home from the Eastern Cape

Sorry I haven't posted in so long- we've been in the Eastern Cape for a few weeks. Now we are back! I'll try to recap. On Thursday we went to a community outside of Durban called Bayview, which is really well known for its community/grassroots resistence programs. Despite the fact that the ANC has been in power for 12 years, the people in this community are essentially poorer and worse off than they were during apartheid. Nelson Mandela was an unbelievable man, there is no arguing with that. But very few people knew how he would be as a President- they all voted for him out of love for him as a person. Although he was completely negligent of the whole HIV/AIDS issue, he did at least attempt to help the economy a little bit. The current administration doesn’t seem to be doing anything to help the thousands of people in communities just like Bayview. They are constantly shutting off their electricity and water (if they are lucky enough to have these services) and continuously offer empty promises to fix up their run down shacks. Despite it all, these people are gracious and happy and welcome us into our homes simply for the sake of doing it. It really pisses me off that I can’t do more, but being in Africa has taught me that just being there IS doing something. By taking time out of my day to say “I’m here. Tell me what you know, and I’ll tell you what I know”, I am validating their fight. While we were in Bayview we visited a home for abandoned/orphaned infants. One of the babies was HIV+ and nobody seemed to want anything to do with him, so I ended up holding him and rocking him for at least an hour until my group made me leave. His body was so small and frail. I started singing to him and he looked up at me as though he had never heard the sound before, and laid his head on my chest to feel the vibrations of my voice. Can you believe that nobody has ever sung to that child? I’m pretty sure all the kids had TB, but this baby had it the worst. At one point I had to put him over my shoulder and settle the fluid in his lungs because he was going to suffocate on his own phlegm. When I put him back onto his blanket and had to walk out the door listening to him cry, I honestly felt like my whole body was crying with him. My arms and chest felt empty the rest of the day. It is sad to know that he is one of thousands and thousands of babies in this country with crumbling, dying bodies and nobody to hold them or sing to them. (1 down, 999,999 to go. Just watch me.)

We spent our last day in Durban on the beach/in the ocean all day, it was amazing. The waves are really powerful and fun to play in. Yesterday we flew back to Cape Town to spend 3 final days with our families in Langa. It felt like going home again, which was a strange but nice feeling. My brother Thulani is the subject of a documentary show here called “Whats your story?” so I might be on South African TV in a few weeks! They filmed us eating lunch as a family, and Thulani and I looking at pictures together. He is in a band that plays traditional African music and does some dancing. We went to one of his shows last night which was tons of fun. All the guys are incredibly upbeat and talented. They play drums, marimbas, trombones, and a bunch of crazy percussion instruments. Today we had our farewell homestay party with our Langa families. We sang a Xhosa song acapella, and then a boy on my program taught us a folk/contra dance that we performed for everyone. It was pretty ridiculous. I’m going to miss living in Langa; now that I am finally comfortable and confident enough to walk around alone, we are leaving! I’ll also miss my mama’s cooking. Although I’m not complaining about going to Stellenbosch- we get to drink wine and eat cheese and study all day.

Tomorrow we are having a 4 hour identity seminar with this intense guy that we met a few weeks back during our Direct Action Center for Peace and Memory weekend. (As if we don’t do enough forced existential reflection as it is.) Oh well. I should probably get some sleep. I’ve posted pictures from the rural homestay week/my 21st celebration: http://sallysouthafrica.shutterfly.com

Love and Miss you all. Thanks for the birthday messages :-)