Serurubele/ Butterfly Heart, Theatre for children and young audiences
Venue: Glennie Hall
Next Performance: Saturday 5 July 14:00
Review
By Ndalo Mbombo
The stage is littered with multicoloured butterflies, dressed in what I recognise as ugqabsi [skipping rope]. In comes Neo dressed in a light blue knee-length dress stitched with butterflies on the pockets, she catches a butterfly and watches it as it soft-lands on her arm.
Friends Neo and Mosa (played by Lalu Mokuku) spend their days playing all kinds of games, giggling and admiring all the beautiful butterflies in their butterfly garden. We watch the purity of love the children have for their friends and loved ones, a love so trusting and carefree, which unfolds before us with both Mosa and Neo freely declaring it – Mosa to her mother and Neo to her grandmother.
Some days they play udwadla, a game I recognise from my own childhood, played with a ball normally made using newspaper and plastic. Other days the two friends play hopscotch, laughing and giggling, sometimes they collect rocks to play upuca. Neo reluctantly agrees to play upuca because of Mosa’s continuous complaints of fatigue. “Wena Mosa, you are always saying you are tired,” Neo says, sulking before turning to Mosa to play with her. Mosa endures the short-lived sulk from her friend without complaint – a child’s heart so swift to forgive.
The play is humorous and stirs up a sense of nostalgia as you enjoy Musa and Neo playing and picking on one another. It’s light and fluffy, simple — even though it attempts to address the rather heavy and dense subjects of death and grief.
It gives us a glimpse into what children go through while trying to navigate unexplained changes caused by death. It unveils the confusion, pain and trauma children go through when they’ve lost someone dear – how they just call out to a friend, a sibling, or a parent who was there one moment then gone the next. The pain settled into my heart when Neo was calling out to Mosa, with no response.
Perhaps children more vocal with their thoughts and questions, children will ask their parents, “Mama uyephi uMusa?” [Mom where did Musa go?] should watch this. Children who can question and understand more clearly, who are in a phase where their curiosity allows them to be still for a period to listen and ponder, can continue with their parents the conversation that Serurubele / Butterfly Heart is initiating.
