African Travel Adventure

I've been traveling around South Africa and now to Swaziland during the past week or so. I'm having a blast and just wanted to update in case anyone has had some trouble connecting with me since I've been away.

The trip has been Cape Town to Durban, Durban to Richard's Bay and a small village near there that I don't know the name of, then to St. Lucia, now in Swaziland. We'll leave Swaziland tomorrow probably. It's been amazing so far and travel has included a 24-hour bus ride, minibus taxis, hitchhiking, cars, trucks, some walking, and lots and lots of spontaneous decision-making and fun!

I met up with a friend from Semester at Sea and one of his Peace Corps buddies... it's been great so far. I'll update with pictures and details when I get back to Cape Town!

Crazy Fans!

One of the things I've enjoyed taking photos of during the World Cup --- all the CRAZY FANS!! Hope you enjoy just a few of the photos of fun fans from all over!

World Cup!

The World Cup started on FRIDAY June 11!!!! So exciting. That said, I thought I would update everyone at home about thoughts about the World Cup here and also events happening because of the World Cup. Fascinating stuff. Never did I think that I would be in a place that would host such a massive international sporting event. So glad I am! One of my favourite things about all of the World Cup hype are the various country flags that you see everywhere. In an effort to truly be “ready to welcome the world” (South Africa’s slogan for the world cup), restaurants, shops, citizens, taxis, busses, you name it – have plastered international flags of all the participants everywhere. It’s quite amazing. It is also cool to see the support for Bafana Bafana (South Africa’s national team) with all of the South African flags flying from cars and homes. Don’t tell the American team, but I’m even sporting a Bafana Bafana bracelet!

Until the World Cup started, I would have said that many of the locals were sort of “over” the World Cup because they’ve been hearing about it since the second that South Africa was awarded the hosting rights. The construction, discussion, hype, and everything had been going on for years and many locals (including some of my friends) seemed kind of frustrated and a bit tired of hearing about it all. That was until it all actually started. The sense of unity and excitement that came with 11 June was amazing! The fan parks were packed, the streets were crowded, people everywhere were waving flags, wearing country colors and gear! It was amazing. And it still is. Everywhere I’ve gone during the past few weeks has been taken over by soccer fans. The friendly competition and fun patriotism has been unlike anything I’ve ever experienced.

11 June 2010 -- I've never seen such a friendly and fun display of flags, national pride, and excitement! It was so much fun walking through town and going to the fan park and cheering just for the sake of friendly sport. I was sporting a Bafana jersey (South Africa's national team) in bright yellow like most others, which was such fun! (I've gotten a USA scarf for the USA vs England game, not to worry -- i haven't become a South African yet, haha!). The sounds of vuvuzelas blowing overwhelms all other noises throughout the city. The vuvuzela was selected as one of the official emblems of the 2010 games. They're fun to play with, but quite loud and I'm sure I won't be as enthusiastic about them once I've been hearing them non-stop for a month. I live about a five minute's walk from the Green Point stadium, so a lot of the fan stuff is going on just outside my front door!

Township Debating League (TDL)

Photo: Two of my students from TDL :)


As I mentioned in an earlier post, I have been volunteering with an organization called the Township Debating League (TDL). This organization works with youth from the townships around Cape Town to develop critical thinking, public speaking, and debating skills. The organization was founded in response to the lack of a proper debating organization for township youth (a debating league was already in existence for the more affluent schools). TDL is part of an umbrella organization called Ubunye that is organized and supported by UCT students. There are also local private donors for funding needs. Ubunye also has tutoring programs, a media program that assists students in developing school newspapers, and a mentoring program. I chose TDL because of my experience with debating and the opportunity to encourage critical thinking. Also, the topics we discuss in TDL tend to be about current events, politics, and world affairs (need I say more?). Every Thursday afternoon, I go to LEAP School in Pinelands (not in a township, but attended by students bussed from local townships) to lead workshops about debating. The students here are such a pleasure to work with. They are high school age (14-18 years old) and it is a co-ed school. The students have qualified to attend this school either through application or recommendation from a previous school and specifically focus on math and science.

Recently, we had a tournament. My school sent two teams to the tournament and they divided boys and girls (just because the students wanted to, not because it was required by the school or the organization). The day we spent at the tournament was so much fun because it allowed us to bond more and for me to get to know the girls much better. They are so sweet and had such a good time. They did three debates during the day. The first one they lost and you would have thought someone had killed their dog -- they were so sad. I told them that it was okay and they'd do better next time. We talked about strategies and how good it is to practice and continue through even when you don't win. We also talked about what they learned from the first debate. After the next debate, they waited for me outside of the volunteers' room and had sad faces. I asked them how they did and they immediately started cheering and told me they won! I was so so proud of them and they were so happy! They also won the next debate as well. The winning and losing, of course, is not the important part and I think most teams win and lose some of the debates. It was great to be a part of the whole event. Students from the 20some schools that TDL operates in come together to debate and get to know one another. It's a lot of fun. Anyway, thought I'd let yall know a bit about what I'm up to.

Dunoon (Class Project)

As part of a project for my Politics of Poverty class, we went to the Dunoon Township for two days of interviews with local residents about their lives. The Dunoon township is an informal settlement area of about 1500 shacks. We partnered with the South African Homeless People’s Federation (SAHPF) to assist with their enumeration of the township and to have local residents to enter the township with. The SAHPF works to secure housing for homeless people and slumdwellers. Part of their process for securing housing includes surveying an area to determine needs and numbers of residents, etc to gain information for applications for government housing subsidies. This process is called enumeration and we were asked to help the SAHPF with this portion of their project. In turn, they provided us with a valid reason for being in the township as well as translators and time to speak with locals to answer our project questions. Below are the reflections I wrote for my class project.

The process of learning and gaining understanding about poverty from those most affected by it was unlike anything I could have expected. I feel as though I walked in wanting to learn something very specific and left feeling as though I know less, but understand more the issues that I am studying. I cannot pretend to understand or even relate to the people that I interviewed. My life, circumstances, background, history, family, class, culture, race, and education have made me so far disconnected from the interviewees that it is difficult to begin to understand. We didn’t have the vocabulary or understanding to comprehend and relate to the people we spoke to or the space in which we spoke. This, I think, was the single greatest lesson that I learned during our experiences in Dunoon. My naïve expectations to understand and relate were met with warm greetings, frightened refusals to speak to us, deep conversations, shallow calculated responses, suspicious looks, attempts to impress, and a wider range of expressions than one could describe in words.

The range of emotions I felt from sorrow to frustration to joy to helplessness perhaps express more what I experienced in my two days in Dunoon than the attempt to express the disconnection I felt from those who I interviewed. From discussing HIV/AIDS with an HIV positive woman to playing with children to exploring a new environment that I never have before, I engaged in a new praxis and a new way of learning that truly opened my eyes. This new understanding of what I do not know is more useful than any single piece of knowledge that I could have learned about this topic.

Following the interviews, I asked the interviewees if they had any questions for me. Nearly every interviewee asked me the same question – how this interview was going to help them? Essentially, what was I going to do to improve their lives as a result of learning from them? The first time I was asked this, I didn’t know what to say. I am still not quite sure what to say. I would like to think that the lessons learned from this experience will inform my perspectives and actions for the future and that this in some way will lead to change or improvement for their lives. The truth is that I have no idea.