Page 2 - Demo

INTRODUCTION
I sat in my class and looked around at all the smiling faces, blonde brown, light brown, caramel brown, chocolate brown all together to learn in this happy classroom. I can honestly say that my friends never made me feel less important, we never spoke about our shades of brown and eventually all the fuss melted away.
When my mother made that bold choice to send my sister and I to Wynberg Girls, it was the best decision she could have made for us. Here I became a stronger swimmer, (I couldn’t believe we had a pool at the school), I had access to extra murals (drama and art being my hidden talent), I met my oldest and dearest friend, I learnt to love and find value in myself.
Children thrive in beauty and love and girls nurtured and mentored by strong, compassionate women develop into empowered young women who will give
back to this circle of life.g
stand in my way. I went for extra lessons after school, put in extra time on weekends to study, because there was no magic spell or fairy godmother who was going to wave her wand and turn me into an MD.
Hard work, determination, belief in yourself and never giving up is the key. Getting accepted into Medical School was like being inducted into the Umbrella Academy. Me, average Rizqa had achieved my first big goal. The next 6 years would be even more, blood, sweat and tears. I got through what was definitely a Kilimanjaro in my life and throughout my years at Med School I was fortunate enough to be tutored and mentored by the super women of Health Science.
In 2010, I entered my final year of Med School, two months before graduation my second son was born and after a short rest I went on to complete two years of internship and another year of community service during which time my daughter Yasmin was born and I am proud to say that she too is a Wynberg warrior.
Recent weeks in South Africa have made me more proud than ever to be a woman. We have come together and almost stopped time. Women standing for women irrespective of colour or social standing, it was a powerful display of what we are capable of.
Young Wynberg women, I want you to know that I was never the top of my class, but I worked hard to keep my grades up. I was never a house captain, but I tried out and was happy to act in all the house plays. I was not a very good sports woman, but played social sport and was a really loud cheerleader. I was an average high school girl, but one thing was for sure, I wanted to be a doctor, and not even higher grade maths was going to
As I stand here today, I am in my final year of specialisation in Medical Genetics. That’s almost 17 years of studying after I left high school, hard work and determination while still living life and growing my own family. And I could do all of this because of all the wonderful women I encountered along the way because again, we as women are stronger when we support one another.
Being invited back to where it all began is definitely a highlight for me and I am sure my mother didn’t think back in 1992, that her brown daughter would be standing addressing this wonderful spectrum of her alma mater in 2019 – the year of the South African Woman.
By Dr Rizqa Baradien
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