Synopsis

Three people board a Johannesburg-bound train. Strangers, each on their own mission with a simple task to complete and in search of family to help them. But when they are betrayed by the very people whose protection they sought, they find themselves trapped in the city, invisible and alone. Vaya interweaves three separate plots that intersect and intertwine in a gripping, deeply moving, and often funny narrative about struggling for survival and dignity in the city. In the first story, a rural man has been promised a job by his big-city cousin; his earnings will allow him to pay lobola back home, which will change his life forever. He's excited; his cousin is an important man whose patronage the village has relied on for many years. To work for him is a great honour. But on arrival he discovers that the job is not quite what he thought: He is required to kill his cousin's rival. In the second story, a young man is sent to Jozi to reclaim his father's body, but he discovers that the body has already been claimed: his father's hitherto-unknown 'city family' has taken it and they are not giving it back. The young man must find a way to return the body to his rural home or risk the family reputation forever. In the third story, a young woman takes her aunt's young daughter to Joburg to live with her mother for the first time, but she has her own plans to dump the child and finally escape the boredom of rural life to explore her own dreams and ambitions in the city. She soon discovers that her aunt is not who she thought she was: She runs a shebeen and lives with an extremely devious gangster who supports her. She is unable to take care of herself, let alone a small child. The young woman must now choose between her own dreams or saving the child and ruining everything.