The Fortune Teller

It is widely believed that 'coloured' (South African colloquialism for mixed race) women from South Africa's Western Cape region have the power of clairvoyancy. Randomly, I found such a person in a slum of Lusaka. "Antie Ann" had to be at least 70 years old. She came to Zambia (or at that time, Northern Rhodesia) in 1960 when both South Africa and Malawi (her late husband's homeland) were unwelcoming. My four friends and I booked an entire morning with her, allowing for about 45 minutes each.

I had expected her to whip out some wildly exotic tools of divination; instead, she procured a regular deck of playing cards. Still, I felt chills run down my spine as she overturned each card one by one, literally unfolding my fate before me. To my surprise, she knew that I was going back to school next fall. Learning about my past was fun, but of course I was more interested in what's to come. I think it would be somewhat sacrilegious to divulge her findings here, but if anything she says comes true, I'll declassify the info :-)