South African pupils can learn from those who studied without electricity - IOL

The writer talks about having had no electricity, which meant that studying after dark at home was simply not an option.

EXAMINATION season is upon us. For thousands of South African pupils, the 2026 National Senior Certificate written examinations begin on October 13, while university and college students are also preparing for their own battles with textbooks, notes, past papers and, occasionally, their own wandering minds.

There will be late nights, nervous stomachs, tired eyes and moments when self-doubt whispers that perhaps becoming a professional TikToker would be a better career option.

I understand. I have been there, although in my time there were no smartphones, no TikTok and certainly no YouTube tutorials to rescue us at midnight. I survived my examinations, and I have lived long enough to tell the tale.

Let me take you back to a time before load-shedding, before water stoppages and before anyone had heard of a hybrid car.

During the dark days of apartheid and the Group Areas Act, my family lived in a condemned home in Mayville. We had no electricity, which meant that studying after dark at home was simply not an option.

So my friends and I did what we had to do. We stood beneath streetlights with our textbooks, trying to concentrate while competing with moths for the available illumination. It was not exactly the ideal study environment, but we were determined to learn.

When we became tired of standing under the streetlights, we sometimes walked to the then Natal University and sat in its park-like surroundings, hoping that some of the knowledge in our textbooks would somehow find its way into our heads.

There was, however, one serious distraction. The grounds had monkey-balls growing in abundance, and studying was occasionally interrupted by the temptation to pick them. Monkey-balls were not exactly brain food, but they made the struggle a little more enjoyable. We happily devoured the monkey balls, but we knew better than to swallow the toxic seeds

Looking back, we could easily have given up. Instead, with determination, perseverance and more than a little youthful stubbornness, we got through matric and embarked on further studies, where we discovered that the examinations had become more difficult and that there really was no gain without pain.

I still remember sitting in an examination hall and opening a paper for which I believed I was reasonably prepared.

Suddenly, the questions seemed to have been written in another language.

There was always that moment when you looked at the first question and thought, “I know this.” Then came the second question, and you began to have doubts. By the third question, you were wondering whether you had attended the right classes for the past year.

Multiple-choice questions brought their own special form of torture. You would confidently select “B”, only to discover that you had selected “B” for the previous three questions as well. You would then stare suspiciously at the paper, wondering whether the examiner had a personal dislike of the letter B, or you would select "C", hoping that "C" stood for "Correct".

Sometimes, my brain simply refused to cooperate. I would stare at a question, hoping that if I looked at it for long enough, the answer would suddenly appear.

It rarely did, yet somehow, I survived.

That is one of the things I want today's students to remember. An examination can feel enormous while you are sitting inside it, but it is only one moment in a much larger life.

Our examination worries should also be placed in the context of those who came before us.

When the first indentured Indian labourers arrived in Natal in 1860, they brought with them more than the physical strength required to work the plantations. They brought hopes and dreams for their children. Yet the colonial authorities had no immediate plans to provide proper education for those children.

Parents, community leaders and other visionaries therefore had to find their own ways of opening the doors of education.

In 1865, a school on the Isipingo plantation opened its doors to African and Indian children. At Reunion Estate, a hospital was converted into a classroom. In 1868, Reverend Ralph Stott established a day school in Durban, while Mr Barker conducted an evening school at Umzinto for children and adults.

Education became a beacon of hope, although progress was painfully slow. By 1876, there were only two schools in Durban serving 54 Indian pupils.

As the years passed, estate schools appeared and evening schools were established. Eventually, Indian communities began taking greater responsibility for educating their own children. The Pietermaritzburg Hindu community established a school in 1902, Carlisle Street School opened in 1905, and the Indian Educational Institute in Durban, founded in 1911, provided education to day scholars and working adults, including commercial subjects, languages and cultural education.

These were not merely classrooms. They represented determination, self-reliance and resistance to a system that placed enormous obstacles in the way of people seeking a better future. Much later, iconic schools like Sastri College, Durban Girls High, Gandhi Desai and Orient High, among others, opened up.

The very early students did not have electricity, the internet, smartphones, online tutorials or a seemingly endless supply of past examination papers.

What they possessed was something more fundamental: determination, community and a belief that education could change the lives of their children.

Many students today have advantages those pioneers could scarcely have imagined, although I know that South Africa still has schools and homes where studying remains difficult and resources are limited.

For those who do have access to resources, the lesson is simple: use what you have.

Study consistently rather than waiting for panic to become your timetable. Work through past examination papers. Learn from your mistakes. Ask your teachers for help when you do not understand something. Study with friends when that helps you, but remember that a study group should actually involve studying.

And please, get some sleep. An exhausted brain is not necessarily a more intelligent brain.

Most importantly, do not allow one difficult subject, one disappointing mark or one bad day to persuade you that you are a failure.

If you are reading this as a student preparing for examinations, I want you to know that being frightened does not mean that you are weak. It means that you care about the outcome.

You do not have to know everything. You do not have to be perfect. You simply have to prepare as well as you can and then give the examination your best effort.

When you enter the examination room, take a breath and read the questions carefully. Start with what you know. If a question troubles you, move on and return to it later. Do not allow one difficult question to convince you that you know nothing.

And when you eventually walk out of that examination room, remember something even more important: your marks will measure your performance in an examination, but they will never measure the full worth of the person you are.

I know this because I remember the young man who once stood beneath a streetlight in Mayville, textbook in hand, trying to study without electricity.

He did not know what the future held. He did not know where his education would take him. He only knew that he wanted a better future and that he was prepared to work for it.

Perhaps that is why, all these years later, I can smile when I think about examinations. They seemed so enormous at the time, but life turned out to be much larger than any examination paper.

So, to every South African student preparing for examinations, I say this: do not be afraid of the journey. Work hard, believe in yourself, ask for help when you need it and keep going when things become difficult.

One day, you may look back at these anxious weeks and realise that they were not merely preparing you for an examination. They were preparing you for life.

If the people of our past could study by street lights, build schools when there were hardly any, and pursue education despite enormous obstacles, then surely we can ask today's generation to believe in itself.

Give it everything you have. Then walk out of that examination hall with your head held high. The future is waiting.

Jerald Vedan is an attorney, community leader, and social commentator based in KwaZulu-Natal.

** The views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of IOL or post.co.za