Book 36: Streets Paved with Gold

There is a robbery at Nomvula’s business. She discovers that her ID book and her passport have been stolen, both of which are needed to run her enterprise. She goes to the government department to apply for new documents with dread in her heart. She has to queue for hours. The civil servants are rude and unhelpful and worst of all her personal details on the department’s computer are all wrong. Now, she has to prove she is who she says she is. She discovers that losing one’s identity is far worse than losing one’s car keys or one’s glasses.
The second story is about the religious sects hugely popular with the working class. These sects meet in the open and are driven by charismatic preachers. There are a large number of them, not bound together in a formal organization as such. In this story, there is some degree of rivalry between “The Children of the Word” sect and “The Living Water” sect. While both have roots in rural communities, “The Living Water” plans to modernize and to reach out to the urban youth. However, the leader of the sect resorts to tactics which might be considered less than ethical.