Nicole's thoughtful analogy

It would suck to be an Impala. Think about it, not only are you at the bottom of the food chain, and constantly have to watch your back, but you’re also the animal that nobody cares about, because there are so many of you. At Kruger, the Safari truck didn’t even bother to stop when it would come across a herd of the small deer, but instead would zoom on past, in the hopes of finding a more ‘interesting’ animal, ones that would be “worth” stopping for.  

I can’t help but wonder if the Impala is similar to many of the people who live in South Africa. I can’t help but think that the people who live in Khayelitsha or Tafelsig, and I’m sure many of the other informal settlements and townships, are like the Impala. 

They are numerous in number, and at the bottom of the socio-economic classes. During Apartheid, they were pushed to the outskirts of the city, and out of they way to fend for themselves. It’s almost as if these people are left on the outside of the city so that they are out of view. After all.. “Out of sight, out of mind” is how the saying goes. Even after being in South Africa for a little over two months, it still amazes me, the effects of Apartheid that are still so prevalent in today’s society. There is still so much disparity between the whites, Coloureds, and blacks, especially in Cape Town. During a lull at my internship today, I had a chance to talk with one of the nurses about my stay in South Africa. She was asking me how I liked it and what I thought about certain things. Somehow the conversation eventually steered to where she lived and where she had come from. I learned that, while she had spent the last couple decades in an area of the Mitchells Plain Township, she has originally come from District Six, and was part of one of the first groups of people to be forcibly removed from their homes. She told me how she was involved in “The Struggle” and had risked becoming imprisoned for the part she had played in her workings against the National Party. It was amazing to stand in front of this woman and listen to her story. It’s crazy to think that a person who looks so normal, an elderly nurse, a woman, and a Coloured person, had not only survived through such a struggle in her lifetime, but had actually been an active part, and had fought for her rights and freedoms. What’s even more ridiculous is that I was there to listen to her story, and that she was willing to share it with me. I felt so connected to a part of history, a history that really has no place for me as an American, but as a human being is important that I understand. It is important that people around the world realize that there are many decisions from our pasts that have had a huge impact on our present and will continue to have an impact on us in the future. A regime cannot simply be overthrown and everything be fixed in a snap. It is a slow process to heal, and this country still very evidently has gaping wounds.