At 14, Justine firmly believed that the world was her oyster and the future hers to shape and conquer. She was bright and her mother made enough money as a seamstress to send her to a decent public school in Zimbabwe's capital, Harare.
"I used to dream about finishing school, finding a job and being independent," the now 38-year-old told me. "I would buy a car or a house and do anything I wanted to do." But shortly after her 14th birthday, her mother died of meningitis, and life as she knew it came to an end.
...
AllAfrica Subscription Content
You must be an allAfrica.com subscriber for full access to certain content.
You have selected an article from the AllAfrica archive, which requires a subscription. You can subscribe by visiting our subscription page. Or for more information about becoming a subscriber, you can read our subscription and contribution overview.
For information about our premium subscription services:
You can also freely access - without a subscription - hundreds of today's top Africa stories and thousands of recent news articles from our home page »
Already a subscriber? Sign in for full access to article