Sometimes, it is good – and necessary – to be reminded that under the skin, we are all the same. We are human beings and shouldn’t be put into the boxes society uses to define us: those of race, gender and ethnicity.
When a black street vendor in Tshwane, Martha Nukeria, saw a white, drug-addled Connie van Staden, she offered him human warmth … and love.
Van Staden, who calls Nukeria his mother, told us: “Mommy fed me and she treated me like her own son. She hugged me and she loved me. I needed that motherly love and I think every drug user on the streets needs it too.”
That love and support, and her pushing him, saw him turn away from heroin after nine years of addiction. She saved his life.
It may be only one story, which means little in the great scheme of things. But it is a reminder to us that we all have a capacity to care for others, to look beyond race and see each other as equals.
In these fraught times, when racism is rearing its ugly head in many areas of our society, the story of Martha and Connie brings us a little, bright ray of hope.
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