The Book of ProVerb. Tebogo Thekisho
I modelled my entire adulthood on them. He often played Toto’s ‘Africa’ in his white BMW, and I would say, ‘When I am big like you one day, I want to drive a car like yours, and these are the songs I will play in it.’ My dad was a smoker and, as a result, I would say to myself, ‘I am going to be a smoker one day when I am big, so I can be just like my dad.’ I don’t actually smoke, by the way – I just thought that I would as an adult.
My dad has taught me that family comes before anything else, and he encourages my siblings and me to nurture our relationships with one another. We must ‘hold hands’, he always says. One thing he has not mastered is putting himself first, which I wish he would do more. It’s something I have learnt to do for myself by watching him struggle with it. Pa will work himself to the bone, then drive all the way to Joburg to check up on my siblings, my cousins and our families. Sometimes I tell him that he looks worn out and needs to rest, but I think he will work until he can’t any more, because he employs half his family.
Some of the wisdom he taught me is that you should never write off your children; he never wrote me off. He also taught me that money might come back to you but time will not. I am glad that I have learnt to prioritise the things and people that matter to me the most. I guess whoever said that life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away, wasn’t being cheesy after all.
According to Pa, my paternal grandfather was a great lover of music and had two gramophones on which to play his records. My uncles played the flute, and my dad made his own guitar out of an oil canister and some wood. Although he possessed a natural rhythm, he was discouraged from pursuing music professionally. When he was working in a small town called Parys in the Free State, he sang in the choir but gave it up to pursue medicine. Music was clearly in the family genes, so it is no surprise that my life has panned out the way it has.
My dad has a great relationship with my daughter Ditshupo and my son Kgosi, and he spoils them rotten. He always calls to check if they are home for the weekend so that he can visit them. He even came from Thaba ’Nchu to attend Grandparents’ Day at my kids’ school one year, once again proving how important family is to him.
What a guy! Like I said, I really just wanna be like my dad, man!
CHAPTER 3
Heart-Beat
My heart speaks in the language of heartbeats
My heart speeds when glad
When sad my heart bleeds
Some things are easier to talk about than others. When I was a youngster, I was significantly closer to my mother, Nomonde, than I was to my dad, yet it has always been much easier to talk about him. Perhaps it’s because my mother and I had a fairly turbulent relationship, although this never changed the fact that I loved and respected her. My older cousins used to call her Sisi. I picked up on this as a toddler, and started calling her Si for short.
In the early days of my career, Si did not like that I had chosen to be a rapper. As my career progressed, however, she became aware of all the radio and TV shows I appeared on, and her attitude started to improve. She’d read magazine and newspaper articles about me and keep the clippings in a file, so she got on top of my career quite impressively.
For almost 35 years, my mom was a highly respected lecturer in social sciences at the University of the North West in Mafikeng, which used to be known as Unibo – the University of Bophuthatswana. She then became a professor after attaining her first PhD. She loved her students dearly and referred to them as her ‘kids’. Often, they would update her on anything they’d read or heard about me in the media. When we spoke, she’d start a sentence with the words, ‘One of my kids said’ and then recount the latest story.
It blew my mind when she referred to me by my stage name, ProVerb, for the first time, in a conversation with her friends. It was a real turning point! Even more special was that she sent me an SMS after every Idols SA episode to discuss what she’d found interesting, from funny moments and participants’ interactions to a mistake I might have made. I like to end the live episodes with a quote, and if I quoted biblical scripture, man, she would sing my praises! I could feel her beaming with pride.
My parents separated in 1983, when I was two, and divorced in 1986. I’d been living with my grandmother from the day I was born, so the divorce did not really affect me. Despite my parents’ busy schedules, they were very active in my life, which I really appreciated, especially because I was in boarding school from the age of twelve. Si wanted me to attend a better school, so in 1993 I moved to Mmabatho to enrol at the International School of Bophuthatswana, now known as the International School of South Africa.
This brought me closer to Unibo, where my mom was lecturing, so even though I was a full-time boarder, I got to see her much more often. At the end of every term, she’d pick me up so that I could spend the break with her, unless of course it was Pa’s turn to have me over for the holidays, which happened more frequently when I was in high school.
Si was raised by my grandmother, whom I fondly called Mami, in Greenpoint, Kimberley. She was an only child. Although she became an academic with two PhDs, she always tried to convince me that she was never academically inclined in any way. I’m sure she only said that because I wasn’t academic at all, and she just wanted to make me feel better about myself. I mean, she was a professor, after all!
My mom was an incredibly focused, forward-thinking person who always planned ahead. She paid my school fees ahead of time and, when I was in college, she ensured that my meal card was always loaded with money. I do have to mention, though, that she was quite strict in raising me. I am talking about a time when physical discipline was very much a part of people’s childhoods, including my own. So yes, I grew up with the belt, the slipper and the backhand, all of which my mother used frequently, because I was so naughty. Physical punishment is now frowned upon, but I am grateful for it, because it made me a better person.
Today, when I have a decision to make, I still think about what Si would have said about it. It could be about something as basic as wanting to get a tattoo; my mom believed they were the work of the devil! When I was in Standard 7 (now Grade 9) at the CBC in Kimberley, I kept a Flipfile as a rhyme book. I would write lyrics on a computer, print them out and then place them in the plastic sleeves of the file, believing that one day I would become a superstar rapper. Unfortunately, my mom found my file, and was very disappointed in me because some of the lyrics contained swear words. She warned me that if she ever saw that ‘rubbish’ again, there would be hell to pay!
As a result of that incident, I’ve always been conscious of how I present my content. I cleaned up my act even more when Si started listening to my music. Not only did I become more selective with my words, I also chose topics that wouldn’t result in additional reprimands. I became more responsible about and aware of the messages I was sending out to the public. I thank my mom for this, because it shaped what I stand for as a person and as a brand.
I am strategic about the products and services I endorse, and I am careful not to compromise what I stand for. All of that is informed by the foundation my mom laid for me. I don’t pass judgement on people who endorse things I would not, because I don’t consider myself better than them. It’s just how I was raised, and that’s who I really am.
So although my mother was very strict, just like my dad, she never wrote me off, despite having many reasons to do so. I didn’t take advantage of the opportunities afforded to me. Even though I attended a private school, I barely passed. And when my mom enrolled me at an international school, I performed even worse. I was a spoilt brat who didn’t put in any effort. I just wanted to become a rapper, which was all I excelled at, except for playing tennis, which I also enjoyed. I have no doubt that a lot of who I am today comes from Si, such as being a planner who thinks ahead. She drilled that into me, although I believe she wasn’t really conscious of it.
I generally strive to live a debt-free life because Si always told me to plan for the future and save as much as I could while living modestly. My children’s 2020 school fees were paid up by the middle of 2019! But I try to find a middle ground between planning ahead and living my life