Always Another Country

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Sisonke Msimang. Always Another Country

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A MEMOIR OF EXILE AND HOME

Born in exile to a South African guerrilla father and a working mother, Sisonke Msimang is constantly on the move, from Zambia to Kenya to Canada and beyond. Always the outsider, Sisonke develops a keenly perceptive view of the world. In this sparkling account of a young girl’s path to womanhood, Sisonke interweaves her personal story with her political awakening in America and Africa, her euphoria at returning to the new South Africa, and her disillusionment with the new elites. Always Another Country is a search for belonging and identity: a warm and intimate story, and a testament to sisterhood and family bonds.

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Some of the residents of Burley Court did not find the women and the men who visited us especially interesting. They found them loud and they resented the fact that their president – His Excellency Dr Kenneth Kaunda – had given all these revolutionaries special status in the country. Dr Kaunda was a dreamer who believed that Africa belonged to Africans. He had said that independent Africa had a responsibility towards the parts of Africa that were still in chains. And so, because Africans in South Africa and Zimbabwe and Mozambique were not free, Dr Kaunda had given us refuge in Zambia.

For ordinary Zambians, our presence was a daily reality, not just an empty political slogan. Most were gracious and embraced our cause. But for others, like Mama Tawona, we were rule-breakers and layabouts. For them, the word ‘refugee’ was a slur. The refugee women took Zambian men while the freedom-fighter men caroused and broke Zambian women’s hearts.

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