So began a long year and a heavy load for me, one which was both exhilarating and fulfilling, and saw me emerge like a butterfly from its chrysalis. My self-confidence grew in leaps and bounds as I met all my commitments, learning how to organize events at the school, whilst maintaining my very high academic standards. My parents later said that they had worried about me, when I was still up studying long after the rest of the family had gone to bed, but I relished the peace and quiet of those late nights when I could work quietly in my bedroom. I had a comfortable chair, with a piece of wood placed over the arms which served as my desk.
At the end of the year, on Prize-Giving Day, I was awarded the school’s highest honour, The Dux (= leader, in Latin) Prize, a silver watch engraved with this inscription and my name. I loved it. I was so proud of all that I had achieved. At that time, I didn’t know my examination results, which were marked by The Associated Examining Board of Education in London, England, and would take several weeks to come back to us. I was yet to find out that I had achieved success there, too. Hurrah! I was going to university to study for an Honours Degree in French! I was happy and relieved, especially since I had also just won another prize, one awarded by the Alliance Française to the student who had submitted the best essay in a competition open to students in the Federation of Southern Rhodesia, Northern Rhodesia, and Nyasaland: me!
So it was that, despite my having attended several schools in my life, and despite the numerous upheavals and the occasions when I had hated feeling like an outcast, I had ended my schooling on a high. I had made it by dint of hard work, perhaps, but I had made it. Onto pastures new now. I was heading to university.
It was early 1966. Did any of us know at that time about the political turmoil that was to emerge, growing every fiercer for years to come till a guerrilla war raged? No, we didn’t, but maybe we should have guessed as much, from the moment our right-wing Prime Minister, Ian Smith, declared an illegal Universal Declaration of Independence from Britain, on 11th November 1965. This not only put the country at risk of international sanctions but gave the largely unenfranchised African majority of four million very little political power in the face of 250,000 privileged Whites.
I wasn’t paying much attention to all that was happening politically. I was focusing on my studies and my own future. I was about to attend our local multi-racial university, an external college of the University of London, UK, with a student population of only 350. What did I expect to happen in such a political hotbed? I don’t know and I didn’t think much about it.
I was soon to find out.
