Through Luke and Charlotte's Eyes

This morning, Carolyn and I hurried off to Luke’s 5^thgrade class celebration, both a fitting acknowledgement of the students’ efforts throughout the year and a ceremonial send-off to next year’s middle school experience.  Standing beside a lavishly adorned breakfast table - from which I semi-discreetly plucked a handful of pastries, I looked up at one point to appreciate the raucous events on stage.  What I saw amazed and delighted me.  Dancing to Kool and the Gang’s “Celebration” - a perfect choice for the occasion - were roughly 50 11-year-olds, moving as one blissful wave of wiggling bodies and limbs.  Many hugged, others twirled, but all were clearly happy to be there.  Best of all, in spite of their glaring cultural differences, the palpable camaraderie that gushed from the stage evinced an incredibly unified group, one that transcended skin color and language barriers.  I suddenly realized the enormous impact this year has had on Luke and Charlotte; their world has blossomed, affording them a new perspective on life, so vast and diverse, that their outlook will never be the same.  Charlotte’s impromptu get-together a couple of months ago, at which she was the only white person out of a several 8^th graders, perfectly showcased this new reality.  And to think back to a few months earlier, when she actually confessed her “uncertainty” about African Americans back home, attributing such confusion to the fact that whites and blacks generally stay apart in school.  Here in SA the opposite is true.  In an environment where less than half the students are white, with roughly 2/3 originating from other countries, blending is non-negotiable.  On the stage this morning, South Africans, Chinese, Angolans, Germans, Japanese, Americans, Dutch, French, British, and dozens more embraced as though they had grown up together.  How liberating it must be to interact with so many people, from so many backgrounds, without implicit bias and prejudice inhibiting your thoughts.  Much of what my kids had previously believed about other cultures stemmed from movies and/or social media.  But this year was the perfect remedy for that, forcing Charlotte, Luke, Carolyn, and me to examine our beliefs and to adjust our perceptions according to the very real around us.  Though not without some trepidation at the start of our year, we all quickly grew to love our new, multifaceted world.  When Charlotte and Luke return to Milton, MA, they will bring with them a heightened awareness of what human means.  Ideally, they will engage rather than stand back, pose questions rather than assume they’re right, and seek common ground rather than dismiss anyone as too different.  In the end, we all seek the same things out of life, for ourselves and our families.  None of us is better than another, merely unique, perhaps, in the ways we ensure our own survival.  By acknowledging this truth, the notion that we are only mildly different on the outside, we open our minds to unlimited possibilities.  Better yet, we become agents of a much more inclusive, accepting world, where the tendency to love is far greater than the tendency to hate.  And as I see this newfound discovery unfold in my kids’ lives, I realize that coming to South Africa, 8,000 miles away, was the smartest decision we could have made.   

South Africa's Future

The South African presidential election took place yesterday amid acute tension and uprising.  Having lived here for ten months, I can now appreciate why South Africans have grown so angry, uncertain, and jaded over the last twenty years, particularly around politics.  Though Apartheid officially ended a quarter century ago, the corruption that followed has, to a large extent, economically (and psychologically) paralyzed this country.  Nelson Mandela, the mastermind behind the dismantling of Apartheid, needed and deserved so much more time - it’s that simple.  He possessed uncanny abilities to unite SA at its most volatile state.  To achieve this, he included everyone in the conversation - blacks, whites, coloreds - to ensure that no one exploited the process.  The ANC, African National Congress, of which he was the longstanding leader, unthinkably abandoned Mandela’s teachings and principles for quick money as soon as he stepped down.  The Zuma regime, SA’s last administration for almost a decade, systematically destroyed most of Mandela’s accomplishments.  Currently, that is the tragic reality of South Africa, the fact that those who succeeded Mandela focused on money-grabbing rather than healing the nation.  You can’t say enough about Mandela’s talents as a leader; his measured approach to life (including his almost 30-year incarceration), coupled with his forceful, uplifting political rhetoric, gave all of South Africa a common identity.  Rather than move steadily toward revenge, furthermore, Mandela eased conflict by promoting a new world mentality, one in which everyone pulled together.  What a simple, yet priceless, message.  And now SA, still shrouded in the smoke of Zuma’s corruption, must choose its next President.  Let’s hope that the frontrunner, Cyril Ramaphosa, in whom most South Africans hold considerable faith, can revive a crippled land.  If not, the future of this wonderful place and all that Mandela stood for could easily dissolve into even more unhappiness and chaos.  

Bulungula Education

This past week was one of the most valuable, fascinating, harrowing, sobering we’ve experienced so far.  To maximize school vacation, we flew 1000 miles east to East London, a quick hour-long flight, and explored the Wild Coast, stopping every 100 miles or so at a cheap hotel/ hostel.  To say that this area is rural is a perfect understatement; one can travel for miles and not pass another car or see another person.  The land, as with all of South Africa, is raw and sublime, with rolling hills and rugged coastline.  The beaches are unlike any I have encountered, sprawling for as far as the eyes can see, with twelve-foot waves that thunder and hiss into shore.  No wonder elite, bohemian surfers ultimately find their way there, adorned with flowing locks and full-body tattoos, to enjoy some of the best conditions around the world.  One nomadic, Australian, twenty-something surfer whom I met on our travels informed me that “these are spiritual waves without Cape Town’s fear of large predators.” Then, like a figment of my imagination, he bounced down the hill and hit the ocean for the second time that day.  I’ve never felt so old and uncool in my life.  Fortunately, there were many other activities around to preoccupy me.

One such distraction occurred a day later when we were invited to visit a preschool in Hole in the Wall village, funnily named for a giant cave in the side of its mountainous shore.  There, we met one of the best educators I have ever observed.  With over 30 tiny students, aged 1 – 4, Dawn Vergat ran her class to virtual perfection.  The way she enthused the kids, counting and singing, while keeping them in line was awesome.  Doing this all in a tiny rondeval (a round hut with a thatched roof) with scarce resources was even more amazing.  And the kids returned her energy, all smiling and laughing.  They also quickly gravitated toward us, many stroking Charlotte’s long hair and examining Luke’s arms like foreign relics.  Many of them stunted by malnutrition, they were half the size they should have been.  But that did not keep them from enjoying our visit, pulling us toward a pile of wooden blocks or jumping on our backs outside for a ride around the school.  In general, they were delightful, due in large part to the positive, fun environment that Dawn fostered.  As we left, we noticed that there was only one toilet outside, contained in an undersized tin shack with a shoe string for a lock.  When we asked Dawn about this, she said she had repeatedly asked the government for help over the past two years, but no reply.  We promised to help out with fundraising. After high-fiving all the little ones, we reluctantly departed.

The next day, we drove roughly 50 km to Bulungula, an even more rural village with about 300 thatched huts and a few small schools, one of them established in January called Bulungala College, or BC (college = high school).  Funded entirely by a social impact organization with which we connected a couple of months ago, BC opened with 80 students and 3 full-time teachers.  To put it mildly, this school is a crisis-management work in progress, trying desperately to provide rudimentary education to as many underprivileged teens as possible.  Making matters even more precarious, the students have to walk to get there, some for miles, as cars are virtually non-existent throughout the community.  What’s more, from what we were told, the majority of the fathers in the area flock to cities to find employment, leaving mothers and grandmothers responsible for raising the kids.  This paternal absence clearly weighs heavily on everyone, especially young boys who lose essential role modeling.  When I arrived to help teach, I was immediately struck by the immensity of these challenges.  In fact, when I introduced myself as a teacher from America and asked who had heard of my country, only one young woman raised her hand.  That stunned me.  For most of the classes with which I worked, I decided to talk mostly about culture, mine and theirs.  In the end, I learned so much about the many names that Xhosa youth are given - some up to six in the first several years of life, the longstanding circumcision ritual that all young men must endure at sixteen, and the fact that the entire community still revolves around a chief who governs the community.  I, in turn, answered many questions regarding America’s teenage experience, what government looked like, and what students did once they graduated from high school.  Again, to express my thanks, I spent the last few minutes of each class encouraging students to visit other places, even nearby villages, to gain a clearer view of who they were and where possibilities might exist.  They seemed genuinely appreciative, many initiating high fives with me on their way to the next class.

These were just two of many eye-popping experiences.  Throughout the Wild Coast, most roads are endless stretches of dirt and mud, with thousands of animals – goats, sheep, cattle, and horses – roaming the hillsides and fields.  Dodging their droppings is no joke, like a constant obstacle course that keeps distant visitors on their toes.  For the locals, it’s just part of the territory, a mild inconvenience in a brutal world where survival is far more pressing.  But no matter how hard life appeared to us, the families did just that, survive.  In fact, as I had heard from many before arriving, the kids, though occasionally hungry and/ or cold, are happy, frequently playing in puddles or trying to catch piglets with their bare hands.  Yet another reminder that life is very different for people, and that my list of expectations clearly doesn’t apply to them.  On our way back to the airport in our decadent Nissan 4 x 4, as we struggled through several pools of deep mud from a night of torrential rain, both Carolyn and I realized the value of this trip: Our kids are so much more cognizant of the world, sensitive to human struggles they did not know existed last year, but equally aware that such people don’t want or need our pity.  The best we can do is remain aware of the world beyond ourselves and resistant to taking simple things like fresh water and medicine for granted.  As the incomparable Cheryl Crowe points out in one of her many great tunes, “it’s not wanting what you don’t have; it’s wanting what you’ve got.” 

             

Survival...

There’s lots to share about my world in the South African classroom, but for this week’s blog, I’d like to shake things up. This past Sunday, Carolyn and I rode in the 41^st Cape Town Cycle Tour, the largest organized cycling race in the world. The crazy thing is, I didn’t officially register until just over a month ago, by which point I was dangerously behind in my training. And though I’ve ridden in a small number of bike races before – a 20 to 30 miler here and there, I have never even considered stepping up to something like this.  The Cape Town Cycle Tour, a.k.a Argus, is an absolute beast of misery, covering 66 miles of hilly terrain while frequently dispensing 50 km winds along the way.  Even the best riders – I was fortunate enough to meet a few of them while “training” – spoke stoically about survival.  One guy, who placed in the top 100 finishers last year, pointed out that, by the end, he had “lost a piece” of himself.  In fact, I realized I was in deep trouble when, in parting, this obviously superior athlete offered a final piece of advice: “whatever you do, don’t play the superhero.  You’ll burn.”  And with that sobering revelation, I spent the last week before the race sleeping restlessly and digesting my own hubris.  How was I going to live through this ostensible death trap?  If people who virtually ride for a living were saying things like this, what the *** were Carolyn and I thinking?  In any event, it was too late; my deposit was already in the bank and I had no physical injury to use as an alibi. So as Carolyn - who wisely trained before me – and I took our place at the start with another good friend, my mind played cruel tricks on me, conjuring images of crashing on a steep hill or careening off a precipitous cliff.  Luckily, before I could actually hyperventilate, the gun fired and thousands of bikers (36,000 in total) were on their way.  Five torturous hours later, presumably due to the grace of some higher power, I crossed the finish line, a mental shadow of my former self. What I had hoped to be common hyperbole associated with any great task proved dismally true; the wind at the start of the race, as we made our way from the city center to the shoreline, was overpowering, at times almost holding riders in place.  This meant that the first 30 miles were devoted to making whatever progress we could, mile by slow mile.  Hearkening back to my new cycling friend’s urging, however, I did not push it and managed to conserve strength for the second, far hillier half.  And when I say hill, I mean mountain.  Three of the five are a mile long, winding relentlessly upwards.  By the time I had surmounted the last of the bunch, my legs were licorice, more numbed than pained.  On the flip side of that last interminable hill, though, was a gift from the gods, a steady, rolling descent back into the city, with a massive, celebratory crowd of spectators to boot.  Crossing the finish line with We are the Champion lyrics blaring in the background, I was as exhausted as I’ve ever been. Around me, hundreds of other cyclists hunched over their bikes, dazed though relieved, one woman saying to another that she will never subject herself to such torture again.  For me, three days later, The Cape Town Cycle Tour was an oddly ideal way to love this part of the world even more.  Though I too lost a piece of myself in the process, namely 5 lbs. of sweat, the rigor of the route did not prevent me from basking in the unimaginable beauty that is Cape Town’s coastline.  Nearly 2/3 of the race looks directly down upon the ocean, vast and hypnotically turquoise.  Craggy cliffs, sprawling fields, and horse pastures bless every single mile.  Equally wonderful, I met some of the coolest people along the journey - a Brit, an Australian, a Finn, all happy to share a story about themselves to help alleviate the pain that gnawed on all of us.  I guess that’s as fitting a takeaway as any from this genuinely spiritual experience: no matter how tough it was to accomplish, I survived because of nature’s invigorating splendor and the wonderful support of strangers from around the globe.

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