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| Coming into CapeTown, with a view of the World Cup stadium and Devil's Peak |
I have been troubled by what I have been exposed to in the last month... realities about globalization unfolding in technicolor and causing me to wring my hands and nash my teeth ---multinationals literally running the world with no constraints; capitalism and greed - the new religion; racial and gender inequality; the growing distance between enormous wealth and abject poverty; the absence of available heath care for most people; and the fact we are on a threshold with no turnaround regarding environmental sustainability. My new awareness has been really borne out of the harsh realities in Morocco and Ghana and now here in South Africa.
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| Street Art in the Townships |
As often is the case, what you see very suddenly and clearly away from home brings a new reality into sharp focus for the very same problems on your doorstep.
The interesting thing in Morocco, Ghana and now here, especially, in the Townships in Cape Town is that among the everyday people there is a sensitivity, intelligence and, yes, some fatalism about the whole picture: the real and the nasty, the good and the bad, the hope and the despair. They are dealing with these issues frontally -- out in the open-- as hard as it is to witness. This is courageous and it's hopeful.
Luckily Black Africa has been nurtured by some great leaders- peacemakers and good men. Gandhi stayed in South Africa preparing himself for his work for freedom in India. Kwame Nkrumah was a peacemaker and freedom fighter for Ghana’s independence. Nelson Mandela was elected South Africa’s first president and led the country with his ANC party out of apartheid. But these men are mostly memory today and what they began has a long way to go before final realization of the dream. Nevertheless, the memory of their fight for social justice and human rights --freedom for Africa-- is tight in the guts of these people, an enduring and inspiring legacy.
The interesting thing in Morocco, Ghana and now here, especially, in the Townships in Cape Town is that among the everyday people there is a sensitivity, intelligence and, yes, some fatalism about the whole picture: the real and the nasty, the good and the bad, the hope and the despair. They are dealing with these issues frontally -- out in the open-- as hard as it is to witness. This is courageous and it's hopeful.
Luckily Black Africa has been nurtured by some great leaders- peacemakers and good men. Gandhi stayed in South Africa preparing himself for his work for freedom in India. Kwame Nkrumah was a peacemaker and freedom fighter for Ghana’s independence. Nelson Mandela was elected South Africa’s first president and led the country with his ANC party out of apartheid. But these men are mostly memory today and what they began has a long way to go before final realization of the dream. Nevertheless, the memory of their fight for social justice and human rights --freedom for Africa-- is tight in the guts of these people, an enduring and inspiring legacy.
For Africa, America and the world, this is a hard time. Cape Town has about 40% unemployment among its Black and Colored population and many are living in the Townships---still segregated and still living in abject poverty with an annual income of under approx $1000. Today only 7% of the South African population pay taxes and 80% of the population is black.
The economic dominance of the white minority is staggering and problematic. And I do not believe the gulf between the whites and the blacks in Cape Town can be justified by thinking the blacks still live a third world life with all their relatives living under the same roof together and eating from the same pot of food....as one white Cape Towner explained and saying: "they just don’t need higher annual incomes with their third world way of living.” But the truth remains that the white population pays the taxes that help to support those living in the Townships and has done so for the last 17 years. With the economy in recession, people are frustrated.
The greed of colonialism, the rape of resources, the slave trade, apartheid, abject poverty, pestilence of aids, terrorizing corruption, never knowing personal or political freedom and not having the chance to protect the richness and beauty of the earth because survival is first -- this is what we’ve been witnessing in the lives and stories of black people in Sub - Saharan Africa.
Cape Town’s Townships are the special suburbs created just for the blacks and coloreds by the apartheid laws. Some are 15 miles from the downtown and the industry where their displaced residents might have been working at a job. Their subsistence structures are made of steel or concrete and freely supplied by the government as these people were displaced, are isolated and still are segregated.
Reference the 6th District in Cape Town to learn more about the displacement.
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| A store in The Township |
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| Housing in theTownships |
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| Hopeful in theTownship |
Last night we were invited to hear jazz in the Township homes of a few of Cape Town’s top black musicians. It was an unforgettable experience.
These wonderful black musicians hosted a few of us in their simple huts. All night they sang and played instruments, some of their own making. I will tell you about the beauty and musicality of these gorgeous instruments another time, but the resilience, creativity and incredible beauty and soul of the music that flowed out of these men and women was beyond inspiration. In the simplest of structures---with the simplest drums and handmade wooden bows and flutes these men and women made us move and clap and sway with rhythm and joy. Bobby Macfarran would have died and gone to heaven listening to this fabulous improvisational jazz and tribal song.
We are going to the Khayelitsha Township tomorrow and then to the Cape of Good Hope. The weather has been glorious. I will report more after Bishop Desmond Tutu’s visit.
No problem drinking the water and having salads, this is a very beautiful, clean city.
I understand why the Dutch never wanted to go home.
No problem drinking the water and having salads, this is a very beautiful, clean city.
I understand why the Dutch never wanted to go home.
