Given a second chance at life

ABANDONED on the streets at the age of 3 by her biological mother, Rox-anne Maistry’s fate changed the day a stranger found her and took her to the nearest social welfare office.

Maistry, right, now a 41-year-old semi-finalist in the Tammy Taylor Mrs SA 2018 pageant, spoke about the challenges she faced in the hope that it would inspire women.

Attempts to find her parents failed and she was raised by a woman she calls “mom”. She knows little about her biological parents – only their names – Adam Sheik and Lutchmee Govender.

“I was 3 years old, scared and all alone, when a man saw me looking for food in a bin,” said Maistry. “I had a head injury and was bleeding.

“He left me at a social worker’s office. I was moved from one orphanage to the next until I was eventually placed in a home of safety.

“A woman, who I now call mom, took me in and saved me from a terrible fate.”

Maistry said at the time she only spoke Hindi and Arabic, and was able to tell her new mom that her name was Rekha. The social workers’ efforts to find her biological family yielded no results and they later learnt that her mother had died. Her foster mother got custody and, when she was 18, she changed her name from Rekha to Rox-anne.

“I learnt that my biological mother was involved in drugs and prostitution. She was arrested and died while awaiting trial,” said Maistry. “I found out about this when I was 16, but I’m yet to receive confirmation.”

Maistry is married to Pastor Ezekiel Maistry, 46, and they have two daughters, Ezel, 15, and Raeanne, 11.

She is the founder of three church groups – Who Told

You? (started in 2013); Kenako Whatsapp prayer group (2014) and I’m Blessed to be a Blessing (2016). She also started Pillow Talk this year, an initiative that reaches out to girls between the ages of 13 and 25.

The Tammy Taylor Mrs SA

2018 is Maistry’s first pageant appearance.

“This pageant is about women with real lives, real stories, real curves and real problems,” said Maistry. “It offers married women, who have careers, families, and hobbies, a platform to make a difference and to empower women.

“Glamour and sophistication are part of the criteria but the women who enter and win all have stories to tell.”

The top 25 entrants will be announced on June 29, at Emperors Palace in Joburg, and the winner will be crowned on November 10.

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