“Divided Appropriately”

At first I thought that I would not be able to concentrate in a class on a campus as beautiful as UCT, but the lecture I attended this morning was exceptional. It was given by Zwelethu Jolobe, an instructor in Comparative Politics at the University. He gave us an overview of apartheid (or what he called the act of being “divided appropriately”) in a two hour time block. As you can imagine, compacting years and years of a complicated topic in that short of a time frame was intense to listen to. However, it was fascinating to hear the history of apartheid from a South African who is well educated on the politics of many other nations including the United States and Russia. I also enjoyed the conversation that ensued from the question and answer session at the end of the lecture. Listening to Zwelethu and his friend’s comments regarding American politics put into perspective how non-Americans think America’s problems can be solved soon. It sparked particular interest with me regarding Steven (Zwelethu’s friend) comment on issues important in our upcoming election. He wanted to know how Americans can care more about whether or not gays and lesbians should have the right to get married versus people being able to have such easy access to guns and bullets with intentions of using them to shoot children in schools. I suppose he wondered why because in South Africa, people don’t really care if you are gay or straight; any type of couple can get married. It’s an interesting thought to ponder.

Today’s lecture helped me to rediscover something about myself that I had forgotten for a long time—I absolutely love to learn! (My mom always said that if I could earn a living as a student, I would be a wealthy woman). I couldn’t help but become immersed in the lecturer’s words. During school at home, I almost always feel overwhelmed with the things I do on a daily basis. Trying to balance 15 credits of class time, time for homework, being involved in student organizations and Greek life, having a social life, working, and time for myself is no easy task. Don’t get me wrong; I am in love with my life at the U of M and wouldn’t trade it. But today’s lecture opened my eyes to how I treat my academic life at home. Usually, because I have so much reading and homework associated with my course load, I don’t really take in the information that I am reading. It’s more of a “cram the information into my head a few days before the test” so I can get a good grade. To those who know me, I am unbelievably grade-oriented. And the next day, the information is gone. Today, for one of the first times since grade school I remembered what it felt like to learn something for the simple sake of… learning. Honestly, I know that I don’t remember everything Zwelethu said; I never expected to do so. However, I do remember how enveloped I became in his passion for the topic of apartheid and how his passion made me want to pay attention. And I remember that I felt empowered to learn and soak up as much as possible while I am here because I have been blessed with an amazing opportunity to simply just observe and LEARN. I can truly say I was inspired today. [Okay, so I realize that I may have been repetitive. But hey, it was a big revelation. Welcome to my way of processing my surroundings. I’m sure that you will come to love it.]

Before departing to our second destination of the day, we stopped for lunch at what seemed like a student union. It reminded me of Coffman at the UMTC in that there were different restaurants with distinct cuisines. I was happy to see that the “African Cuisine” place had chicken curry and rice, which I devoured enthusiastically; it helped to cure some of my “homesickness.” We then went to the District 6 museum. The museum is dedicated to preserving the history of people who were displaced from this area under the Group Areas Act of 1950. In a nut shell, the prime location of District 6 was declared “white” and therefore, the community of mixed races was forced to leave. The area before everyone was forced to leave was filled with a great sense of community and respect; people of all different races and faiths coexisted harmoniously. The pictures in my blog today are from here. I can’t imagine what it would have been like to be forced to leave my home because of my race. Yet, even though the pictures and artifacts depicted sadness and pain, some also reflected happiness and hope for their community and the future. The first thing I noticed was the poem at the top of my post today; what powerful words. It takes great leadership to still have hope even in the most difficult situations. How do people keep hope for the future in times of darkness? My simple answer is: if people didn’t, where would their strength to live come from? This is something I hope to learn more about next week in the township of Gugulethu.

I would just like to say that I love reading the comments on my blog... thank you! It’s so comforting to know that people at home are following my adventure here in Cape Town; your words of encouragement inspire me to learn as much as possible so I can share it with you. Knowledge is power. Today, I rediscovered my passion for learning. My guess is that a lot of people are in my boat, just too busy to take time out of their busy schedule to just learn something new. Can you imagine a world if more people learned because they wanted to? Maybe I am becoming an optimist…. but I think that it might just be a better place.