. Remember the hunger, poverty and hardships that our people are experiencing, and remember that together we can find a solution to Africa’s problems.

There are enough smart people in the world today, enough gifted people who can make a difference in Africa, and the only way we can uplift our people, the only way we can uplift our race, is by doing it ourselves. For hundreds of years we have sat and looked west for solutions. For hundreds of years we have sat with our hands outstretched pleading for global help, waiting for help, waiting for medicines to combat this pandemic that has ravaged our beloved continent.

Well, my brother, my sister, help is not on the way. Help is not coming. We are the help, you and me. We have survived this disease for a reason, and only through our own efforts can we rebuild our beautiful continent of Africa. So please pass this stick, pass this mindset to everyone you meet, everyone you talk to. Let’s solve our own problems and solve them on a micro level by helping our immediate families and then extending a helping hand to everyone around us if we can. We can no longer trust the West to help us. We can no longer wait with outstretched hands like the beggars we have been for centuries.

A dandelion spreads its seeds as far away from the field as possible to ensure the survival of that seed. A tree produces sweet, succulent fruit to ensure that it attracts birds and animals to eat the fruit and carry the seeds to more fertile ground. And so, too, Africa has scattered its children into what we now know as the African Diaspora. I am one of those children, and so are you. We are the seed that has landed on fertile ground, and our survival will ensure the continuation of our dying race.

Statistics show that 25 million Africans are infected with HIV or AIDS. Sixty percent of the world’s AIDS sufferers are Africans and 16 million Africans have already died in the pandemic. AIDS has left an orphan 12 million African children.

Mama Africa has thrown me 17,000 kilometers from home and I now live in New Zealand, ‘The Land of the Long White Cloud’. I know I may never return home to Africa permanently, but my purpose in life is to be the messenger, the storyteller, the storyteller of a past generation. I am a sower of seeds and in particular of that precious seed that we all know, the seed called Ubuntu.

With the benefit of my book, “Born on the Mainland – Ubuntu” I have established the “Africa Viva Foundation” a charity that cares for HIV and AIDS orphans in Zimbabwe. Please buy a book and support me, it is available at borninthecontinent.com