I can’t help but noticed that a lot of the posting’s lately have been about different people visiting townships. I feel that we’re finally getting comfortable enough here, and settling in enough to head into these areas, and that we all are really eager share our experiences, in addition to learn more about the culture here. It’s a strange experience getting to the townships. This past weekend I went into both Crossroads and Khayelitsha, each time people didn’t believe us. We had people asking “Are you sure you want to go there?” and worrying that we were in the wrong place. It took a bit of convincing, but finally we were able to get across that yes, we knew what we were doing. After getting to them, and finding the people we aimed to see and the places we intended to go, we were introduced to different people, and particularly in Khayelitsha, people thanked us for coming. While it was nice being hugged and thanked for going there, it just seemed so odd to me that all I was being thanked for was visiting some friends, the fact that people asked to take photos with us was flattering but at the same time uncomfortable, you can’t help but think it shouldn’t be this way, we shouldn’t be praised for trying to learn about a culture and a population of people, especially when everyone seems to know a lot about our culture. The woman we visited in Khayelitsha told us that the photo her husband took with us was brought to his work, where everyone was jealous and mad that they weren’t informed that we were coming. Being treated as if we were celebrities is a really strange feeling, and I wish it weren’t such a big deal for white people to be seen hanging out in a township.
Through work we head into schools in the township, and while a lot of teachers have no idea who I am, they assume that I am here to help and kindly point me to the bathroom or classroom that I’m having trouble finding, no questions asked. Another thing that I found odd is one of my coworkers admitted that when they see a white person in the townships, they just assume that person is a foreigner, and that white South Africans do not come to the townships. While this isn’t 100% true – a lot of my coworkers are white South Africans working in the townships, a guy I work with my age admits that his friends express concern for his safety, and even question his reasons for volunteering in Philippe. We’ve been talking in class about using your privilege to improve inequalities, and this would make it seem that that isn’t really the case here in South Africa. And while it’s easy to point fingers and to blame South Africans for not helping themselves, you could say the same thing about people in the US. So many of us have never gone into Hartford to help out, or even Willimantic, which is right down the road from Uconn. Also, a lot of the time, when people do volunteer, they tend to go far away- not to say that that isn’t helping, I’m just trying to point out that our home still needs a lot of work too. It is just sad that sometimes we are so oblivious to the sad, terrible things that go on in our backyard, and through this program, I think that a lot of us are learning that we can’t ignore the problems, no matter where they are. And while it may only be 23 Uconn students who are coming to this realization, hopefully when we return we can work in our community, and make some type of difference, even if it is small.
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