The Early Years

I have been asked recently about my childhood and where I came from. It's not a topic I often discuss, but it is an interesting tale for sure...

I was born in a small African village to a tribal prince and one of his wives. My given name was Mbeki Ogbwe. I did not have this name for long, because when I was born, I was born with white skin. The tribesfolk saw the colour of my bleached white skin and rightly assumed I was evil. So they insisted I be killed so this evil wouldn't spread, and decided at sunset of the following day I was to be burnt to death. My mother couldn't bear the thought of it, but she had no choice - it was her life and my father's, son of the king, or mine. Or so said the tribal law.

My sweet mother, beside herself with grief and hysteria could not accept this solution. In later years I was to learn of her resolve; a trait I have inherited. Refusing to accept my iminent 'murder', at sunrise on the day of my would-be death, I was put into a basket, wrapped in a cloth and set downriver; in her mind at least she could rest with more peace knowing that whatever was to happen to me would be a far better fate than leaving this world charred, on only my third day of life.

Accompanying me in my journey downriver was a message, written on a piece of our village's famous papyrus (famous still to this day), with only the words 'Abmeki Adaora Oday Mgwe', which loosely translated means "The gods must be crazy! My boy is not evil, he's just fiendishly white. Please feed." Now I wasn't really aware of my 'difference' in terms of skin colour, but I suppose now in retrospect, I think perhaps (evil or not) I was different. I felt very self-aware at three days old, and people have always been amazed at how good my memory is.

My mother's actions were truly a godsend, because I didn't die on that river but I did float all the way to South Africa.

I was discovered by the river bank by a nun, as she was oddly washing herself below the waist, in the river. Tears were in her eyes, while nearby I also saw a catholic priest looking very red in the face, sweaty, nervous, and somewhat embarrased. I never did figure out the connection between them, but no matter - luck was on my side, and at last I was found! Being in the hands of Christians I thought there would be no need to worry and that I would be safe. They even thought I was a gift from God.

So I was well taken care of at a convent for a while, being fed regularly, provided a wealth of various wet nurses from whom to choose, and I thought this truly was the life of royalty. Life couldn't have been better for that year I spent in South Africa, until the day where one of the nuns was curious about my origins, and looked back into the basket I made my incredible journey in. She removed some of the cloth laid down on the bottom to protect me, and inside that wrapping she found the piece of papyrus with my mother's writing on it; it had never been found until that point. She noticed the writing was in a tribal dialect, and after a bit of research she quickly discovered my lineage as a black African prince!

In these times, this realization was actually somewhat serious. I, to all the white folk of South Africa, was a cafir. A black. A negro. These were in the days of apartheid, you understand. When this news spread around the convent there was widespread panic. The nuns felt ashamed, the wet nurses clutched their breasts in horror. Nobody knew what to do. If word got out about a convent of nuns raising a white-skinned, yet black African prince from a foreign, hostile country, there would be a scandal upon the catholic church, far worse than the result of just letting me grow up to serve as a choir boy. No, something had to be done. And something was done. After only one year of life, I was to begin yet another incredible journey to an unknown end.

I was taken to a nearby port. It was decided that I was to be smuggled out of the country. So I was wrapped up in a tight bundle, put back into my basket that carried me on my first incredible journey, and was taken by Sister Margaret (the nun who originally found me a year before) down to the docks. There by the side of a majestic ship, the Bee's Knee (and bound for Ireland), she was met by a hulking sailor. This sailor must have been 7 feet tall, and pure muscle. He who was to have great significance for me had stopped what he was doing as he saw young Sister Margaret there, looking very out of place.


"Well, hello sister! You're looking... well bundled this evening. What brings you down to the docks so late at night? It's not safe here, ya know. A girl like you could get herself into some troubles down here lookin' like that." he said with a slight grin.

"Please sir, you must help us, my sisters and me. We don't know what to do. Please take this boy with you on your ship to Ireland, he can't stay here any longer. He has to leave this place."

"What are you on about? Why does he have to leave?" he wondered confusingly, as he gazed down at me. "He's a cute little fella, why would you want to get rid of him?"

"You don't... understand. He's... he's a black. We don't care for blacks. This is South Africa. You can't have blacks and whites together... it's just not... not God's way!" she said anxiously. "We were going to leave him in a ghetto somewhere, but one of the wet nurses working at the convent really took a liking to him and..."

"Black?! Jasus, Mary and Joseph woman! Have you been drinking boot polish or somethin'? This wee fella's whiter than snow!"

"Yes, yes, I know. They say it's a rare skin disorder called... vit... vitiligo? It bleaches the skin. Look, if you don't believe his origins just have a peek underneath that there diaper."

The sailor looked and stopped dead. "My GOD! Yes, I see you have a point. It's like he's got a third arm. Or leg."

"You see? Well, that aside, he can't stay here. It will be discovered that he's a cafir, and if people see that we are being hospitable and charitable to blacks in South Africa, that won't make the church, and especially not the convent look good at all. Please, if you took him to Ireland, nobody would know about his past except for you. God help you to keep that secret."

"Well do you think they like blacks in Ireland?!" He asked sharply.

"You did point out sir, and rightly so, that he is whiter than snow - nobody in Ireland would expect a thing", she answered.

"You've got a point there. Well what's the wee fella's name?" he asked.

Sister Margaret went blank. She didn't know. Up until that point I had just been called "The Miracle". Nobody knew my name. Nobody except my poor grieving mother, back in my home village, crippled with guilt, worry, and regret (yet surprisingly enough of a glimmer of hope so to make her every day bearable). Nobody but her, and a faint recollection I had from my second day of life. I decided it was time for me to speak for the first time.

"Mbeki. Mbeki Ogbwe."

"Awww, babies are so cute when they babble!" remarked Sister Margaret as she was temporarily drawn away from her thoughts. "I don't know his name" she then said to the sailor. I was confused and somewhat hurt. Feeling a greater sense of urgency, the sailor said "Well, he's going to need a name. If we want him to blend in with the Irish, he'll need a proper Irish name. Let's give him the most common Irish name imaginable, and that can easily obscure his origins. Let's call him... Stephen. Stephen O'Connor."

"Yes, that does have a nice ring to it. Stephen O'Connor it is. Wonderful."

Sister Margaret thanked the sailor for his kindness, and gave the sailor 100 Rand (SA currency) for his troubles. Not being a follower of religious custom, the big brutish sailor leaned over and grabbed Sister Margaret assertively by her arm and gave her a soft kiss on the cheek. This sent a visible wave of excitement through the blood of Sister Margaret. "If only you weren't a nun, or I queer" he said, then took me in my bundle and walked away. I looked back to see her face lit up like a cherry from the blushing, and perspiration could be seen above her lip. She was bouncing on her toes. I wondered if this is what sort of behaviour brought her to be down in the river nearly a year ago, washing herself out with another man nearby, but it's hard to focus on anything when you're one year old, so I paid it no further thought. I never saw Sister Margaret again.

Now I wish I could tell you now that I did in fact make it to Ireland, and was well cared for by a wealthy Irish family, but sadly neither happened. I never did get to Ireland, and if I had, there were next to no wealthy Irish families anyway, just people chasing what they think to be leprechauns running to the end of the rainbow. As a side note, the effects of drinking and the shocking treatment of midgets in Ireland is truly a major human rights crisis and somebody should really inform the UN.

No, I spent the following 12 years on that very same ship, the Bee's Knee. The big sailor who smuggled me onto the ship, my gay 'Uncle Pat' as he was to be known, became my caretaker and guardian. After being taken into his care, as he tells me, he said I was too adorable to part with. So he didn't. I don't exactly know the wisdom in such a decision, but I suppose all people grow up in all sorts of circumstances, so although I didn't have all the things that most people would have growing up, like friends of the same age, or manufactured toys (I did have GI Joes however, because Uncle Pat seemed to really like the soldiers), or a fixed address, I did have plenty of books to read (I taught myself to read when I was three and Uncle Pat liked to collect books on his travels, particularly art books), and I had a big ship to explore. Exploring the ship was a great pastime. I would imagine little stories where I was the main character and play them out on the ship. As I got older and more responsible, Uncle Pat would let me venture into parts of the ship that were previously forbidden, so that in turn would allow more potential in my stories. I always liked the machines of the engine room. Sinister deeds would always go down in the engine room. Like conspirators meeting, or someone's beating because those machines were just so loud; to cover up the nastyness.

When I was five, Uncle Pat bought me a violin when the ship had docked in Belgium. Uncle was never that talented a musician, not knowing how to read music, but he did teach me how to *listen*. He always said "Boy, with a good ear, and a good memory, music on paper is a waste of paper." So I ear trained, and learned the violin. This couldn't have made the ship's crew any happier. It was said I became their good luck charm, and whenever they were feeling blue, they would call me in and have me play them a tune. I didn't mind, I thought the attention from all those grown ups was a nice thing.

So life carried on much in this way. I played violin, I read, I had daydreams, I explored, and I learned all about life drawing and sculptures of men. Uncle Pat was overly protective of me, I won't deny that, but his heart was in the right place. Only on rare occasions would he let me leave the ship when we were docked at port. So I've seen just a handful of cities around the world. At 13, Uncle Pat thought it would be best for me to live on dry land and live the life of a normal teenager. He was smart enough to know that keeping a pubescent teenager locked up on a ship full of men wasn't in my best interest, developmentally.

Since it was Christians who passed me on to Uncle Pat, he thought it only fitting that I be passed back to Christians. Through a contact he had in the Canadian shipping industry, I was adopted by an Anglican minister and his lovely wife from Toronto. These two have acted as my parents ever since, and this was truly a blessing from God. We didn't always get along, but in general they are good for me, and to me. So, I've been living a relatively calm life ever since, but there are times where I do think about my incredible journeys and wake up in cold sweats. Even though I became accustomed to my own company I do still feel lonely sometimes. I guess that's a part of living.

But now that I'm a part of 'normal society' the best part of all of this is that nobody has yet discovered my unique origins. This makes me laugh because I now play the drums, and many people tell me "Steve-O, I swear to god you must be a black man the way you got rhythm. Shit!" I just shrug my shoulders, grin a slight grin, and keep on playing.