In reading “Kaffir Boy”, Mathabane puts the reader into his shoes, feeling the pain and neglect of the apartheid, seeing life in South Africa living in the apartheid. The horrors of his encounters are eye-opening and alarming bringing out fear. Though his journey is more hopeful than that of many of his neighbors, he has his mother and grandmother backing him and pushing him in school so he will get the chance of a future. It also shines light into the tribal reserves held by Africans and the background of those as well as life in Alexandria, the poor small confinements, filthy surroundings, poor circumstances as well as poverty. It also gives hope that through education, the Africans were given a window of opportunity to escape from the poverty and make something of themselves, though the journey was long and treacherous troubled by danger, physical threat, and giving up.