Translator: Giulia Dal Lago Reviewer: Leonardo Silva
What if everything that makes you different is viewed as negative?
The very circumstances of your existence and biological make-up were punishable
and laws were created to make who you are a crime?
By the time I was five, I had lost my mother to suicide
and my only sibling to measles.
My father abandoned me because he did not know how to raise a girl.
So there I was, orphaned through the death of my mother
and the rejection of my father.
But I was fortunate,
one of the lucky orphaned African girls,
for my mother's siblings all stepped in to care for me
at different points of my childhood.
But if I was to say that I've never felt the sting of not belonging
in each one of their households,
it would be a blatant lie.
You see, in my culture,
there is a pity of hopelessness that is placed on children like me,
who are unlucky enough to have lost a parent,
as if it is our own doing.
And perhaps not just my culture, your culture as well.
Nothing of substance is ever expected out of orphaned children.
Failure is preordained, except I thrived.
By the age of 12, I'd been moved to the big city of Harare,
the capital of Zimbabwe.
You may all remember Zimbabwe for Cecil the lion.
In Harare, I was enrolled in a school
that facilitated the expansion of my horizons.
I took part in public speaking, debates, sports.
I excelled academically.
At the age of 18, I found myself navigating British streets,
making my way to the nursing home I illegally worked at
under someone else's name.
The road to getting me to England had been paved with good intentions.
My aunt knew a Zimbabwean doctor who needed a young girl from back home
to work for him and his family as a live-in maid.
However the doctor forgot to mention that my compensation
for working for him as a maid would only be a 100 pounds a month.
That was equivalent to USD$ 163 a month at the time.
But I was one of the lucky ones.
See, many young girls that are brought from developing nations
to work as domestic workers or sex workers
never make it out of that trade.
This is actually known as modern-day slavery.
At the age of 19, I found myself undocumented in America,
after the expiration of my visitor visa.
My life in England had been a nightmare,
but my aunt knew a friend of a friend of a friend, who lived in Omaha, Nebraska.
What could possibly go wrong?
(Laughter)
My country of origin was declining rapidly.
Zimbabwe has been marred with political finance, corruption and greed.
That started with the violence seizures of white-owned farms
for redistribution to 'landless' black Zimbabweans
who had no farming knowledge
or the finances to run farms.
Zimbabwe was once the bread basket of Africa
and to this day still boasts the highest literacy rates in all of Africa.
But inflation rose so high in Zimbabwe
that at one point
one needed a suitcase of money just to buy bread, milk and eggs.
Zimbabwe is now ranked as one of the poorest countries in the world.
Over 5 million Zimbabweans have fled the country,
and Zimbabwe no longer has a currency of its own.
At 23, I married a white American man I knew to be violent,
but I hoped that finally being able to adjust my undocumented status
would balance out the abuse.
But I was mistaken.
Yes, I probably should have titled this TEDx talk:
'A series of unfortunate events'.
At the age of 28,
after putting myself through nursing school,
purchasing a home and becoming the mother of two beautiful American children
who are actually in the audience today -
(Applause)
I was asleep in my La Vista home one morning,
when four to six immigration and customs enforcement agents,
wearing bulletproof vests and guns and holding a clipboard with my face on it
knocked on my door.
I knew exactly who had sent them there.
In retaliation to my finally finding the courage to end my abusive marriage,
my American husband had reported my undocumented status
to Homeland Security.
It was the end of December in 2008.
It was a month after he had attempted to kill me with his bare hands,
and a month after I had obtained the restraining order against him.
The reason I'd failed to adjust my status in the six years I had been married to him
was because of his lack of having a birth certificate.
But that story is for another day.
(Laughter)
Prior to deciding to end my marriage,
I had also come to terms with my true sexuality.
I had known way back as a young girl growing up in Zimbabwe
that I was attracted to other females.
Way before I had seen Ellen on TV.
(Laughter)
In my coming to terms with my sexuality I discovered the true horrors
that come with carrying the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer label
anywhere in the world.
Homosexuality is illegal in all but two African nations,
with some African nations even trying to impose the death penalty
for homosexuality.
I'm the first person in the entire history of my family
to ever publicly come out as a homosexual.
Violence against sexual minorities is rampant
all across Africa, Asia and the Middle East,
and even right here in America,
discrimination against LGBTQ individuals is evident.
We see it with elected officials like Kim Davis
refusing to grant marriage licences to deserving citizens
even after a Supreme Court ruling saying it is indeed a human right.
I celebrated my 29th birthday
awaiting deportation in Cass County Jail, in Plattsmouth, Nebraska.
In the 30 days that I was in jail,
I lost 20 pounds, contemplated suicide
and started writing the pages that would become a memoir titled:
'Outsider, crossing borders, breaking rules, gaining pride'.
You see, I was one of the lucky ones.
I was lucky enough to be English speaking
and could understand what was happening around me.
I was lucky to have family that lived here that had documentation
and therefore could help me with legal assistance.
Many illegal immigrants spend years behind bars
trying to fight deportation on their own.
My aunt and her family had acquired asylum within a year of getting here,
something I couldn't be a part of
because I'm not my aunt's biological child.
The saddest thing
about the way the American Justice System handles people like me
is the way in which we're separated from our families.
Had I not had family here the day of my arrest,
my children who were only one and three at the time
would have been placed in foster care.
Had I had been deported,
my children would have grown up without a mother, just like I did.
But here I stand, unbroken,
because our struggles should not define us,
and -
how small other people make us feel should not take away our desire
to experience life in its fullness.
I am still here fighting to legally remain in this country.
I lost everything that I had prior to my arrest in 2008,
my nursing jobs and my home.
I am now doing the most typical illegal alien job ever.
I own a cleaning business -
(Laughter)
which I love.
It's my gym.
It allows me on a daily basis
to interact with people from different backgrounds.
Not only does it allow me to earn a living;
it allows me to employ other people as well.
I finally have documentation that allows me to work and stay here
while my immigration fight is ongoing.
It costs me approximately $ 600 a year to renew that document,
but you can't call me undocumented anymore.
(Laughter)
I continue to write.
My latest book is a work of fiction titled 'Indelicate Things'.
My number one job remains that of raising my children.
You see, there is nothing easy about being an orphaned African girl,
nothing easy about being a once undocumented immigrant
who was incarcerated for it,
nothing easy about being a queer woman of colour,
and very recently, nothing easy about being an outspoken humanist atheist,
but all of those things make me who I am.
So, I say to you:
now that we have marriage equality in America,
can we also have comprehensive immigration reform?
Thank you.
(Applause)