The Educated Waiter

Tafadzwa Taruvinga's groundbreaking memoir The Educated Waiter: Memoir of an African Immigrant gives voice to the unheard plight of the faceless immigrant Uber driver, waiter, graduate and gardener in South Africa. Released in October, it is hugely relevant at a time where our country is experiencing devastating levels of xenophobic intolerance and violence.When Tafadzwa Zimunhu Taruvinga, a young Zimbabwean, enrolls to study economics at Rhodes University in South Africa, he has no idea that his life is about to be a tumultuous trial of survival. As a foreign student, the fees are exorbitant, exacerbated by the fact that currency has become increasingly problematic in the ailing economy back home. This doesn't deter him; with a sharp sense of self-preservation, Tafadzwa pursues his studies while unpacking groceries, cleaning shit-splattered toilets and waitering for a pittance.Constantly cash-strapped, most nights he goes to sleep hungry.Tafadzwa Taruvinga's groundbreaking memoir The Educated Waiter: Memoir of an African Immigrant gives voice to the unheard plight of the faceless immigrant Uber driver, waiter, graduate and gardener in South Africa. Released in October, it is hugely relevant at a time where our country is experiencing devastating levels of xenophobic intolerance and violence.When Tafadzwa Zimunhu Taruvinga, a young Zimbabwean, enrolls to study economics at Rhodes University in South Africa, he has no idea that his life is about to be a tumultuous trial of survival. As a foreign student, the fees are exorbitant, exacerbated by the fact that currency has become increasingly problematic in the ailing economy back home. This doesn't deter him; with a sharp sense of self-preservation, Tafadzwa pursues his studies while unpacking groceries, cleaning shit-splattered toilets and waitering for a pittance.Constantly cash-strapped, most nights he goes to sleep hungry.