WATCH: Varsity dropout says voices in his head led him to the streets

University dropout turned street dweller Sibusiso Siyoko says the voices in his head led him to the streets.

Siyoko from Soshanguve recently celebrated his 29th birthday – alone on the streets. At the NA recycling yard in Pretoria North, Siyoko hands in the cardboard boxes and empty plastic bottles he collects in town to recycle in exchange for R19.

Dropout

VIDEO: From university student to streets dweller

Siyoko said he dropped out in 2019 because he was discouraged by the amount of money it cost to travel to university.

He had a bursary to study TV and film production at the Tshwane University of Technology (TUT) but threw in the towel three months later.

“Things were too much. My motivations didn’t allow me to be myself. Life told me to do some thing I couldn’t do. That is the most painful feeling,” he said.

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Insanity

Siyoko described his university experience as impossible. “I just went crazy. I started hearing voices taking me to different places.

And then I started listening to them and I got lost.”

Dr Erica Munnik, a clinical psychologist at the University of the Western Cape, said there were many factors to consider in Siyoko’s circumstance.

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Reasoning

“There can be different contributing factors why he finds himself where he is – from micro [own characteristics] and family and close environment and then more macro factors, such as work factors, current financial climate.”

Munnik said, according to the four levels of Bronfenbrenner’s theory, the microsystem, mesosystem, ecosystem and macrosystem factors interacted and impacted Siyoko and his circumstances.

Munnik said one should under stand the individual [own thinking, feelings, actions, health] in the context of his family and the community and country in which he lives. Siyoko said he didn’t miss home.

“I’m not scared of any thing on the streets. When it gets to your security, you get used to what you can afford to handle.

When you don’t have a roof over your head, you don’t need stuff. “Sometimes you steal to sell. Sometimes when you sleep you know others might want to steal from you, but you sleep knowing that you don’t have much. It is what it is,” he said.

Siyoko said the voices told him he was going to be okay on the streets. He has been on the street for almost a year now. “I’m tired. I don’t have dreams any more.

I have spent too much time in the darkness. I was lost, I couldn’t see anything,” he said.

READ MORE: Varsity dropout says voices in his head led him to the streets

– marizkac@citizen.co.za