Musings of the Week

This entry contains many short and sweet stories about the happenings of the past week and a half of my time here in South Africa. It has been very busy and the time has flown by! Here is what I have been up to:

Reading Area @ Pendla

"Before" 

"After" 

There is a library at Pendla Primary School that was created by the 1999 CSB/SJU group that spent their semester abroad in South Africa. It is a great library; however it never gets used. The principal of the school is protective of the precious books and thinks that the kids will destroy the books if they get their hands on them. This breaks our hearts since we can only imagine how much time, effort, and money went into creating the library. Also, the school nor the learners can afford to buy books “just for fun” and the library would be the one area where kids can read for fun. We came up with the idea of creating a reading area in the front of the library where kids can bring books out and sit and read them. It could also serve as a teaching area for teachers to bring their classes out to on a nice day. We worked a few weeks transforming a muddy area into a new reading area. We leveled the ground, took out rocks, pieces of cement, and weeds in this area. We took benches that were sitting on the top of the library that had the tables broken off of them, which were not useful in the classroom, and gave them a new coat of paint and stain to resist the weather. We dug holes, put up a fence, put in the benches, and laid gravel in this area. We did all of this work in a few days when the learners and teachers were on break. When they came back after break, they were very excited to see this new reading area! And since then, we have had the library open at recess and we are trying to teach the kids how to treat the library and books respectfully. And in order to make the project sustainable, we are working with the teachers to set up a schedule where teachers can bring their classes to the library once a week and let the kids get reading time for a few minutes. Hopefully it can be used year-round and not just when the next batch of Bennies and Johnnies show up. It has been such a rewarding experience and we hope the novelty doesn’t wear off!

Dudley Tito

We took a field trip in music class to visit the home of a famous South African Jazz musician, Dudley Tito. He lives in the township and practices in a “shed” in his backyard with his band. We heard many South African songs, particularly jazz. He is obviously a popular guy because the whole neighborhood showed up to watch them practice while we were there. I spent part of the time dancing with the kids that showed up. It was great to learn about Dudley in class and then see him perform at his own house in the township. It was a fun afternoon!

Bio Prac on Rocky Shores

Last week in Biology we had a practical that required us to get out in the environment. We went to a rocky shore area and counted the number of species of organisms living the 5 different areas of the rocky shore coastline. We spent part of the time in the water looking at sea stars, anemones, and urchins. We also played with snails and mussels and many different kinds of algae. It was awesome to have the ocean as our classroom for the day!

Grahamstown

Our Drum and Dance Instructor

Our group took a trip to Grahamstown and Peddie. In Grahamstown we had a lecture on the history of African music. I got to blow into a kudu horn and then was chosen to play the drum on a song that the teacher was trying to teach us on the spot. I failed. It was rather embarrassing. We continued onto Peddie where we had a traditional African meal of chicken, potatoes, pumpkin, pap, and pot bread. With our stomach full, we had an African drumming lesson lead by a man in traditional Zulu wear. We also learned a new song that we sang while drumming. I fared much better at the all group drumming rather than the drumming where I had a complicated part accompanying a xylophone. After the drumming, our teacher taught us how to Zulu warrior dance. It was a lot of laughs and I learned a lot! We finished off the day by watching an incredible sunset.

Iron Man

The Iron Man was an adventure and a half! I signed up to volunteer at showed up at 6am prepared to do whatever they needed me to do since I had not been given any other instruction. I met two new best friends right away and spent my whole day with them. They both study at my school and are from South Africa. They were great! We spent the first 6 hours wandering around and watching the race. We were on the Reserve team so as long as we checked in every hour, we were free to do whatever we wanted. We wandered around and started collecting our free things such as noisemakers. We even rode a mechanical bull. Since we all rode for longer than 10 seconds, we were given free scarves. And we needed them! It was a very, very windy and cold day!

We were finally called into work and I was placed in the transition area from biking to running. I basically had contact with every single athlete. It was great. It was my job to make sure that the athletes had the correct bag (the run bag, not the bike bag) as they switched shoes and whatever else before they began the run. I also had to make sure they grabbed the right numbered bag. Since they are in such a daze, I also had to make sure that the females went into the female tent and the males into the male tent. I also congratulated every single person as they went past to their respective changing areas. There were many characters. There was a blind man, a man with one leg, and a man who pushed/pulled his son the entire race. There was a world famous surgeon, half of the Springbok South African national rugby team, and many South Africa actors. It’s exciting to think about all of the brushes with fame I had that day.

After the bike cut-off time, we put all of the bags back on the racks in the pouring rain. I then went to watch some of the runners cross the finish line. It was very exciting! I apologize for not taking any pictures. Since I had no idea where I would be, what I would be doing, or what the unpredictable weather would do, I left my camera at home. (And thank goodness I did because it rained on and off all day!) It was a very, very long day, but one of my most favorite days here is South Africa so far!

Teaching Gym @ Pendla

After being exhausted from the Iron Man, I woke early and went to Pendla. I arrived and was asked to teach a gym class. I was not expecting that whatsoever. I couldn’t say no and ending up playing with the kids as they jumped rope and played soccer. I also attempted to teach some of the kids how to juggle even though I have no idea how to juggle. Yeah, that good. I also taught some kids how to play jacks. It was more of an activity class per say rather than a gym class. So I keep saying that I taught these kids how to do all of these things, however I am not very good at any of them. Africa has definitely made me realize how many skills I have, however at the same time, it also has made me realize how many skills I lack. Time to go practice my juggling skills now…

A New Perspective on Pendla

The Courtyard at Pendla

Now I know that I have spoken many, many words of praise about Pendla Primary, however I have only sugar coated everything that I have seen. Like most African schools, there is no one giant building that contains all of the classrooms; instead there are 4 cement buildings that form a square with a courtyard in the middle.  Each of these buildings consists of multiple classrooms. All of the doors to the classrooms open to the courtyard so the classrooms are exposed first-hand to the weather. There is not heat nor AC and the kids must wear uniforms year-round so they are hot in the summer and cold in the winter. Most of the uniforms are hand me downs and the kids wear them until the last stitch rips out. Most of the skirts are too short for the girls and many of the boys have tears in every article of clothing they have on.

The kids are packed into classrooms and there are usually not enough chairs for every learner. In that case, the kids run from classroom to classroom looking for a spare. None of the chairs match. Some are orange, some are blue, some are wooden, some are metal, some are plastic, there really in no one type. Some of the chair seats are not attached to the legs and I have seen many students slip out of their chairs for this reason. Also, most of the chairs have cracks in the backs or the back has completely broken off leaving a ragged edge on the chair making it easy for learners to cut themselves. The desks are rock back and forth because not all of the legs are the same height and all are scratched from the many, many years of usage.

When a teacher does not show up for class, which is quite often, the learners from that class are shuffled into the next classroom and the teacher must teach 2 classes as half of the kids sit on the floor. There are no substitute teachers. And when a teacher retires (which has happened this past week, with 2 more retiring before we leave) that teacher is not automatically replaced. All of the other teachers must pick up those extra classes or hop between multiple classrooms to teach the extra classes (I witnessed my teacher doing this today). There didn’t seem to be much discipline in the classroom until I realized that most of the talking spurred from sharing a single pencil stub between 4 different learners, in multiple cases. The learners share pencils, pens, sharpeners, rulers. They have one set of color pencils for the whole class. Their books are in very poor shape. Nothing is the same as what I grew up with.

Yesterday we had the opportunity to tour a couple of the homes where Pendla students live. Before I get ahead of myself, let me first say that Pendla Primary School is situated in a fairly nice part of town (I use the term “very nice” loosely, my perceptions have definitely changed since coming here). And we all assumed that the houses surrounding the school are the houses our students live in. We were sadly mistaken. Just a couple of blocks away is a large area of shacks that have been built on top of a trash heap. The majority of our students (Pendla total is about 450 learners) live in these shacks.  The shacks literally consist of 4 pieces of metal thrown together for walls and one on top that acts as the roof. The house that we saw had 3 rooms which housed 7 people. There is no kitchen and no electricity so they cook outside on a fire in a single metal coffee pot. There is no running water. They must walk a long way to the single tap that provides water to the whole area and then must drag that bucket full of water back to their house. The toilets work on a “bucket system.” There is a bucket located in the corner of the yard. If you are lucky, it has walls around it. This bucket is emptied once a week, no more, no less. If one family does not have a bucket, then they share with their neighbors. It rained about a week before we toured. Water was still sitting in the roads and yards. And like I mentioned, the whole place is situated on a trash heap, so the stench was unbearable.

In the first few days of volunteering at Pendla, I was amazed at how much learners shared their food with one another. They literally would pick food straight out of another kid’s lunch and eat it immediately. I was so surprised because it was a crime in my elementary school to share food with one another. However, I found out that many of the kids attending Pendla do not have money for food. Therefore, the teachers encourage students to share whatever they have with one another so that no one goes hungry. The school used to be funded by the government for lunches, however the government suspended their funding because they did not think Pendla had the “need” that other places did. The government assesses the need of the school based on the statistics of the students such as poverty. Since Pendla has not had the time or resources to put together a thorough report, their funding is still cut and most of the students go without food.

One of the houses that we toured was actually the house of a Pendla student who had drowned a week prior. His mother was kind enough to still let us into her home, yet you could see how much she was hurting. Like I mentioned with the rain, a mini lake had pooled in middle of the area. This little boy and his friend thought it would be a good idea to swim, but neither one knew how to swim and drowned in the “lake.” The family was devastated. And to make matters worse, that little boy was the only income into the household. His mother was unemployed and his two sisters in secondary school are too old to have grants provided for them from the government. The family was given a grant for R280 (approximately US $40) a month to support this entire family. With the loss of their son, this money was also lost. There is now zero income for the family. And one of the sad possibilities is that these two young girls may have to turn toward prostitution in order to bring money into the home (a commone occurrence in the township). And of course this doesn’t help the ever-present AIDS/HIV epidemic here in Africa. It is a vicious never-ending cycle.

Cape Town

These past 10 days have been full of fun and adventure! The amount of activities that we did were incredible so I will break things down day by day. Enjoy!

Day 1

Face Fear

The start of our journey. Our group of 30, plus a few family and friends, headed out early in the morning for the beginning of our trip! We piled into two short buses that came to be our home away from home for the next week. Our first stop along the away: World’s Highest Bungy Jump! I have been telling myself since the time that I was accepted into the South Africa program that I was going to complete this daunting task. It was a South Africa “Must-Do.” Surprisingly I stepped off the bus and could not have been more excited to leap off a bridge. That feeling soon left after I sat down and had my feet attached to the one rope that my life would be hanging on, literally. Filled with pure terror they helped carry me to the edge of the bridge. I made the awful mistake of looking down. As they counted down my jump I started to tell them “No, I do not want to jump off a bridge today,” but they did not listen and pushed me off. It was the scariest couple of minutes of my life. Not only was the initial 216 meter drop the largest in the world, the second bounce was the second highest bungy jump in the world. I tried to keep my eyes open as much as possible but I think it is safe to say that my eyes were glued shut the first ¾ of the initial jump. I have pictures that will soon be posted on facebook as well as a DVD documenting this “fun” experience. I’m glad to say that I survived, as well as the rest of my group, and I will definitely say that it was worth the experience, but man oh man, I do not think I will ever do that again.

Feeding the Ostriches

We continued our trip along the Garden Route and stopped at many beautiful outlooks along the way. We saw everything from beaches to the mountains and it literally felt like I was walking through a calendar with all of the pretty views that we had! Our next stop was at an ostrich farm. There I learned many interesting facts about ostriches including: ostriches only have two toes, those two toes can rip open in your chest cavity in one scratch, one ostrich egg is the equivalent of 24 chicken eggs, ostrich brains are smaller than their eyeball, you can punch an ostrich in the chest and it won’t feel a thing (I witnessed this from our guide), as well as many other ostrich facts. We watched an ostrich give hugs, massages, kisses, and rides to many of the people in our group. I may or may not have “fallen behind” the group to feed the ostriches some of the extra kibbles on the ground and the ostriches may or may not have bit my finger which is why you weren’t supposed to feed them in the first place. Oops. Just a few small bruises was definitely worth the thrill of feeding a 6 foot tall bird.

We had dinner that night at Oude Muel, which is Afrikaans for Old Mill. It was an incredible dinner! I had kudu and springbok, and a toffee pudding that was to die for! Lots of native South African food this week. We spent the night in Oudtshoorn before continuing onto Cape Town.

Day 2

This is morning we made our way through the “Adventure Route” at Cango Caves. I have been to many a caves before, but this was definitely the most intense cave tour I have been on. We skinnied sideways through the “love tunnel,” slid headfirst down a one foot opening and hole at the “postal slip,” used all walls in the three foot opening to climb up the “devil’s chimney,” and army-crawled through many other parts of the cave. It was very, very fun! Extremely claustrophobic at times, but luckily I had many supporters behind and in front of me. We continued our long bus ride and finally arrived in Cape Town!! Our first Cape Tonian adventure was to the Cape Town international Jazz Festival. While there I watched David Koz, Allen Stone, Atmosphere (from Minnesota!), and a few other bands perform. It was a great kick-off to Cape Town!

Day 3

On Saturday morning we explored the Slave Lodge Museum. This was very eye-opening because I did realize that Africa also had slaves. A very, very brief history of South Africa: the Dutch colonized the Cape Town area, but originally just wanted to have it as a spot for their ships to “re-fuel” on their way from India to Europe. So therefore, many of the slaves that were used in South Africa were originally from the India area, the east coast of Africa, as well as the natives that were already in the area. This was quite amazing to learn about.

At the top of Table Mountain!

Our most physical adventure of the week was climbing Table Mountain. It was an hour and a half hike straight up the side of the mountain. It was so exhausting, but the view from the top made the whole thing worth it! We ate our lunch at the top of the mountain and looked over the massive city of Cape Town. We took the easy way down and rode  a Cable Car which gave you a 360 degree view of the descent. The hour and a half hike up was just a 4 minute Cable Car Ride down. Weird.

The next part of the trip was the highlight of my week! We participated in homestays within the township. We were paired up and sent off with different Mamas to their homes. My Mama was great! She was very kind and polite and hospitable! She had two daughters, one age 18, Pearl, and one age 24, ZoZo. Pearl took us out to a “block party” of sorts the first night where we met many new people and got a feel for the township. It was an awesome experience! We got back “home” and ZoZo taught us how to make “pap” a corn dish that is served with almost every meal. We feasted that night on chicken, sausage, pap, vegetables, and potatoes and shared in some small talk with our new family.

Day 4

On Sunday morning we went to church in the township. The first half of the mass was music that was performed by a soft rock band and I was lucky enough to know a few of the songs and sing along. There was lots of singing and dancing going on! The second half of the mass was basically run by the people of the church and was translated from Xhosa to English and vice versa. It was quite interesting.

Our big part of the day was touring Robben Island, the place that Nelson Mandela was imprisoned at for over 20 years. Since I have read Mandela’s autobiography, Long Walk to Freedom, it was very interesting to make the connections from the book to the place where he spent so much time. Our tour guide was a former prisoner of Robben Island himself and it was really neat to hear everything from his point of view. I’m still amazed at how recent of history of South Africa is and how many people are still alive that can share their stories from apartheid and the first years of democracy.

Nelson Mandela's Prison Cell

We took the ferry back to Cape Town and I was one of the lucky ones who got to stand outside on the deck with the wind in my hair! I also was given the wonderful opportunity to see my “spirit animal” (given to me by one of my friends on the trip), the seal! Many of them were frolicking along the side of our boat on the way back. Talk about cool! We spent the next couple of hours exploring the Waterfront area, a very popular tourist attraction. I saw a marimba band, an acrobatic group, and other singers in the small stretch. I also treated myself to ice cream and a few souvenirs before heading back to my Mama!

It was wonderful to return to our Mama. Apparently she had missed us so much that she had called the person in charge looking for us and asking when we would be back. It was too cute! She made us another feast of sheep, rice, squash, salad, a delicious pudding and jello dessert! Also, we only were given spoons to eat with, so most of the meal was ate with our hands. We again sat around with our Mama and asked her about her part in the history of South Africa. She many great stories to share and two of my favorites were: she touched the car that had Nelson Mandela in it the day he was released from prison, and she stood in line for hours in the cold weather with her 2 week year old daughter in order to vote in the first democratic election in 1994. She is a very proud of her country and of her ability to raise a wonderful family and keep a roof over their heads. It was wonderful to learn about her life!

Day 5

After saying good-byes and not wanting to leave our Mama, we went back into the heart of the city to visit the building of Parliament. We sat in the room where the State of the Nation address is given every year (I actually watched it on tv the first week that we were here) and learned all about how their government was run. We then went on a tour of the Bo-Kaap area which is a very colorful neighborhood where many Coloreds live including Muslims and Cape-Malays. We went to the small museum and walked around the streets. Since this was our fifth day in a row of busy activities, I must be honest and say that I was rather exhausted and this was not my favorite part of the trip. However, the meal that we had for lunch at the Bo Kaap Kombuis (Afrikaans for Kitchen Over the Cape) made up for the slow tour. We had some delicious Muslim food that I don’t remember all of the names for, but it was great!

A few of us spent the afternoon at a place called Camps Beach which was a very touristy beach that was beautiful and had many restaurants and a few small shops. We sat in the sun and relaxed on our first afternoon off in a week. We also were now on the side of the country where the Atlantic Ocean is with the cold Alguhas Current. We warmed ourselves in the sun before taking a running start into the frigid ocean! I literally ran into the water, dunked, and came back out shivering. A friend said that the temperature was comparable to that of Lake Superior. Brrrrr!

We had our “farewell” dinner at Mama Afrika. It was a farewell because it was our last night tongether as a big group and with our guide as well as some of our guests. I had a Zimbabwe dish that was a chicken curry of sorts in a peanut sauce. Very yummy! The atmosphere of the restaurant was very lively! We danced the night away to a live band performing that night!

Day 6

It was an early morning on Tuesday for a long drive to Cape Point, or the most south-western point of Africa. We stopped at many scenic viewpoints along the way and took many pictures. We reached Cape Point and managed a short hike up to a lighthouse where you got a 360 degree view of everything around you. We got to see where the Indian and Atlantic Ocean meet, which was great because we learned about the two currents that meet there in my Biology class that I am taking. We ate our lunch at the top and continued onto Boulder Beach. At Boulder, we got to see penguins in their natural habitat! There were many out and about sunning themselves and posing for the tourists. And we all couldn’t help but laugh every time they walked around. This was our last stop altogether as a group and we said good-bye to our tour guide.

Sunset @ Camps Bay

I spent the afternoon back at Camps Beach with a few friends. But instead of swimming this time, we watched the sunset over the ocean. It was the most gorgeous sunset that I have ever seen! We then found  a place to eat and had some delectable pizzas for dinner and slow-paced night!

Day 7

I spent the day with 2 friends exploring the city. The first place that we went to was the District 6 Museum where we learned about the forced removals in the District 6 area in Cape Town. For all who don’t know about forced removals: in the 1980’s, the government decided to remove all blacks from their homes in certain areas and move them to another location. The black population was given no notice and had about 2 days to pack up their belongings and say good-bye to their friends and their homes. They were forced to live in places far away from their previous lives that the had. Children had to do to different schools and most people had much more extensive commutes to their jobs. The area that they moved out from was completely demolished and was supposed to be built up for whites. In the case of District 6, the area was never re-built and the empty land serves as a remembrance of Apartheid. The Museum was really cool to look through and the hardest thing for me to wrap my head around was that this happened only 30 years ago. That is very recent and there are still many District 6 inhabitants that are willing to share their stories with others.

"Untamed" Sculpture @ Kirstenbosch

I then did some shopping in the Market which is a square completely dedicated to locals who try to sell their African curios to the many tourists. We then hopped on a city bus and went to the Kirstenbosch Gardens, very comparable to the Botanical Gardens. It was gorgeous! We wandered around for about 2 hours and didn’t even see half of the whole place. It was so big and beautiful! We headed back to the city and had dinner at the Eastern Food Bazarre. I had a falafel, another new taste for me! We meandered our way back to where we were staying and called it a night in.

Day 8

It was a very lazy morning. I sat in bed all morning and wrote journals for one of my classes. We then spent the afternoon down at the Waterfront. We spent most of our time at the Aquarium which was really well-made. We saw many different fish, sharks, penguins, and coral. But the best part was that we were able to watch 3 of our friends SCUBA dive in the shark tank. It was really fun to watch them as they had no idea how close they were getting to the sharks and turtles and sting rays. We then walked around the Waterfront, did some more shopping and sightseeing and went out to dinner for Thai food and sushi.

Day 9

On Friday night a few of us went on a search for live music. We saw that there was a live piano at Kennedy’s and went to watch. We ended up being the only people who were actually paying attention to him, so he took some of our requests even though he usually doesn’t do that type of thing. It was great! After he finished, we stumbled upon another live band happening the floor below. They were quite the duo and obviously a crowd favorite. We watched them perform for a little bit and then left. We ran into a couple of classmates and sat and had hot dogs from a street vendor for awhile. We people-watched for a bit and then headed back to our Backpacker.

Days 10 & 11

Unfortunately, our shark cage diving was cancelled due to bad weather. So I took off with 9 friends for our road trip back to Port Elizabeth in the morning. We made half of the drive in the morning and stayed in Knysna for the night. Sadly the weather was not cooperative and since it was Easter weekend, basically nothing in the small town was open. We did find a grocery store and had a braai and sat around the bonfire for the night at our Backpackers.

Kayaking in Africa

We woke up the next morning and went on a Kayak trip. It started off great, the weather was nice and the sun was out. We reached our halfway point and stopped for a snack with our guide and froze because the weather became cold. Some of my friends jumped off a bridge into the river, led by our fearless guide. I sat and watched because I had enough jumping off of bridges for one week. Our break time was cut short because the winds picked up and it started to pour. We hopped in our kayaks and tried to paddle as fast as we could out of the rain. One of the kayaks went parallel to the waves and was flipped. It was funny but they didn’t think so until we got back to shore and had put everything away. We reached the shore wet and cold but still with smiles on our faces. After a warm shower we hopped back in the car and headed back to Port Elizabeth. It was nice to be “home” after such a busy week!