I was born in what is now known as Riverlea in 1953. I am one of 3 children, and the only survivor. My sister and brother are both deceased. My mother is also deceased. My mother and father divorced when my twin brother and I were four and my sister was eight. We never really lived with my mother; my grandmother raised us.
I found out I was different at a young age because I never liked playing with girls. I played football, rugby and all those boy games. I was always attracted to my same sex, and that happened in the convent and in a reformatory. I was never attracted to the opposite sex, never was and never will be.
In those years everyone was in the closet. Nothing was public. But to me it wasn’t really difficult because I used to move around with the boys just as I am. I was very different from other lesbians. The last gym dress I wore was at the age of 14. Once I cut off my long ponytail I never looked back. Now I’m bald. For me it’s different and I feel different from the others. I don’t know why they hide their sexuality by first going to the opposite sex, having a child and then admitting they’re lesbian. If I can do research I’d ask them flat out ‘what did you think you were doing?’ If they were raped, something like that I can still understand.
I used to move around in Hillbrow at a club then called Club 505. It was the Barbarella’s, Zipps came years after that. There you could now really see gay crowds but in the time we grew up we had no advantages. We were not accepted then. All of them jumped into the closet. That’s why a lot of people never ever knew what I was. I liked to participate in sports and the only sport that was a bit masculine that I played was hockey. Otherwise there was nothing else. Today you can play soccer and cricket and you can see who is a lesbian in those teams.
Today they really have a lot of privileges. They can openly walk hand in hand. One could always make out who is the butch and who always wears a skirt and blouse. But now it’s unisex and you can wear what you want. You are accepted in your job and wherever you work. This was the year 1971. I was living in Westdene, and sub-contracted to Roberts Construction. I worked there for a year. He didn’t even know what I was and once when I was arrested, my employer came down to the police station. He was looking for a male and they looked and there was no such person. They looked in the female section and there I was and they said she’s a she, not a he. Later I found out that my employer was dumb-founded.
At work, the problem came in using the mobile toilets. I had overalls with straps. I was so absent- minded that instead of fastening the straps inside the toilet I came out fastening the straps. This Afrikaner says, ‘hey, hoor hierso, mannetjie? Hoekom werk jou maag altyd’ (Translated: hey, boy, listen here, why is your tummy always upset?) Then I said, oubaas, dit is seker maar die kos wat my ma kook.’ (Translated: It’s probably the food my mother cooks). I used the male toilets because one day I went into the female toilet and was smacked out. That happened years ago but I never ever went into the female toilets again.
Another major problem was when I bought stamps for my holiday pay in November. I was going to change those stamps and was registered as John Alexander. My employer had to change my stamps with his ID because my ID was female. Another experience was when I was arrested. It was in Fords-burg. This young girl I was moving around with said, ‘come let’s go and see. There’s a corpse under the tree.’ So there was this Syrian lady and a naked corpse lying under the tree, her pants pulled down and she was stabbed I don’t know how many times. Raped and murdered. She was just covered with newspaper. So, now I’m watching this Syrian lady and every hour the police van drove past. And this time the policeman at the corpse had to sign and it was just at that time that the Syrian lady shouted, ‘there he is!’ And they just grabbed me, and took me by my pants and the collar of my lumber jacket, and threw me into the van. My head bumped against the spare wheel at the back and I was bleeding already and when we got to John Vorster Square they beat me up again. Then I asked why they arrested me. What did I do? They said they were charging me with rape and murder. I said, ‘Murder?’ And in those years they could beat you up as they wanted to. I was quite skinny, crying. And I said ‘Maybe I could have killed her but what could I have raped her with?’ And I pulled down my jeans and trunks. They got such a fright and just told me to leave. I went back to those girls and I was bleeding. Those years you couldn’t bring a charge against these white people. That was still during apartheid.
But then I was arrested again and in the same John Vorster Square I was thrown in with the men. I went to sleep with all my clothes on. And this other guy said, ‘hey, sonny, nou? Jy meen jy gaan nie uittrek nie?’ (Hey, sonny, you’re not going to undress?’) I said, ‘n man kry koud’. (Translated: I’m cold) He said ‘haai, jy’s ‘n mooi laatie.’ (Translated: You’re a beautiful boy) I couldn’t wait for daylight and the station commander and I was standing right near the grill. I told him he was must open up, I’m not a he I’m a she. What could have happened to me as they were already doing things to each other? They then locked me up with the women and these women were also squealing. So they had to lock me up by myself.
The other prisoners knew I was a lesbian because your clothing usually talks when you come into prison. They knew me so well. In prison the clothing you wear is the prison clothing. The colours of the men were green those years and brown and blue for the girls. And I had to wear those that the women wore because they did not want to give me the men’s clothes. It felt so strange for me I cried.
The female prisoners went mad when I was locked up with them and that’s why I was always locked up alone. The females used to fight over me because I was handsome and fair. I went through hard times.
I’ve never had a boyfriend and don’t have kids. I was always a tomboy and the teachers just accepted me. They thought of me as a tomboy because I never ever played with girls. One ‘moffie’ Kenneth even did my sewing homework for me. If my teachers weren’t aware that I was lesbian then they were blind. They treated me the way I wanted to be treated. If they whacked me I had to bend like the boys. I wanted to be treated like the boys. It was just something, and I think I was born that way or maybe living the part of my brother, but that was just how I was. Then I realised my aunt is a lesbian so there is a family connection.
I didn’t really ‘come out’ to my family. I never ever had such an opportunity, not being reared by my mother and growing up in convents and so on. I used to visit my mother but most of the time I was in jail and staying with other people. My mother used to say to me ‘hoor hierso, hier bly nie gangsters hier nie. En jy wil nou ‘n mannetjie wees. En will jy nou maar ‘n tsotsie en ‘n mannetjie wees?’ (Translated: listen here, there are no gangsters living here. And you want to be a boy? And you also want to be a thug?) So I left home. It was that and from there in jail and so on. And so my mother eventually accepted me, she just had to because I never ever tried to tell her. When we were younger, my mother had to buy the same clothes for my twin brother and me. I used to wear braces and Bermudas and safari suits etc.
My friends always just accepted me. There were always one or two girls I was very close to but I always played with the boys. At the age of 8, I realised that this was getting stronger and that’s when I ended up in the convent.
I was a bricklayer but no-one there actually knew I was female, only the close ones. There was no problem. I did that work because I wanted to be a male and I can’t do any job that was for females. My best friends worked in clothing factories and I never wanted to work in them. I worked in the shoe factory I never liked sewing even though it was shoes. I worked in labelling and after that despatch.
I never ever walked with a crowd. I was always strictly alone. I also never moved with lesbians. I was lucky because I used to go around with serious gangsters and that’s why they always used to think I’m one myself. I was one. To them I was just he, and some didn’t even know I’m not a he. I’ve never been in a group of lesbians.
What stands out in my mind as the most memorable experience in my life is the day I stabbed Dianne. We really loved one another, and long before I stabbed her she had a boyfriend. It was that day when I told her ‘today you are going to choose either me or Anthony. I even went as far as going to her mother. I told her we had been going out secretly for nine months. And my aunt was already having an affair with her aunt. It was quite a shock to her mother and her mother’s reaction was ‘good God, not another Mona in the family’. When I told her ‘I come into your house because I love Dianne, and I would like you to accept me as Dianne’s partner’. She was shocked and she had to accept.
I found out about other gays and lesbians from reading books. And these books were also banned. I got hold of these books from white people. I’ll never forget the book I read, ‘Love of a Lesbian’. I’ve never seen any lesbian films.
There was a vast difference between the times as they were then and what they are now. Today the lesbians and gays are more fortunate. You had to make the best of the situation you were in. And being a lesbian made you different from the other person. You were always in your own shell.
