I recall as a boy in Soweto during the 1990s, there grew a call across the township: “Don’t eat at other people’s houses.”
Parents would warn their children sternly, yet seldom did they explain the reasoning behind the seemingly paranoid command. When they did, their explanations often sounded outlandish and far-fetched to our innocent minds: “Stop playing in the fields; they will steal you,” or “Don’t eat at other people’s houses; they will poison you.” None of these warnings made much sense to a child’s mind.
As children, we are constantly building a case against our parents to prove that they don't really like us – all because they don’t let us do what we want. And so, we often have different kinds of interactions with them.
Some of us got along with our parents, having achieved our mission to have them eat out of the palm of our hands, a mission that starts as early as when we want to be soothed as babies. Others, unfortunately, never found that harmony and some of the worst tales emerge from such strained relationships. Then, there are those of us who lived in the grey area of discipline, deception and orchestrated obedience, teetering between compliance and rebellion.
I was fortunate to have a strong bond with my dad, who raised me by himself. We got along well, though he wasn’t the greatest cook. In fact, my friends didn’t particularly enjoy eating at my place. “Magents, I’ll see you later, I’m going home to eat,” was a common exit strategy for my peers whenever we were out playing. Eating at someone else’s house, despite our parents’ warnings, seemed like a harmless, everyday decision – until it wasn’t.
In the North West province, a reality check of our parents’ warnings has tragically come to life. Three people have died after eating pies laced with poison, and now a family elder has been arrested and charged with their murders. The accused, 62-year-old man Daniel Mokwai, allegedly fed the deadly pies to his own son and two other relatives over a span of three years, all to cash in on insurance claims. Initially, the deaths were believed to be from natural causes, but investigations later revealed the dark reality – Mokwai had laced the pies with poison.
The case is a harsh reminder of how the most unthinkable warnings, the ones our parents issued with a look of seriousness that we mistook for exaggeration, can turn out to be horrifyingly real. The same words that we dismissed as a child – “Don’t eat at other people’s houses; they will poison you” – echo hauntingly in the memories of the three victims and their families.
As children, we never understood the seemingly irrational fears our parents carried. But as adults, we are often forced to confront the reality that evil can, and does, lurk in the most unexpected places. Sometimes, the warnings we once shrugged off as paranoid are the very ones that could save a life.
Saturday Star