Kast's wife dismissive of naysayers

Tshepiso Molapisi, better known as Kast, this week laughed off and dismissed with contempt  the suggestive comments made by people about his decision to have a woman accompany him for his entire epic walk, just so she would keep massaging him along the way.

Joining Kast in brushing the curious suggestions is his wife, Veronica Molapisi who said she was always calm and unperturbed by the arrangement as she has full trust in her man. Many questioned the wisdom of such a move  given the several night stopovers that spanned over a month of the walk, with the daring social media mongers labelling the wife a fool to let her man be in the care of another woman in the wild of the 1000 kilometer stretch.

Among the people who walked with Kast from Maun to Gaborone was Tshegofatso Mpepwa, a masseuse whose role was to ease body pains on the man popularly known as S’jabana.

Suggesting that he had grown immune to doubting Thomases, Kast remembered that when he  took to social media and wrote that he would fill up the National Stadium with a 100% local line-up in an initiative dubbed Tlatsa Lebala, many people were sceptical. The naysayers made fun of him when he later declared that he would walk 1000 km from Maun to Gaborone to raise awareness about the initiative and the plight of local musicians.

Very few people believed that he would do it. But he did. On Saturday he completed the walk and arrived in Gaborone to a resounding welcome. Nothing in Kast’s fast pace suggested he was fatigued from the long walk from Maun.

He has always maintained throughout the walk that he was able to withstand the associate pain thanks to the works of his massage lady Tshego,  who offered to massage him for free. It is this arrangement that inevitably got the people talking. “Kast is a married man, I just can’t imagine how his wife would feel comfortable  with another woman caressing his man’s body in the middle of nowhere, everyday,” one of the social media comments quipped.

Tshego also found it queer that people would even go that far to cast aspersions on her ethics.  “I believe in helping people and when I heard about Tlatsa Lebala and the walk, I wondered how I could help Kast. 

This was also my way to encourage anyone out there to follow his or her dreams,” she said. The professional beauty therapist was also quick to clarify that massaging and sex do not necessarily go together as some people assumed in their posts and comments, adding that she was a professional whose focus was only on her trade. Kast’s wife on the other hand said all she felt during the unfolding episode of the walk was unprecedented pride for her husband. She too helped support Kast in her own way, knowing it was done for what Kast believed in. “I had no time to think about what people were thinking.

My husband is a professional and I trust him enough to let him do what he believes in,” Veronica told The Midweek Sun. She said that she has however covered only 10 Km of the 1000km walk because she had to remain home to take care of their son and attend to other domestic duties in her husband’s absence. “My mother-in-law, son and I joined the Tlatsa Lebala team in Francistown to also show support by covering 10km of the walk and it was exhausting,” she giggled.

The soft-spoken beauty said that she was not affected by the jibes of those who mocked and ridiculed her husband. “Everyone knows their capabilities best and should not be doubted until they have failed.

I am not much of a social media person, so it was really not that bad when everyone was condemning my husband because I did not really pay much attention but just supported him. The end of the walk is not even the end but the beginning of a new chapter to fill up the stadium, and I am confident that this will open doors for many artists,” she said.

Throughout the walk, Kast says he avoided the comments of critics who poked fun of him on social media. He said that he was aware of the negativity and criticism, including jokes about how he walked in boots instead of trainers. “I did not take these comments seriously because trainers are actually meant for training at various sport codes while boots are recommended for walking by professionals. The talk of Tshegofatso does not bother me as well, because she is a true professional who raised her hand to help me, for free,” he said.

He also expressed hope that more people now understood the mandate of Tlatsa Lebala. “The walk was helpful in terms of publicity. I appreciate the contributions and support that individuals and companies made towards the initiative,” he said. Kast said that they would announce the exact figure of all the donations at a later date. The Ministry of Youth Empowerment, Sport and Culture Development also lent a helping hand of P150 000.00 coverage for Kast to use the stadium. He said that he now looks forward to accomplishing the initial mission.