White Supremacy? But first, who is white?

In the midst of writing about the creation and undoing of apartheid by the South African government, I can't help but retreat into my own thoughts about the absurdity of apartheid. The question that keeps making me laugh with frustration is: if the Afrikaner and British people in South Africa hated each other so much, why did they keep making laws that explicitly keep them together?

It seemed to me that in South Africa, the very idea of white supremacy was riddled with contradiction. Didn’t the British consider the Afrikaners lowly peasants and didn’t the Afrikaners see the British as leaders of an evil empire? Did the Afrikaner government really want to give the white British equal opportunity? Or did they simply forget that their British rivals were also “white?”

On our second visit to Pretoria, we went to various historical sites around the city. One such place was the Voortrekker Monument, opened in 1949 by the Afrikaans-dominated South African government. The marble walls are engraved with depictions of the Great Trek from 1835 to 1852 made by Afrikaner pioneers. Though the events give a heavily biased Afrikaner perspective, demonizing the Zulu people and the British, there is no denying the suffering that the Afrikaner pioneers endured during this time. If I learned anything from this monument, it was the stark contrast in histories of the Afrikaners and the British. The Afrikaners, whose ancestors had escaped from political oppression in Europe, were tough farmers who lived closely with the land. The British were privileged colonizers who came to South Africa to establish influential sea-ports and reap the benefits of the natural resources.

The sentiment surrounding this monument expressed the Afrikaner feeling of entitlement to the lands of South Africa. At the time of colonization and expansion in South Africa, the only people greedy for private property and mass accumulation of wealth were the only two white groups around. Yet, when the 1948 Afrikaner government came into power and established apartheid as a national policy, it succeeded in denying black South Africans the equal rights and entitlements but it failed to suppress the British, the Afrikaner people’s most serious competition for gold, land, and power.

Thinking about this just adds another of layer of absurdity to the concept of apartheid. I am glad for everyone’s sake that it was abolished; what foolishness the South African people had to endure.

-Emily Haghighi

I Heart Wits

During our two weeks in South Africa we visited two primary schools, three secondary schools, two Saturday schools for students in their final year of high school, and four universities. Our visit to University of Witwatersrand (Wits)—its campus lovingly referred to as a concrete jungle—particularly stands out in my mind. Although we only had a short time to look around the campus, I had a good feeling about the school.

We met with Nazir Carim and Misheck Ndebele, two professors at the School of Education. Dr. Carim described how Wits was a significant location for the anti-apartheid struggle. Winni Mandela led many rallies on the campus, in spite of the armored military vehicles that closed in on her and the crowd. Now I knew why I liked this school so much, its history was entrenched with the spirit of justice and forward thinking.

In our discussion with the two professors, we discussed policies of the newly democratic government, school curriculum, effect of HIV/AIDS on teachers and students, rural versus urban education, etc. A topic that particularly interested/upset me related to the literacy rates of students. Dr. Carim noted that any student, from primary level on, can engage in an informed conversation about rights and liberties, current events, and their opinions about the government, but just don’t ask them to write it down. According to the international TIMS study, an average sixth-grade student in South Africa has a second grade reading level and a student in third grade struggles to simply sound out words.

Then I wondered, what about the university students? Do they have decent reading and writing skills? Students that Drs. Carim and Ndebele encounter are brilliant thinkers but many still struggle to connect sentences together. Dr. Ndebele stressed that reading and writing are basic human rights that every person requires. If the professors at universities must go back to the very basics in order to equip their students with reading and writing skills to survive, then so be it.

Talking with these two extremely knowledgeable professors and learning more about the legacy of Wits, I left the school optimistic about the future of education in South Africa. Obviously students on all school levels are critical thinkers and thirsting to learn. The fact that many struggle with basic literacy is a large problem, a problem that may threaten to halt the growth of the country. However, with people like Carim and Ndebele and their young students, it feels like an obstacle that is possible to surmount.

-Emily Haghighi

Cry Freedom

There are countless images exploding in my mind, as this life transforming journey advances into its twilight hour. There are so many emotions swirling within me that I struggle to translate feelings to words.

I can only think…

I think of forty fists, every shade of brown, from ebony to milk tea, thrust proudly upward in Bonarto High School’s ninth grade classroom, honoring the struggle against Apartheid.

I think of the chill, shooting up the backs of my calves to the nape of my neck, as forty impassioned voices filled the room with the South African National anthem in the beautiful native tongue of Setswana.

I think of Flora, the principal who created a vibrant oasis of knowledge of the once desolate Ikaneng Primary School, empowered by her ability to “take the T out of can’t”.

I think of the Apartheid Museum and the courage of unflinching throngs of women, marching to free their husbands and children of the bondage of racism.

I think of Steve Biko and Nelson Mandela, leaders, political prisoners, examples of courage and perseverance in the face of injustice.

I think of maropeng, a Setswana word meaning “returning to our roots”. I think of how we are all fundamentally the same.

I think of the seven pillars of the new South African constitution: Democracy, Reconciliation, Respect, Diversity, Equality, Responsibility, and Freedom.

I think of kicking a soccer ball on streets of iron rich, red earth with the children of Soweto. I think of their smiles and youthful laughter.

I think of the future…

I think of Africa…

I think of hope…

~Orpheus

Celebration of National Women's Day in South Africa

August 9th was a national holiday in South Africa. It was National Women's Day in honor of the fight for a free South Africa that it's women undertook in many ways during the Apartheid era and since. Their famous 1956 protest march to the Union Building in Pretoria wherein they burned their racially designated passport books and demanded equal and human rights for all was one highlight of their leadership.

We visited a classroom of middleschool students in which students read poems that they created to honor their mothers and women in South Africa. The boys were very enthusiastic in sharing thier poems. South African President Thabo Mbeki wrote an article in the Johannesburg daily newspaper (The Star 8/10/07) saluting women and acknowledging their struggle and "fight for freedom and justice" and their role in shaping democracy in South Africa. He also said that, "It is important for the South African male population to join the fight against gender oppression;" and that "the struggle to emancipate, empower and liberate our women cannot be completed without the meaningful participation of our men." I think we can learn many things from South Africa.

Our SUA group also joined comrades in South Africa in an HIV AIDS community outreach project on National Women's Day. We contributed and helped distribute towels, soap, blankets, and clothes to families of AIDS and cancer patients who were homebound and who lived in the Soweto Township. In one instance, the patient died the night before. Health issues, and especially HIV are very serious and visible issues here. However, there are lots of policies and education around the latter.

Despite all the struggles and the multiple challenges and issues involved in the transition to and buildinng of a "New South Africa," the spirits and hope of the people that we continue to meet in general appear high and hopeful. They continue to say that Mr. Nelson Mandela has been and remains the source of their inspiration. I'm impressed with how one person can have such an impact. I'm also impressed with the number of languages and dialects that are spoken among the South African people. Being able to communicate with people in their language is indeed an important asset and increasingly so in our expanding global village.

If you can, visit South Africa and explore the continent and the world apart from your own local village. As I've said before, it's one of the best forms of education. But also, I think it's important to explore corners and places in our own countries that takes us out of the familiar and our comfort zones. We don't have to travel to South Africa to learn about poverty and AIDs. Also, there are many similarities that we share with South Africa apart from being a member of the same human family.

I've a lot of ongoing and more serious self-reflecting to do. It is often the case when I step outside of my culture to experience another.

More later perhaps or maybe not as we have limited time left on our journey and still much to do and learn.

Jackson speaks

My educational outlook in the United States, presently, is pretty… idealistic, just ask Orpheus. I have no problem waxing eloquently and at great length about cultivating wisdom, encouraging personal involvement with class materials, and moving beyond the classroom to contribute to society. This is Soka education. This is humanistic education. I have the luxury to spend my time contemplating these personal ideals. What happens to a child’s education when their time is spent worrying about personal safety?

Jackson is an unassuming 20-something University student in Johannesburg with a bright future. But don’t ask him his name unless you brought your reading glasses. Jackson does not speak. He has not spoken for years. Jackson grew up in Rwanda and witnessed some horrible atrocities at too young an age. Unable to deal with the stresses of young life in a war zone, Jackson shut down and shut up. Children are not concerned with quality education when family members are dying atrocious deaths left and right. I relate to him. Speech is the first thing to leave me when I find myself in tense situations.

Last week in a kindergarten in Langa, Capetown, we were serenaded by 40-plus five year-olds. Due to the thickness of the accent, it took me a moment to realize they had begun singing in English, after a stream of traditional tunes. But the chorus hit me loud and hard: “It is my body! Don’t touch it, don’t touch it!” My mind screamed, “what abuses must they be encountering for this song to be of importance to them?” At the conclusion, one teacher explained that these children experience much physical and sexual abuse in the community and therefore the song aims to arm them with some degree of self-respect and self-worth at a young age with which to fight back against their aggressors, if not physically then spiritually. What child could take education seriously in the classroom with the constant fear of being attacked upon return home?

One educator made these dire circumstances crystal clear today. He said, in some areas of South Africa, the likelihood that a female student can walk to and from school safely in one day, without the incident of rape during the walk, is not very high. Students are attacked regularly. Who would want to go to school?

So my mind aches. How can I justify thinking in such idealistic terms universally when the basics of safety are taken for granted in much of the world? How do we create the circumstances so all may become philosophers in a renaissance of life when many would be satisfied with the guarantee of personal security, and rightly so??
I return to Jackson. He moved to South Africa as a refugee to attend high school. Jackson couldn’t focus on his studies in Rwanda, but once removed from those desperate circumstances, Jackson thrived. Save for the special arrangements made to allow for his continued silence, Jackson dominated the chess scene, made good marks, and now enjoys much success at the University level. Give him the guarantee of safety and education becomes the focus. One down, a million to go. Thank you Jackson; you have instilled hope in an overly-fortunate idealist.

-Karla Meier

From Johannesburg!

On August 7th (Tue), we departed from our beloved Cape Town and flew to Johannesburg, our next research spot and also our fellow South African Wandile’s hometown. The hotel we are staying right now is actually just 15mins walk from his former work place, and he has been a fabulous guide to this world-known metropolis. Jo’burg is particularly famous for being a capital of commerce of the country. From what our driver told us, Johannesburg is like New York in the US in a sense that it’s a commercial center of South Africa, as Pretoria, political capital of the country, can be compared to Washington DC. Of course, Johannesburg is not just about big corporations and businessmen, as it is also very close to a site called Cradle of Mankind, where oldest fossils of human being were found.

Since my group members are sharing about different session that we had so far in this city, I will just quickly go over the schedule for our study tour this week. (And I’m writing this in the night of second day here…sorry for the delay on the update!)

Aug. 7 Arriving at Jo’burg
Aug. 8 Visit to Barnato Park High School, Ikeneng Primary School, and Wits University
Aug. 9 Community Assistance Work
Aug. 10 Visit to University of Pretoria
Aug. 11 Arranged Pretoria Tour
Aug. 12 City Tour of Jo’burg
Aug. 13 Departure to the US!

Stay tuned with our hot blog cite!

-Haru Irie

Can I be like Melane?

“No, because you work so hard and you don’t get paid. I don’t want to be broke like you.” This was the response of a young twelfth grade, or “matric” student at Zonnebloem NEST high school, when asked by his instructor Heather, whether he’d like to be a teacher himself someday. He was not alone in his opinion. Not one of the twenty odd learners in her class room answered “yes”. This is why Melane, a soft spoken young man undergoing a teacher training program through ASSET (an NGO I mentioned in a previous blog entitled Cape Town Contradiction) in Khayelitsa, is special. He said to me: “I want to uplift my people. Many students want to go overseas. I want to stay and help my country.” When he spoke those words, a destitute and crime ridden sea of squatter settlements, where he had been mugged days earlier, sprawled out behind him.

Another voice that’s been echoing in my head is that of Dr. Derek Joubert, Executive Director of the ASSET program. He told me that, after Apartheid, all the best teachers had been paid to leave the Western Cape because the government didn’t want to pay their salaries. The poorest learners of Cape Town are in trouble. Qualified math and science teachers are a rare commodity and the transition to the newly instituted Outcomes Based Education system (OBE) has their under trained educators struggling to provide quality classes.

For twenty years Dr. Joubert has been working to help disadvantaged high school students connect with the most committed teachers on weekends, to help them graduate, and to do so with better scores on their matriculation exams. Dr. Joubert and Melane are examples of people who have committed themselves to giving young people tools with which to climb out of Apartheid’s mire and into a new South Africa. In demonstrating such passionate commitment they have made me think about my own actions across the pond.

I mentioned a South African man named Rob in my last blog. He told me that after going abroad for the first time as a young man he “learned more about the country than in twenty one years of living there”. Sometimes it takes gaining a different perspective to see what’s close to you. It’s just like using a mirror to be able to clearly see the nose on your own face. Cape Town has been a mirror for me to reflect on the conditions of people within my own borders. While distinct, the issues of poverty, disadvantage, and crime in the townships of Langa and Gugelato are not entirely unique from those found in the states. The issues of under funding and understaffing in schools which now must face the harsh standards of “No Child Left Behind” are concurrent with similar struggles I’ve been witnessing in South Africa. Children with limited access to good education need help everywhere. But what meaning does this have for me?

My first week in South Africa has taught me that I don’t have to take a twenty hour flight to find people in need. There are so many students that don’t receive the guidance at home or sufficient tutelage to have opportunities to advance themselves. Nevertheless, much like Rob, it took my traveling thousands of miles from home to see my own country more clearly. Because Soka University of America is located in Orange County, one of the richest and safest places in the world, it is sometimes easy to forget or feel distanced from the Melanes of the world. However, an hour’s drive can put us students right in the heart of schools that are reminiscent of Zonnebloem NEST, and neighborhoods that are cousins of Khayelitsa.

When I return to the States, I am going to find ways to involve our student body in taking responsibility to help less fortunate students, right there at home, receive help. After all, isn’t that part of living the “contributive life” that our “steady stream of global citizens” aspires to?

~Orpheus