4 minute read
THE LOSS OF A REAL TROUPER
BY GASANT ABARDER
ILHAAM GROENEWALD
IN JANUARY THIS YEAR, WE BID FAREWELL TO A SPECIAL AND MUCH-LOVED COLLEAGUE.
THE CAMPUS COMMUNITY initially knew her as Adrian Haynes but now remember her in death as Adrienne Galagatsi. Adrienne was one of the first people you would encounter at the Sport Administration wing of the UWC Sports Centre. Her infectious laugh and her willingness to always find a solution to a challenge while the university was hard at work preparing to host a sporting event endeared her to many colleagues across the campus.
BUT THAT BROAD SMILE hid much pain and heartache. Adrienne was one of us and we embraced her journey to becoming a transgender woman. Outside the boundaries of the university campus, however, the rest of society was not as accepting.
Many who work and study at the University of the Western Cape knew only a dedicated individual who gave everything for the sake of UWC Sport’s success. To the outside world, Adrienne was an activist, a trailblazer, a dear friend and a woman with a heart of gold.
AT A POWERFUL AND POIGNANT memorial service hosted by UWC on 24 January 2022 at the Proteaville Recreation Centre in Bellville South, several of Adrienne’s mentors, peers and colleagues as well as those who spent time with her off-campus spoke of her impact on the different worlds she occupied. Many of her work colleagues and the students she mentored didn’t know of her prowess in the LGBQTI+ community. After winning a major Miss Gay Western Cape pageant she used her platform as an activist to support those who were being ‘othered’ because they were considered different.
UWC DIRECTOR OF SPORT, Mandla Gagayi, told the audience: “All of us at Sport had wonderful relationships with Adrienne. She was always the centre of attention at all of our functions, whether on the road to an end-of-year function or organising the sport awards.
“I don’t know how many times we had shed tears in my office. None of those tears were for work. They were tears because Adrienne was struggling with many things in her >
LIBERTY MATTHYSE
life. She was good about asking for help (at work). But there were circumstances that sometimes pushed her to fight her struggles on her own,” said Gagayi.
ALLUDING TO ADRIENNE’S STRUGGLE for acceptance, Gagayi quoted from the Book of Matthew, Chapter Seven, Verses 1 to 3: “Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you. Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye?”
ADRIENNE’S MENTOR and the former UWC Director of Sport, Ilhaam Groenewald, said she was more than a colleague but rather a dear friend.
“Thank you for blossoming as a student, a leader, an athlete, a volunteer and an activist. Most importantly, thank you for honouring your queen, your late mom, because you are with her now. Thank you for making choices that made you happy – even when you went through a tough time,” said Groenewald.
LIBERTY MATTHYSE, a transgender woman who represented Gender DynamiX and was a friend of Adrienne’s, told the gathering: “Indeed we are part of something much bigger.
“AS A TRANSGENDER WOMAN myself, how many of us find ourselves in a world that keeps turning away from our existence? Sometimes in overt and harsh ways. Sometimes in covert and subtle ways. Then we must go back and make sense of it and ask, ‘Are we part of the bigger picture?’
“She was a leader, an ambassador and a great contributor in the fields of sport and higher education. This was groundbreaking. I don’t think the sports department knows how lucky you were to have her in a discipline such as sport that contests our belonging consistently.”
ADRIENNE TOUCHED MANY LIVES at UWC and beyond – and not only in sport. She will be fondly remembered for her excellent contributions in dancesport, netball, the UWC Varsity Cup rugby campaigns and in many other areas as a student, sports administrator and activist.
REST IN PEACE, GALLA. YOU MAY BE GONE FROM OUR SIGHT BUT NEVER FROM OUR HEARTS. B+G
