It is Sunday afternoon. It was quiet in the yard because all the little ones in the yard had gone to Sunday School. Marsue is sweeping the front of the yard with a broom. She pauses her sweeping and looks down into the tenement yard she had lived in for most of her young life. There was a huge two bedroom apartment in the front of the yard. It had its own bathroom and kitchen. This was where the Landlord had lived before moving to his new home in Cherry Gardens. It was now occupied by his cousins. There was a row of single rooms on both sides of the yard. The rooms on the left had enclosed verandahs. The rooms on the right were larger with verandahs that were not enclosed. There was a building on the right which housed three toilet stalls and three shower stalls and another building on the left which housed four separate kitchens. Two tenants each per kitchen. To the side of the kitchen was a water pipe built within a cement enclosure. This was where the tenants got water from to do their cooking and washing as well as where they would gather to gossip. It was affectionately called ‘The Pipe-side’. Everyone of the tenants had a wooden table with zinc on it at the front of their quarters. This was where they kept their laundry pans and where they washed their cups and plates. Clothes lines were strung up all over the yard and even though it was a Sunday some of the tenants were busy hanging out their laundry to dry. Looking at it all from the top of the yard it was not a pretty sight and Marsue longed for the day when her mother would be able to move from this tenement living! She was also tired of the constant bickering amongst the adults. She sighed and resumed her sweeping. Even though her mother had told her over a hundred times not to sweep the rubbish through the gate unto the street she was doing it anyway. She was sweeping the
