“I had so much love at home, the love that I have experienced is unreal, it’s organic, it’s natural. It’s the reason why I love everybody. When leaving home, I was always so charged up with that love and respect that whenever I was disrespected for not speaking isiZulu or not having a good weave or not knowing what to do with my hair because my parents are white and not doing phondo’s on my hair before I sleep.”
That used to bother me and I got upset but then I quickly moved on and by the time I was in grade 11 I had done Idols and then everybody wanted to be my friend,” she said.
On racism, Shekhinah says moving to Johannesburg exposed her to racism she wishes she had not experienced. “The only time I started to experience racism was last year when I began paying my own bills and getting my own apartment, that’s when I was exposed to a whole lot of things that I wish I wasn’t exposed to,” she said.
“When I came to Joburg I was always around black people who were very Black Conscious and I wasn’t. I just didn’t understand why you’d hate white people because I love my white family, but then I would be around white people that were like ‘You’re very cool because you’re not like that.’ So I was exposed to those two worlds and I just didn’t understand it but my eyes were opened, and I got some education and I’ve formulated my own opinion about it.”
