South Africa/ United States Compared

WARNING: THIS ENTRY IS A BIT POLITICAL.

 We arrived safely this morning and after a delightful lunch of impala burger and wandering around, we arrIved at the Apartheid Museum.  

As you might imagine, it was powerful and though provoking and all of those other things that you expect in a museum dedicated to man’s inhumanity to man.  I was inspired by the exhibit on Nelson Mandela, having read his autobiography.  I was interested in other important leaders and their impact on the struggle.  But there were two unexpected parallels that have gotten me thinking.  When apartheid was introduced in 1948, it was through a party that didn’t get a majority of votes and was mostly rural.  One of it’s stated goals were to keep the undesirable criminal element far away from the “good citizenry”. Another was to ensure the white citenzry got enough jobs.  Starting to sound familiar, yet?  Trump fits the bill in all of these categories and listening to some of the rhetoric from the supporters of the system of apartheid sounds like some of the things I hear at Trump rallies.  I’m not saying that we are headed for apartheid, but the parallels, such as income equality and exploitation of the working class, run deep.  

A second parallel that I found just as jarring were the parallels between apartheid and the Jim Crow/ pre-Civil Rights Era.  The purveyors of both types of racism chose to make the other side less human and inferior.  The blacks in America and Blacks/coloreds in South Africa “need”the guidance and help of white people and “enjoy” the protection they are getting.  Right.....

But the question I am pondering is if we really finished the process with our Civil Rights movement.  The South Africans had to go through the Truth and Reconciliation process with all of its struggles and the United States just passed laws and never forced people to confront and admit to what they did.  With the recent resurgence of racism and nationalism, I wonder if we skipped an important step. Did we just force it underground and make it fester and grow?  Do we need to go back and try again?  

We live in strange times.  Is South Africa providing a blueprint for how to get our country back on track?

I Second That Emotion

Sunday morning we got lost in Stellenbosch, had a wine tasting, learned that early humans actually came not from the middle of Africa, but instead from Southern Africa, down by the Cape and discovered a new health drink.  It was a busy morning.

The afternoon I spent at the Museum of Modern African Art and I’m still processing what I saw and experienced.  

The museum was throbbing with emotion.  Every piece was designed to not only make you think, but to pull hard at the emotions.  It didn’t matter if it was laughter ( silly drawing faces) or tears ( a reimagining of the Pieta) or confusion.  It was all right there on the surface.  One of the things that I will take with me from this trip is the overwhelming connection to their emotions that we have seen in the people we have visited with.

Probably the most powerful exhibit for me was a set of six movies that used found home movies along with news footage to tell a story .  The story wasn’t told by a narrator, per se, but there were words on a screen to read.  There were tragedies and humor and daily life, but there was something powerful about having to read the words and here them in your own head. You became part of the story.  I’m still pondering how it  feels to be in someone else’s story.

Monday we say goodbye to  CapeTown and move on to Johannesburg.  New adventures await!

District Six Could Be Our Future

When I first heard about the District 6 museum, I thought it sounded like some dystopian novel, where war had broken out and entire communities had been destroyed by the winning army.  Well, I was right about entire communities, anyway

District 6 was located in the heart of CapeTown. Beginning in 1963, they began forcing out residents so they could give the lands to white people who wanted them.  Entire neighborhoods of people were tossed out of the only homes they had ever known and were moved far away into new homes that were nowhere near friends, family or work.  They were given enough time to pack a suitcase in some cases.  Since these were the poor non-whites, nobody really considered their needs or the impact it would have on a thriving community.

Such a thing would never happen in the US, right?  But it is happening in our own country, with the, prices of living in cities such as San Francisco and New York are cost prohibitive for the working poor.  Gentrification can be great, but what about the people it dispossess?  Switch the cuts in housing support for our own poor, many live in substandard housing and are just a housing court ruling of unlivable from being thrown out.

Everyone deserves to feel as safe as I do in my home, surrounded by a community like the Prairie Lane and Westside Community that cares for each other.  I shouldn’t be one of a lucky few.

Go Tell It On The Mountain

I apologize for it getting these posts up in a timely manner.  Internet is limited and spotty in our hotels.  Also, it limits my uploading photos.  I will likely have to add them back at home.

Saturday we climbed up to the top of Table Mountain.  Okay, not really, we didn’t climb but instead took cable cars with rotating floors.  As the cable car climbed up the mountain, it revolved so you could see the entire view from the car.

Once there, we took the requisite pictures and went on a tour where we found out that Cape Town has a unique biodiversity.  It is actually World Heritage site because, of the 2,285 species of plants in the area, more than 1500 occur in the 57 square kilometers of Table Mountain and the Back Table.

A few of my traveling companions and I went for a hike around the flat mountain top.  The path was rocky and uneven and at times we were unsure of where the trails even were.  It was a challenge, but one we were definitely up for.  The best part of the walk was the discussions we had about the struggles of teaching, of trying to be new and creative in this atmosphere of standards and standardized tests.  It seems that there is no time for the whimsical offshoots of teaching that make the classroom rewarding for kids.  One of my colleagues shared that years ago, she had read  Charlie and the Chocolate factory with her students and other had begged to recreate it in her room.  They researched and organized and planned for the whole event over the next two days and the room turned out beautifully.  Did it match a standard or indicator?  No.  Was it on the curriculum map? No.  But did it give ownership over the classroom to the kids and allow them to be creative?  Yes.  That experience even may be more valuable foR the children than another three math lessons but we don’t take time anymore for students to follow passions and bird walk into l earning something that can’t be measured on a standardIzed test.  The social learning is just as important.

We didn’t solve the world’s teaching problems on our adventure, but it was good to talk about it with people who are as passionate about teaching as I am.  And just as the cable car took us down the mountain, giving us a360* view on the way down ( the car has a floor that rotates), I realized that what I valued most about this adventure was getting that new perspective.  A long way to go but glad I got there.

The alarm sounds

And the alarm is...

We got to bed at approximately 12:30 only to be awoken by a robotic male voice announcing that the alarm had been set off and that they were investigating.  What alarm?  What should we do. Only minutes later, the same robotic voice came back to tell us “The alarm is” and then cut itself off.  We never did learn what the alarm was about.

But it did get me thinking about the alarms that schools use when kids start going off the rails.  We visited a school where many of the kids come from violence.  Our tour guide told us that he has a car pick him up in the morning because the bus won’t enter his neighborhood.  A majority of the students reported either witnessing gun violence or being impacted by it.  Yet, they have 99% off their students pass the state exit exams for high schools and 88% go on to college.  The principal talked about the discussions they have had.  Do we pull the stragglers into the lifeboat or do we try and sAve the entire ship? How do we manage limited resources ( these kids had desks that still had slots for inkwells in them). It’s a struggle, but they manage to pay the teachers.  The principal actually teaches more than half the day and the kids have a council that resolves problems and discipline (did I mention they all stand when a teacher enters?). This school, despite its financial troubles, focuses on finding kids a safe place, an oasis in the chaos of their lives and fills it with order and love-  oh, and the fine arts.  Lots of fine arts.

After a delicious lunch at the Harbor House where we whale watched and watched sea otter, we headed for a fine arts school, where we were treated to some incredible performances and eventually became part of the music ourselves, learning to dance and drum with abandon.  It was almost miraculous.  These kids, who also struggled, found joy in the music of life.  The outside world was a million miles away.  It was just the beat and the bodies and a communal soul supporting everyone.

So, what do we do when the alarm sounds for kids?  Maybe a little less talking and a lot more dancing, singing and drawing.  With caring staff, it is working wonders for these kids.....

And so it begins again....

Tomorrow I begin another travel adventure.....

NEA Global Fellows are heading to South Africa on the 100th Anniversary of Nelson Mandela's birthday!  (Too bad we are a bit late to hear Barack Obama speak, but I guess we can't have it all!)

I've revved this blog back up so those who want to follow along can do so.

I'm excited to begin a new chapter in my global adventures.

Karma sometimes works in your favor....

For those of you who wondered, yes, I did finally make it home late Sunday night.  I'm writing this on Wednesday because I have been busy getting reacquainted with my family and try to pick up the pieces of life from while I was gone.

Getting home was a bit of an adventure.  When I got to the airport on Sunday morning, after a very short night, there was a problem.  I had a ticket from Tbilisi to Munich, but it was unclear if I was going to get home from there.  After twenty minutes of working with the folks in Tbilisi, they told me I would have to work it out with the United folks in Munich and sent me on my way to the plane.

Although we were all a bit nervous, the plane trip went fine.  My experience in Munich was less pleasant, involving several ticketing agents, phone calls, security lines and even a tear or two on my part, a combination of being exceptionally tired and worried about finally getting home.  I finally had an aisle seat for the long trip home and began the long wait until our plane would depart.  Amanda, Brian, Josh and I were a bit giddy at this point and when we found out the Kindereggs we were going to bring home would bring massive fines akin to bringing crack into the USA, we began gleefully opening them up and finding the toys inside and handing them out to the children gathered at the gate.

Finally, my boarding group was announced.  I got into line and began comparing notes with another young woman who was also traveling home from a medical conference to Nebraska.  We compared tickets and noted we both had the same seat.  I was SURE that a mistake had been made and that I was going to be stuck in Munich as my friends departed.  Near tears, I got to the front of the line and presented my ticket, pointing out to the ticket agent that we had the same seat.  No problem, she said, I had been upgraded, along with Brian and Josh, to BUSINESS CLASS.  (Amanda, in some horrible twist of fate, was still stuck in Economy).

If you have never had the joy of intercontinental travel in business class, you are in for a treat.  I have never been treated so well in my life.  Plenty of room to stretch out, constant food and drink (all for free), large personal movie/tv screen and even extra room and toiletries in the restroom.  It was heaven in the skies, possibly the best flight I have ever been on (and I don't particularly like to fly).  My friend Deb had told me about the wonderfulness of business class, but she didn't do it justice.  I had real silverware and an actual menu of choices for my food.  Hot towels to begin and end the flight and a little bag of toiletries that I could use to make my flight more comfortable.  Flight attendants were at my beck and call at any given moment and I was treated like royalty.  I'm not sure I  can ever fly coach again.

When we landed in Chicago, we spent quite a bit of time in line at customs/immigration, but breezed through customs with no problems.  When I went through security to get to my flight to Omaha, I even got into the express line that didn't require removing my computer or shoes.  Finally, after all of the stress it took to get to the US, everything was working in my favor.  Karma, which earlier that day, seemed to be trying to get some retribution, was on my side.

Karma, however, can also be a fickle friend.  My flight to Omaha was delayed several times and finally had to move gates.  I got home much later than I had intended, but I did get home.  Safe, sound, and with my family ready to greet me.

It is weird to be back home. I sometimes wake in the middle of the night and I have to take a minute to figure out where I am.  I want to be up in the middle of the night and nap in the afternoon.  We didn't sleep much between Friday morning and Sunday night and I'm suffering from sleep deprivation, but I am so glad to be home, refereeing the children's disagreements and seeing that the dishwasher is finally fixed and the shed installed.

Home is a good place to be!