It was a starlit night. Driving in what felt like the middle of nowhere – which actually was somewhere between Banket and Raffingora – I looked up at the stars dotting the pitch black sky above as we drove by.

The feeling both frightened and exhilarated me.

The eerie sensation of knowing we were the sole car on the road in the middle of rural Zimbabwe brought a strong sense of danger and excitement. If anything were to happen – a tyre puncture or a run in with a wild animal (we’d had a near-death experience with a springbok before) – it would be hard to get help.

The thrill lay in the depth and grandeur of the night. The feeling of being but a tiny, minuscule part of a gigantic masterpiece that is the world we live in.

And yet, as I looked up at the stars as we drove on the bumpy, pothole ridden road, I felt inspired. Inspired to dream that one day – I would travel to far away places and be somebody meaningful, making my stamp on the world. I knew there was more to life than met my eye.

This would be a recurring thought to me for years of my life.

As I grew older, however, I learnt that those dreams were dangerous. The world I was so enthralled by would not be as welcoming as I’d imagined.

Passports and borders would play a huge role on whether little girls like me got to fulfil our dreams or not. These limitations went back in time to history, colonisation, discrimination, oppression and patriarchy. Let’s just say, the odds were more than against me.

It behooved me – “how come I wasn’t allowed to live my dream?” Infuriating, exasperating, demotivating and tormenting – it was a cocktail of sadness and suppression that we were being forced to drink. Life seemed helpless and hopeless.

What I came to realise, however, is that little girls like me had to take those dreams into our own hands. The path was ever so narrow, the road miles longer than our peers, but it could be done.

You see, the world made us think that we couldn’t dream to do the unimaginable. But little black girls from small corners of the world are living the dreams they imagined.

From Tsitsi Dangarembga to Sarel Madziya, Sha Sha to Danai Gurira, Sibongile Mlambo to Donata Katai.

Yes, we have to be brilliant. Yes, we have to be bold. Yes, we have to excel to an unparalleled level just for our stories to be told.

But, my prayer is that little black girls like you and me – from villages to cities, high density dwellings to suburban streets – all equally get a chance to live their dream. Not based on their class, the school they went to or who they know. But based on the fire that lights up inside them that will move the world.