12 Quotes by Bianca Marais

Almost everyone who mattered most to me was in the same room... Black, white, homosexual, heterosexual, Christian, Jew, Englishman, Afrikaner, adult, child, man, woman; we were all there together; but somehow that eclectic jumble of labels was overwritten by the one classification that applied to every person there: “friend”.

There is no lingering twilight in Africa, no gentle gloaming as day eases into night; a tender give-and-take between light and shadow. Night settles swiftly. If you are vigilant, and not prone to distractions, you can almost feel the very moment daylight slips through your fingers and leaves you clutching the inky sap that is the sub-Saharan night.

I do not think it is brave to pick up a gun or to carry a bomb, but it is brave to open yourself up to the potential for loss and disappointment when you have already felt too much of its sting.