It happened in the first week of November 2009 – Matric year. The late nights were paying off as the heavy studying and the final exams were coming to an end. On an ordinary day, Aletha Mahlangu woke up from a late night of studying to go write her final exam.
Her mother drew her bath as she usual did; as she took her bath her mother laid her school uniform out on the bed for her. She finished her bath, got dressed, sometimes she didn’t eat her breakfast because she took so long styling her hair, but she made it for breakfast that morning – and that’s the last time her mother saw her alive.
After breakfast, things usually moved very quickly. Aletha had to go wait for her transport to take her to school at a nearby bus stop. Her mother walked in the oppose direction to catch her taxi for work. Everybody got to their destinations safely.
Aletha got to school, compared exams notes with her friend, Luyanda, before school started. The siren went off; and students queued in their rows for assembly. A fewmoments afterwards, the rows – much like ant lines - moved to their designated exam venues.
The final exam proceeded, the students were dismissed and no matter how Alethaand Luyanda wrote, they were just happy to be done with high school. “We were just happy to be done with Matric, we had discussing which Varsity to go to and how to decorate our flat.” said Luyanda.
They walked towards the gate to get into their transports and go home, the transport always stood across the street for the students.
Around the corner two buses were competing for the lane. The bus driver that stood in front of the other was cautiously driving and wanted to turn into the street – so he waited for the cars to pass. The driver behind him grew impatient and as he was about to swerve into the next lane to overtake the bus in front of him, the driver in front wouldn’t let him pass and he drove into the school’s street.
Insisting on his right of way, the second bus driver still felt it necessary to overtake the bus that was hindering his journey. Aletha and Luyanda saw the one bus coming so they decided to quickly run across the street and that’s when both girls got hit by a bus.
Everything came to a screeching Holt. Students gathered, the bus driver was beside himself the ambulance and the police were called to investigate the scene. Upon the arrival of the ambulance Luyanda was taken to the hospital and Aletha was presumed dead on sight.
Popular social network, mxit, was pouring with news of the accident. Everyone heard what happened, but nobody believed it. Neighbor Nosipho Nkosi was in such disbelief when she heard loud cries coming from next door. “I refused to accept it. We were with her just yesterday, exchanging exam techniques and making plans for the weekend.”
Luyanda was released from hospital the day before her friend’s funeral. “I was broken; I was still in such denial. This is my friend’s funeral, we just finished high school together.” she cries.
The atmosphere at the funeral was gloomy and sorrowful. It had finally sunken in that the beloved Aletha Mahlangu had passed on. Her mother collapsed at the sight of her only child’s coffin being wheeled into the ground. It was then when friendluyanda decided to source sponsorship for her road awareness project.
Aletha’s funeral was devastating to her community, she and Luyanda were supposed to go study to become teachers.
“I want to be a teacher. I guess since I never specified what kind of teacher I want to be I ended up being a teacher of road awareness.” said Luyanda. In memory of her friend, she opted against teaching and went on to study logistics and is more pro-active and alert during accident prone seasons, like the festive season.
It’s been four years since the heart-breaking incident that claimed a matriculants life, and for the past two years in the first week of November Luyanda brings the community together to remember what happened and teach drivers (whether they are taxi drivers, bus drivers or private car drivers) to be more alert of pedestrians and have their brakes checked should they ever need to press on them in a prevention of an accident.
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