Tag Archives: support

‘Wathint’ Abafazi, Wathint’ Imbokodo’

‘Wathint’ Abafazi, Wathint’ Imbokodo’

 

Lilian Ngoyi, Rahima Moosa, Helen Joseph and Sophia Williams-De Bruyn at the Women’s Day march of 1956

 

As a South African woman, I am well aware of the sacrifices made by the likes of Lilian Ngoyi, Rahima Moosa, Helen Joseph and Sophia Williams-De Bruyn. On the 9th of August 1956, these courageous individuals, as part of a +20,000 crowd of women, marched to the Union Buildings in Pretoria, South Africa’s capital, to hand over a petition demanding freedom from the oppressive pass laws.

Prior to 1956, all black men in South Africa were required to carry passes to move freely in urban areas. These passes were only allocated to men who had jobs and were a means of controlling the influx of black people into urban areas. In 1952, the apartheid government announced that black women would also be required to carry such passes, and this was met with grave resistance. Thus, leading to the infamous march on the 9th of August, where they petitioned against the new pass laws and Group Areas Act that would further entrench racism into the fabric of South African culture. Despite the lack of immediate change occurring with regards to the laws, this march served as a pinnacle for the resistance struggle against pass laws which were ultimately absolved in 1986.

At a time when South Africa was divided under the apartheid law, these women put aside any racial, cultural and political differences that may have existed between them, and banded together to challenge the government, with the sole intention of improving the lives of women for generations to come.

‘Wathint’ Abafazi, Wathint’ Imbokodo’

 

“You strike a woman; you strike a rock.” Now regarded as a South African proverb, these words are taken from the famous resistance song composed for the 1956 protest. It now  symbolizes the strength and courage that women possessed at the time (under apartheid law) and continue to possess to this very day, decades after their initial opposition to a government that had blatantly oppressed them.

It’s been 64 years since that momentous day, and at the close of women’s month (August) in South Africa, I am left wondering whether or not the significance of the day has been lost, and if the day is simply regarded as “just another public holiday.”

Our current dilemma

There is no doubt that being a woman in the workplace is difficult. Sure, some fields may be more “accepting” of women than others, but it always feels as though you have to fight 10 times harder than any man in the very same position as you. Microaggressions in the workplace make working environments very difficult for women, and when attempting to speak out, they are sometimes labelled as ”aggressive”, “bossy”, “not a team player” or even “unmanageable”. The unfortunate truth is that the glass ceiling seems far too close for most women. Men don’t face the same issues that women do. Men rarely have to choose between their career and having a family.. Men aren’t really expected to work and still excel in housework. No one would bat an eye if a man consistently overworked and thus failing to be truly present for his family.

Realizations

So what?! So what if they call you bossy? So what if you are told that you are too career orientated? So what if you are the only woman in an entire boardroom? You are exactly where you need to be to make a difference! Own your position, be bold, bossy and assertive … but remember that you are unique in your own way, and you are dealing with things men will NEVER EVER understand.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that we should treat men with the same kind of condescending, passive aggressive nature that they sometimes show us. On the contrary, I think it’s better if we own the things that set us apart. Women are always said to be more emotionally intuitive, highly analytical and driven to make decisions that benefit the collective. So perhaps instead of fighting to fit into spaces currently occupied by men, we should capitalize on our feminine characteristics and create our own spaces with that unique and powerful female touch. Then set down the ladder to allow other women to follow suit. If we truly collaborate as women, building each other up, I believe we would be able to conquer so much more!

“If you educate a man you educate an individual but if you educate a woman you educate a family (nation)”  – James Emman Kwegyir Aggrey

 

For many women, it may seem like the idea of “having it all” is simply impossible. We are often presented with a false choice, told to choose between having a successful career or a stable family, because the option of flourishing in both areas simultaneously is deemed unrealistic and absurd. As a result – in certain situations – it may feel like our ability to bear children is actually an obligation, rather than a gift. So much value is given to bearing children, that in a lot of cultures, a woman is regarded as less than, if she is unable to bear children. On the other hand, a woman who actively chooses not to have children will never hear the end of it. Just ask Tracee Ellis Ross.

 

You are a woman, and that is your superpower. Never let anyone tell you otherwise! Fight for your rights at every turn but remember to protect your peace.

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Below is a list of 20 influential women across varying sectors, including some of my own personal role models. I hope that this list will inspire you to break through that glass ceiling and exist loudly, and proudly in whatever sector you find yourself in!

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  • Ellen DeGeneres

Area of influence: Entertainment

According to a poll by Variety magazine in 2015, Ellen DeGeneres did more to influence American attitudes in regard to gay rights than any other celebrity. The talk show host came out as gay in 1997 — and so did her character on her sitcom “Ellen.”

  • Ai-jen Poo

Area of influence: Activism

Ai-jen Poo was a driving force behind the worker-led movement Domestic Workers United in New York City. The organization’s campaigns led to better conditions for domestic workers, raised awareness of economic contributions that domestic workers provide, helped get legal representation for abused workers, and crafted a framework of legal standards for workers.

  • Malala Yousafzai

Area of influence: Women’s rights

Malala Yousafzai, an advocate for women’s education rights, won the Nobel Peace Prize at age 17, making her the youngest recipient ever. The attempt on her life when she was on her way to school led to her native Pakistan to pass that nation’s first Right to Education Bill.

  • Oprah Winfrey

Area of influence: Entertainment/activism

Oprah Winfrey, the first African-American female billionaire, has had a significant influence on American culture since her time as a television talk show host. She played a key role in the emergence of Barack Obama as a presidential candidate and continues to be politically active. An indication of her influence? The Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture is holding an exhibition titled “Watching Oprah: The Oprah Winfrey Show and American Culture.”

 

  • Judith Butler

Area of influence: Activism

Judith Butler is a philosopher and gender theorist who has written influential books on feminist and gay topics. Her books, such as “Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity” and “Bodies That Matter: On the Discursive Limits of Sex,” challenge conventions about gender.

 

  • Beyonce

Area of influence: Entertainment

Beyonce has more Grammy nominations, 66, than any other female performer, and she has won 22 times. She is an icon for feminism and for African American culture. She dipped her toe into politics at Super Bowl 50, when she had her backup singers dress in black with black berets and afros to protest racial injustice.

 

  • Christine Lagarde

Area of influence: Finance

Christine Lagarde is the first female managing director of the International Monetary Fund, and she has helmed the IMF since 2011. Over that time, Lagarde has helped the international community manage the eurozone debt crisis and the possibility of a trade war between the United States and China, the world’s two largest economies.

 

  • Inna Braverman

Area of influence: Energy

Israeli entrepreneur Inna Braverman is the co-founder of Eco Wave Power, a company that is using the power of oceanic waves to produce clean energy. Braverman designed and created a commercially feasible wave energy plant in Gibraltar that supplies 15% of the British territory’s electricity. Braverman, who survived the Chernobyl nuclear accident when she was an infant, opened her first power plant in Jaffa, Israel, when she was 26 years old.

 

  • Indra Nooyi

Area of influence: Business

Indra Nooyi served as CEO of PepsiCo from 2006 to 2018, and over that time, the company’s revenue rose 80%. Nooyi has been candid about the struggle to balance the pressure of leading one of the world’s largest beverage companies with her home life.

 

  • Christiane Amanpour

Area of influence: Journalism

Journalist Christiane Amanpour first gained notoriety for her reports for CNN on Iran in 1985. She received international recognition for her dispatches as a war correspondent during the Bosnian crisis in the 1990s. Amanpour has also reported from the world’s hot spots such as Haiti, Rwanda, Somalia, and Afghanistan.

 

  • Tegla Loroupe

Area of influence: Sports/activism

Kenya’s Tegla Loroupe was propelled into the world’s spotlight in 1994, when she became the first African woman to win the New York City Marathon. Other running successes followed and Loroupe became one of the world’s elite female marathoners. She has used her fame to found the Tegla Loroupe Peace Foundation to help bring peace to communities in Kenya, Uganda, and Sudan.

 

  • Rhianna

Area of influence: Entertainment

Few artists can match the success of Rihanna in the 21st century. The Barbadian singer has had 14 No. 1 hits on the Billboard Hot 100, and 31 songs reached the top 10. She’s also won nine Grammy Awards. She lists Madonna among her influences and considers herself a black Madonna.

 

  • Betsy DeVos

Area of influence: Education

Betsy DeVos is the secretary of education for President Donald Trump. She is a longtime supporter of school choice, school voucher programs, and charter schools. Her positions on education, as well as amending Obama-era guidelines on rules pertaining to sexual assault cases on college campuses, have made her a controversial figure in the Trump administration.

 

  • Melinda Gates

Area of influence: Philanthropy

Melinda Gates is the one of the most powerful philanthropists in the world. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is the world’s largest private charitable organization, with a trust endowment of $40 billion. The foundation is addressing issues such as education and poverty, and Gates has focused particularly on women’s rights.

 

  • Janet Yellen

Area of influence: Finance

As the first female head of the Federal Reserve from 2014 to 2018, Janet Yellen was one of the most powerful women in the world. Yellen projected stability and a calm demeanor as she began a series of interest-rate hikes that threatened to shake up the equity markets. Before Yellen, the Fed has been lowering rates or leaving them unchanged since the financial crisis in 2008.

 

  • Mary Barra

Area of influence: Business

Mary Barra was the first female head of a major automobile company. She took the reins of GM in early 2014, just as the company was dealing with a massive recall that involved defective ignition switches. Her crisis-management skills brought GM through that troubled period. Since then, Barra has deftly pulled the company out of Russia and withdrew Chevy from Europe. Under her, General Motors has shifted into ride-sharing services by investing in Lyft, and launched the electric vehicle the Chevy Bolt. For her vision and ability to handle crises, Automotive News’ 2018 Industry Leader of the Year.

 

  • Serena Williams

Area of influence: Sports

It would be pretty hard to argue against Serena Williams as the greatest women’s tennis player of all time. Williams has won 23 Grand Slam titles — Wimbledon, French Open, U.S. Open, the Australian Open — the most in the Open era. Along the way, the African American tennis star has battled gender and racial bias, and her own doubts about motherhood.

 

  • Caster Semenya

Area of influence: Sports

South African middle-distance runner and 2016 Olympic gold medallist. Caster has had to overcome several biases and prejudices against her due to her high levels of testosterone caused by a sexual development disorder. In 2019, new IAAF rules prevented women like Caster from participating in female events unless she takes medication to lower testosterone levels.

 

  • Catherine Constantinides

Area of influence: Climate change, environmental activism, human rights activist

A 2013 Archbishop Tutu African Oxford Fellow and 2016 Mandela Washington Fellow, Catherine’s commitment and passion for social change takes her to the smallest of communities in South Africa, as well as global platforms including the UN, where she currently works as a human rights defender actively engaging in Geneva at the UN Human Rights Council for the world’s most marginalised and vulnerable . Her recent work with the people of Western Sahara has highlighted the conflict and one of the longest outstanding issues on the UN security council. In 2017, she was an invited panellist at the inaugural Obama Summit hosted by former president Barack Obama. In 2020, she was named as one of South Africa’s most influential Africans by Generational Wealth Education and one of the 100 Most Influential African Leaders by the Pan African Youth Leadership Foundation. Most recently, she was also named one of the Global Ambassadors for the Earthshot Prize launched by Prince William and Sir David Attenborough

Catherine’s passion and drive is phenomenal and I am privileged to have worked with her during my time as a Miss Earth South Africa (2017) first runner-up. I have witnessed first-hand her determination to evoke change within our communities and encourage young girls to reach for their dreams. She has encouraged me to live my purpose fiercely and with zest.

 

Keeping your head above (COVID-19) water

What day is it ? Is it really Monday ? Are we in April or May? What productive thing have I done with myself this week?

If you’re like me, then these are some of the questions that you wake up asking yourself. It feels as if the days just blend into each other, one ending and the next beginning without any real indication, and through it all, I still feel like I am just drifting along. Just trying to find myself and keep my head above water. I won’t lie, some days I feel like I am drowning. Like I am in this sea of COVID-19, it’s all around me – every news channel, every social media outlet, and somehow, part of EVERY conversation I have. It’s hard to feel like there is anything more to my days than COVID-19, and as such, I am finding it hard to “keep the end in mind.”

When lockdown first started I was determined to keep afloat. Determined not to let this pandemic take my sanity away. So, I resorted to waking up at the same time as normal, and getting dressed as if I was leaving my apartment and going to work. I would try as best as possible to work my “normal” working hours. I would even reserve Saturday for cleaning as I had done in my life BLD (before lockdown) (How bizarre to think of life in different eras!).

I’m the kind of person that needs to have a routine and some structure to remain sane. My compulsive need to remain in control was really been tested when I could no longer properly plan for the future because I had no idea what this future would be like. Slowly but surely I started to lose steam. I stopped bothering about routine, stopped bothering about looking presentable and brushing my hair (please don’t judge me!). With each passing day I felt my motivation slipping away little by little.

At some point I was beating myself up about this. Feeling like I was failing myself for not having the same energy six weeks into lockdown as I had at the beginning. But something clicked one day and I realised that it was okay. It’s okay to have low days. It’s okay to feel like I hadn’t done anything productive for the day (or week). It was okay to just curl up and read a book that had no academic benefit and it was definitely okay to binge-watch a random Netflix show!!

“We should listen to our bodies and be gentle and kind with ourselves”

COVID-19 is something we could never have been prepared for. No one knows how to properly deal with everything. This pandemic has left so many of us scared , anxious, frustrated and putting additional stress on ourselves to be productive. Don’t get me wrong, I am not saying that we should all just give up and turn into couch potatoes, but I am saying that we should listen to our bodies and be gentle and kind with ourselves before anything else. Many of us may have caring responsibilities, and it is important to remember that we can’t pour from an empty cup , so give yourself the time and rest that you need.

I wish I had all the answers in how to make it through these difficult times, unfortunately I don’t, but I can only share with you some of the ways that I have been trying to cope with my limited motivation levels.

  • Try to maintain some kind of routine – I work during the week and keep weekends as my time to spend with family, watching movies and just relaxing.
  • If you can’t work a full day, then try to work for solid uninterrupted stretches, taking regular breaks .
  • I try to spend some time outside, just enjoying the sunshine.
  • As an avid traveller, I have tried to catch up on my travel journal. This has served as a kind of gratitude journal, reminding me of all the amazing memories I have from my travels. It may be helpful to keep a gratitude journal, just to remind yourself of all the positives in your life when things seem bleak.
  • Exercise – I’m not a gym rat, and I really have struggled to keep committed to this, but I try to do at least a few minutes of exercise at least 3 times a week.
  • Meditation – I also suffer from an overactive mind that will focus on any random thing whenever I try to meditate. However, I have found that this has been a way to find peace when the day seems to run away from me.

I really hope that the days ahead would be a bit more peaceful, and that in some way, we would all begin to find peace.

I will leave you with a few quotes to try to boost your motivation each day . Stay safe … and remember, it’s okay to take a break!


*Self-Motivation*

    1. “Believe in yourself! Have faith in your abilities! Without a humble but reasonable confidence in your own powers you cannot be successful or happy.”

    2. “If you can dream it, you can do it.”

    3. “Where there is a will, there is a way. If there is a chance in a million that you can do something, anything, to keep what you want from ending, do it. Pry the door open or, if need be, wedge your foot in that door and keep it open.”

    4. “Do not wait; the time will never be ‘just right.’ Start where you stand, and work with whatever tools you may have at your command, and better tools will be found as you go along.”

    5. “Press forward. Do not stop, do not linger in your journey, but strive for the mark set before you.”

    6. “The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.”

    7. “Aim for the moon. If you miss, you may hit a star.”

    8. “Don’t watch the clock; do what it does. Keep going.”

    9. “There will be obstacles. There will be doubters. There will be mistakes. But with hard work, there are no limits.”

    10. “Keep your eyes on the stars, and your feet on the ground.”

    11. “We aim above the mark to hit the mark.”

    12. “One way to keep momentum going is to have constantly greater goals.”

    13. “Change your life today. Don’t gamble on the future, act now, without delay.”

    14. “You just can’t beat the person who never gives up.”

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Side note …

Hey !  My name is Orielia Egambaram. I’m doing my PhD in Chemistry and my work is focused on the development of energy storage systems. I’m currently in Swaziland (Southern Africa) with my family.  I am the communications manager for WReN. I’m so excited to be part of a network of amazing women. Keep safe . Love & light