Often stories are told of courageous women. Women that would have conquered their worlds, prevailed and celebrated on a daily. Their stories become legend and rooted in our history. In today's world, there are many of these women and sadly, not all of them live to tell the story of their courage. It is a pity because, each and every story not told is a missed opportunity to train the community at large. A missed chance to instil courage to women and to teach their counterparts of the effects to their actions.
At the age of 58, Dot Bekker felt unloved, depressed and needing to change her life. She had been in her marriage for 20 years. In our African culture, questions often arise as to what could be wrong at 20 years that you can't see in 1 or 2 years? I will not pretend to know the answer to this conundrum but all I can say is that in matters of the heart, only the heart can tell when enough is enough. In my life, I have realised that there are many things that we make decisions to using our minds and neglecting the heart which is the centre of our lives.
And so it took her 20 years and living in the United Kingdom with a marriage that was non existent to realise that this was not what she wanted to be and if she had lived a lie or a mistake for this long, she owed it to herself to live the way she wanted, do the things she wanted in the years she had left. She packed a few of her belongings and sought to return back to Bulawayo, her home.
With nothing but a few bits of money to herself, she decided on driving from Europe to Africa, a treacherous journey of 20 000km, alone, almost 60 years of age and in a Ford Van. She did this to liberate herself, re-connect with her roots, and find purpose once again by raising money for High Achieving girls in Zimbabwe.
When I first met Dot, I thought that it was a crazy idea that a woman could do what she did. It is because although I have always loved Africa, to take the journey that she took, passing different countries and people and the possibilities of danger that lie everywhere, I found that scary.
She did that by carefully planning for 2 years on her journey and prevailing no matter what the cost.
To top it, she wrote a book about her life and back to Africa journey which she is selling to raise more funds to her cause.
I had to speak to her and find out more about this amazing woman with an incredible journey. Click on the picture below to listen to our conversation.
