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Tonderai Zvimba, Showbiz Reporter
FORMER Studio 263 actress and radio host Tinopona “Tin Tin” Katsande says she was emotionally bullied when she was young because of her physical appearance but she managed to turn that into positivity.

The actress shared the emotional story on her Facebook page saying she hated growing up as she was ridiculed for being tall.

“I was always ridiculed for my long neck, long limbs and even long nose some said. Giraffe, yes, — that’s what they called me,” said Tin Tin.
She said even teachers would ridicule her for her height.

“Being tall and lanky runs in the Katsande family. Since nursery school I was always the tallest in the class. Everyone from teachers to students taunted me about my tall thin self, but most of the harsh comments came from my peers who inevitably bullied me because I was different to them. I was taller and that alone armed the playground bullies with jeers and insults,” said Tin Tin.

She said her childhood and the bullying made her reclusive and not participate in sport.

“I cried a lot in the hostel on my bed and I would pray to God to cut my limbs shorter or chop my neck to be shorter. As a result I never wanted to stand out in school activities, especially at junior school. I knew I was a fast runner and a good gymnast but I knew if I excelled in them then the spotlight would be on me and the hounding would be from the whole school.

She said her mother would scold her because she would walk stooped low to hide her height.

“My mother would scold me terribly for bending my back and she would say ‘be proud of your height mwana wangu (my child), one day they will all wish they were you waSuper model,” said Tin Tin.

Tinopona said her mother’s words became a reality as in 1997 she was crowned Miss Mutare and went on to be a semi-finalist in the Miss Zimbabwe pageant at 17.

She said that was when she finally embraced her height and managed to face the hurt she had been carrying inside her for years.

“The psychosomatic effects of childhood bullying can be so far reaching, it affects one as an adult and a research we did for a new drama coming soon showed that bullying in both primary and secondary schools in Zimbabwe is at an alarming high rate. Children are going through depression, getting into drugs and unfavourable behaviour because they are looking for an escape from bullies at school,” said Tin Tin.

She challenged schools to be more proactive to weed out bully mentality and parents to be more interactive in their children’s lives.

Any change of behaviour that you deem unsavoury in your child is a probable sign that something is wrong at school and nine times out of 10 it’s from bullying.

School authorities at both private and Government schools should say no tolerance to bullying.