FORTUNE FAVOURS THE BRAVE
And courage is what is needed when you’re being swallowed by raging waves, trapped under a rubber dingy, unable to get your head above water ... all as a paraplegic with extreme water phobia
BY HER OWN admission, Mpho Molemela is terrified of open water: the sea scares her and she won’t even go near a swimming pool as she’s never learnt how to swim.
“Even the water in my bath frightens me sometimes,” laughs the Bloemfontein labour relations manager.
That makes it remarkable that the first taste she had of open water was being dumped out of a raft into a churning, and freezing, grade 4 white water rapid on the Ash River just outside Clarens in the Free State. But what takes Mpho’s story into the realm of gob-smacking is the fact that she is a virtual paraplegic, with little use of her legs.
Mpho and the six other people in the raft were attempting to negotiate the last of five rapids on the river, each growing in intensity. That grade 4 monster, fed by a rushing torrent of water from the Lesotho Highland scheme (which discharges water for Gauteng into the Ash River), was a place with an appetite for rafts. The guide on our raft, Thab Magagani, warned us that we had to paddle like people possessed exactly when he told us to and then to hold on to the ropes on the side of the raft exactly when he told us to.
Upstream of the rapid, pulled over into the reeds on the bank before making our assault, Thab said simply: “We must do this properly because otherwise the raft could flip over.”
We would be the first of two rafts to tackle the rapid. Mpho was in the one following us. Thab’s brother, Fortune, had warned us earlier at a fear-inspiring “safety briefing” about what to do in the event (not so unlikely as it turned out) of the raft flipping over.
“Don’t panic. Even if you are trapped under the raft. Remember to let go of the rope and float out from underneath. Then roll on to your back and pull your legs up and float downstream feet first.”
I had buyer’s remorse immediately for volunteering to do this. I suppose that is covered by the job description of a travel editor, though.
There was a moment, when I looked at Mpho being carried by Fortune on his back over the jagged rocks down to the launching site, when I wondered what on Earth would happen to her, with no legs to help her. Wrapped in a wetsuit with a safety helmet on her head, Mpho wasn’t in the least bit frightened. Her broad smile and laughter said: Bring it on!
And on it came for us. As we hit the last rapid, it was like being tossed into a cross between a washing machine and a deep freeze. I clung on grimly for the last test as we plunged into a deep pot beneath the surface and between the large rocks.
We tilted up and then toppled over, safe to the other side.
From the comparative comfort of the bank we watched as Mpho’s raft was swallowed by the raging waves, only to pop up and out. But then the nose of the raft started climbing and, in slow motion, it went past the vertical and toppled backwards, chucking everybody into the freezing river.
What followed was an eternity of fearfuelled shouting and paddling as we struggled to rescue our comrades as they popped out from under the raft and were swept downstream.
Where was Mpho? We heard shouting from under the raft. How long would it be before she was pulled under and lost?
Suddenly, Fortune broke the surface, the raft in his left hand and Mpho tucked under his right armpit.
We hauled her into our raft and she was giggling like a schoolgirl. It was infectious and we joined in, the realisation setting in that we were safe. When I reminded her of her impromptu “swim” this week, she laughed: “I had almost forgotten about it!”
Again, as I saw her hoisted on Fortune’s back up towards the road where the vehicles were waiting, I paused to admire her courage and her spirit.
“Ah no,” she insisted, “I am not brave. But I live life to the full every day. I have been given another chance and I will not waste it!”
To hear someone who is confined to a wheelchair or crutches for her days saying something like that is truly humbling.
She recounted the day – November 3, 1992 – when her life changed forever.
An ardent football fan, she was on the way back from a match between Kaizer Chiefs and the then Fairway Stars (now Free State Stars) when the minibus she was travelling in skidded and overturned on a wet road. “It went over and over and I was thrown out. But then it rolled on top of me and I was unconscious.”
The police were first on the scene and, perhaps without medical training, decided to move her and take her to hospital: “They may have made it worse…”
Although in a coma in hospital for a number of days, she could clearly hear people coming and going; relatives crying and doctors and nurses saying they didn’t believe she would walk again because of the damage to her spine.
“I was there for four months and then I went home. I also went for lots of physio but no one thought I would walk again.”
Determined as she was to prove them wrong, she fought and fought to regain a little movement in her legs.
“But the problem is that I can’t feel my toes and without that, then you fall over.”
I asked her if her disability had ever made her despair and the answer came quickly: “No, No no! I have never been depressed about it. It is just something which happens and I believe it is part of God’s plan for me.”
Her strong Catholic faith, as well as the support of her family and friends, made getting back to a normal life easier.
But life had another surprise in store for her. With three sons (the youngest being 3), she had given up hope of ever having a girl.
“So I asked the doctors when I went home to sterilise me. I didn’t want another child when I had no legs. But they said, no, the spinal cord injury was low down and that I would never be able to have a baby.”
That’s where she left it until about three years later, in 1996, when she was feeling awful and went to the doctor. He thought she was pregnant and sent her for a scan to confirm it.
“I couldn’t believe it. I thought my body was just breaking up!”
Before she gave birth she asked the gynaecologist not to give her an epidural as she thought she would not experience pain. But she did. She was given a sedative and passed out straight after the birth.
“We called her Realeboha, which means ‘we thank you’. The Lord really does work in mysterious ways and this was part of God’s plan for me. My miracle child! I am so blessed!”
She now heads the Mangaung Metro Disability Forum, is an activist for the rights of disabled people and does motivational and inspirational talks.
“I do not accept that because I have a disability, I am any different from anyone else. I don’t need to fit in to feel good about myself or to think I belong. I belong to myself and love myself. The wisdom here is not to forget that we are all imperfect physical beings and that disability is not inability. People who do not have disabilities are often ignorant and some are nasty. “They just do not understand.” Mpho and a number of other people with disabilities were taken recently on tours of the Free State organised by SA Tourism as part of its #TourismForAll campaign, which has as its key focus universal accessibility.
“We still have a lot to do to make places easier for people with disabilities. Sometimes the problem is the buildings are old and there are no lifts. But sometimes, people try to make a place more accessible but without talking to us.
“We say: ‘Nothing about us, without us,’ so we need to be consulted when they plan hotel rooms, for example.”
She said that on a number of occasions on the trip to the Free State, she would struggle with simple things like bathroom mirrors which were too high, or shower taps that were out of reach.
“In the old days, people with disabilities were put in places like homes. Now we are everywhere and we want to be treated like ordinary people.”
There are more than a few “ordinary”, able-bodied people who would have screamed: “No way!” when contemplating white water rafting, but Mpho Molemela is not an ordinary person.
“I would like people most in me someone who touched others in some way and who never gave up.”
We spoke about her fear of the water and how, when her friends wanted her to go on an ocean cruise with her, she backed out.
I asked her: “Would you consider it now? After all, you’ve already been in some very rough water.”
She laughed: “Why not? Life is for living, not sitting around!”