I had a wonderful conversation earlier this week with a 22 year-old young man who is a ‘Born Free’. A Born Free is a loose term used for someone born after our ’94 elections.
He currently works in a Hotel restaurant. Some days he runs the hotel bookings and all guests in and out. He has a matric and is saving to put himself through a college program to get a Safety Officer’s certificate in order to get into better employment and give himself better chances in life.
We spoke of economics, politics, voting, sport – he was wearing a springbok jersey that day. He chatted at length about what his age people were thinking and doing and how they see the future. He already runs his own small business through owning a few sheep which he breeds to sell. He explained how he manages all this to (also) not be a victim of stock theft. As is usual with someone of his generation, he is very IT literate and even helped me with something I couldn’t manage to do on my phone. (Which is usually Adrienne’s job!)
I asked him if he has a car, to which he said no but that he is saving up. To buy what I asked. He went onto AutoTrader and pulled up 30+ year old Corolla’s. I said, ‘clever man’.
I always find it very refreshing to have conversations with such exciting and efficient young people, who are our future. Wish I was in a place to employ him.