A young man in a hoodie is at a busy shopping centre in Melbourne. He’s trying to stop passers-by for a chat.
He wants to practice overcoming his stutter in public as part of a training exercise. But as he tries to get the words out, most people ignore him and walk on.
“Excuse me,” he asks, before shrinking away at the rejection, then trying again.
Elize Mahungu - or Raizo, as he prefers to be called - recognises a familiar pattern and begins to suspect why most people don’t give him the time to speak.
It’s because he’s black, he says.
“It’s the story of my life,” the 21-year-old tells SBS News.
Raizo describes how he was once lost and tried to ask several people for directions. It wasn’t until the seventh person stopped that he was finally able to get help.
Raizo is a participant in the new SBS documantary Stutter School. Source: Supplied by Danyal Syed
“That just told me that some people just don't want to affiliate or talk to someone who looks like me,” he says.
“[Sometimes I think] why am I getting treated like this? … I'm only human, like, talk to me first,” he says.
The incident at the shopping centre is captured in the new SBS documentary Stutter School, part of the Untold Australia series.
The documentary follows a group of people hoping to overcome their stutter through an intensive course in Melbourne run by the McGuire Program.
It sees the participants learning about the reasons for their stutter and practising techniques to overcome it over an emotional four days.
Stuttering affects one in 100 Australians and can impact not just confidence, but also quality of life.
'Maybe they're laughing at me'
When SBS News speaks to Raizo, his trainer Ratu Clarke is also present and occasionally helps him when he gets stuck.
Sometimes Raizo counts, other times he does breath exercises, as well as voice training.
When the stuttering takes over, Raizo's mind is racing with negative thoughts about what the other person is thinking.
“Mostly I just feel like I'm wasting their time … maybe they're laughing at me,” he says.
Raizo is a participant in the new SBS documantary Stutter School. Source: Ben King/SBS
But as well as the techniques learnt on the McGuire Program, Raizo has another trick to help him overcome his stutter.
Something almost magical happens whenever he raps. There are no interruptions in his speech; it’s a free flow of words.
“I just feel unstoppable and I feel like I can go on forever,” he says. “I just feel free.”
Raizo doesn't stutter when he raps. Source: Supplied by Danyal Syed
Raizo is the stage name he adopted since taking up rapping when he was at school in Mount Gambier in South Australia.
“I just love rapping because ... I could basically, just basically, say whatever was on my mind without being pulled back,” he says.
Childhood trauma
Raizo wasn’t always a stutterer. His mum recently told him he spoke without a stutter until the age of eight or nine.
Originally from the Democratic Republic of Congo, which experienced several years of civil war from 1997, most of his life was spent in a refugee camp in Namibia.
He came to Australia with his parents and two siblings in 2015.
Raizo won’t talk about what he saw growing up, but he thinks his stutter was caused by childhood trauma.
“A lot of things really happened when I was a kid, especially first-hand to me,” he says.
Raizo and his family. Source: Supplied by Danyal Syed
“My mum told me that I wasn't born this way. So it was something that happened.”
It’s not known what causes stuttering but researchers have considered developmental factors including genetics and developmental delays, as well as psychogenic stuttering caused by emotional trauma.
'Lots of things to say'
Raizo has many dreams and plans.
He wants to be a rapper but doesn’t like the stereotype of ‘professional rapping’, he says, and with the coronavirus pandemic putting an end to live performances, he mostly records from his room.
In the short term, he’s also trying to build up his own mobile car wash service.
Raizo wants to be heard. Source: Supplied by Danyal Syed
After years of struggling with his stutter, Raizo just wants people to hear what he has to say - be that if he stops them in a shopping centre, or by listening to his music.
“I've got so many things to talk about,” he says.
“And I just wish people could please lend me just an hour of their time, you know, and just listen to my music.
“There are some things that the world needs to hear.”
Stutter School is part of Season 5 of Untold Australia. .
