When the fun goes wrong

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Friday August 8^th 2003- Three high school girls decided to bunk school. Ever bunked school as a teenager? I know I have, but this particular day will stay with these girls forever. This is not my story, but I have agonized over telling it for some time.

Three girls aged fourteen – fifteen years met at school that morning, but instead of going in they decided to walk up to their local taxi rank and go for a ride. By the time they reached Wynberg taxi rank most of the commuters had already been dropped off and the taxis were mostly empty. They got in a taxi with the driver, his friend and the guardtjie (person who collects the fare from commuters). The driver told them they could sit up front; two of the girls (girl A and B) went to sit up front sandwiched between the driver and his friend, while the third (girl C) had to sit in the back with the guard.

Girl A asked the driver to take them to her boyfriend’s house in Grassy Park, the driver then asked them if they would like a free ride around, they said yes. The music was pumping (if you know anything about South African mini bus taxis you will know that loud thumping music is a standard) and they were off. During the course of the drive the guard gripped girl C to the back of the taxi and pinned her to floor and raped her.

A while later one of the girls in the front turned around and asked where her friend was, as she couldn’t see her. Girl C then got up from the floor and girl B could see that she had been crying. She then told to the taxi driver to stop the car as she needed to go to the toilet.

The driver stopped outside a KFC and the three girls went into the bathroom, where girl C told them what had happened. Not knowing where they were they asked a customer inside and was told that they were in Mitchells Plain (not the safest suburb for anyone let alone three fourteen year old girls). They went back to the taxi and told the driver to take them back to the taxi rank. When they got there all three girls parted ways and girl C went to a nearby friend’s house.

She told her friend what happened and her friend’s mother immediately phoned her mom.

That was when I received the worst phone call a mother could receive.

When I arrived to fetch my daughter her eyes were swollen form crying and at that moment I just wanted to kill the person who did this to my little girl.

There is much more to this story, but I will share what happened after that in my next post.

I asked my daughter first before posting this if I could share her story on my blog, she responded with “It was a long time ago, I have grown from this and it has made me a stronger person”.

To my beautiful, brave daughter - You have grown into such a lovely young woman and I am proud of you.