Ava already making plans to return

Ava's pictures of her in Cape Town: proof positive it was not simply a dream

It's been a little over a month since I’ve been home. This trip happened so quickly that I often have to ask myself if it really did happen….it feels so much like a dream. Keeping in mind Ben’s (one of our RA’s in Cape Town) advice to keep this experience meaningful and to make sure it does not turn into another story, I have done my best to convey all that I have learned while I was away. As we all discussed in our final class how hard it might be to talk to family and friends about our experiences, I have found that the most difficult question has been, “What was your favorite part about the trip?” I’ve thought of a million ways to answer this question but I think I like to stick to the people I have met, because that answer encompasses every other experience I had. Adjusting to life at home has been less difficult than I thought it would be. I thought I would have major issues talking to my friends but I’ve actually found a lot of support and realized that they actually want to know about the real parts of my trip that I really wanted to talk about; ie not landscapes and animals. Missing Cape Town certainly is heartache! The colors here at home are less vibrant, the air less clear and the food certainly could never, ever compare. I miss being at Christel House the most I think, among many other “daily life in Cape Town” things. There is something that is so fulfilling about the work I had the privilege of being involved with at Christel House that makes me feel empty being apart from it. I so miss feeling like I was a part of something that mattered, but hopefully that feeling of missing will help me do other volunteer work around my community. Being back home is a bit boring so I am looking forward to starting my next adventure with my first semester on the Storrs campus. I have begun to make plans to return to Cape Town and I can honestly say that despite all of my fears leaving, I would not trade this experience for anything in the world. Until next time, Cape Town!

Ava's lessons learned in Cape Town

First week in Cape Town: Emily W, Melanie, Savannah, Jen, Ava

 I will be returning to my own bed and closet in a week; where has the time gone? I plan to spend my last week doing all of the Cape Town activities I have not done yet, i.e. Table Mountain (best for last) and one last Lion’s Head hike. My mom also arrives this evening from Zimbabwe and we celebrate her birthday tomorrow in Cape Town! My knowing that one day I will return to complete my post-graduate studies at the University of Cape Town is the only thing cushioning the crushing sadness of my departure. With all the mixed feelings, half excitement and half devastation, that has been going on in the house and inside me, the time has come for the end of trip reflections. As I prepare to be bombarded with questions about this experience, I try to think about what my reply will be to: “How was it?” All I can think of mustering up is “It was great” as a response, but that does not nearly cover what I want to say. I think I will try to explain my experience with a story I want to share with you now. It is a Cherokee legend I heard once from a friend that goes like this:

“An old Cherokee is teaching his grandson about life. “A fight is going on inside me,” he said to the boy. “It is a terrible fight and it is between two wolves. One is evil- he is anger, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego”. He continued, “The other is good- he is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion, and faith. The same fight is going on inside of you- and inside of every other person, too”. The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather, “Which wolf will win?” The old Cherokee simply replied, “The one you feed.”

(http://www.firstpeople.us/FP-Html-Legends/TwoWolves-Cherokee.html)

I think I am ready to go home, but I do not regret the lessons that I have learned while being here. I have been humbled by people half my age and by people close to death. I’ve learned the value of hard work. I have learned the meaning of love and forgiveness, of anger and of oppression and I would not trade those lessons for any trip to Europe or million-dollar job deal. Before this semester had started, I thought I knew what evil looked like. I saw evil in the politicians, CEO’s and bankers. I saw evil in humans who acted on greed and who stole from others for the sole purpose of accumulating more for themselves. I would sit and think about all of the evil going on around me and become angry and bitter at my inability to change it and utterly hopeless for a better world. I was afraid of the capacity for evil in myself. 

Ava helping create a room for teen girls

In Cape Town, I learned another side to what people would call “evil”- a side that is the breaking point of the human spirit in which the person commits an act out of desperation that completely detaches them from humanity. There is a point at which a person reaches such a low that there is nothing better for them than a life of crime. There is a whole world of evil that surrounds us…but there also exists an entire world of good. Africa’s history helped me understand the capacity of humans for forgiveness while learning about the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. The people who can show greatest acts of evil can also show great love and compassion, especially when a lost tourist is walking around Green Market Sq. trying to find the direction of the minibus station. The most amazing thing that I have seen while here is humans helping humans. There is an unbelievable capacity for a person to love and show compassion for another person without wanting something in return and that is single greatest thing that I have learned from Cape Town. This lesson I have learned can be summed up by a South African word that I’m sure some of you have read on this blog before: Ubuntu. It means many things, but simply put: I am because we are. I have come to understand that the capacity for the evil wolf lives inside of me, and inside of everyone, but the capacity for the good wolf exists just as well. What really defines you as a person and us as humanity, is which wolf we choose to feed.  I look forward to working out how to explain the rest of my experiences to my loved ones and to keep feeding the wolf that reflects the type of world I want to be in. Until next time, Cape Town! 

Ava's busy weeks

With three weeks left, we’ve just arrived home from the greatest adventure yet: excursion. We started off flying to Johannesburg and there, we went to several museusm and visited Soweto. Then on Friday morning, we left (very early, I might add) for Kruger National Park to see the Big Five. Johannesburg is quite a city, very much like New York around Central Park. This is the dream city, the place of opportunity and gold and I have seen now lived to see a large part of it. We visited the Hector Peiterson Museum, the Apartheid Museum, Constiution Hill, and the Sharpville Memorial Museum. While all of the museums were amazing, my favorites were the Apartheid Museum, which is absolutely stunning, and a must-see before you die, and the Hector Peiterson Museum. Since the Apartheid Museum is essentially self-explanatory in the name, I should explain the Hector Peiterson Museum. 

In late 1976, with apartheid in full swing, a new law had passed mandating that subjects in school were to be taught in Afrikaans. Afrikaans was not only restricted to white, but to classified coloured as well as native language. This law, under the Bantu Education Acts, would mainly effect black students who speak Xhosa, English, Zulu, Sutu, etc, but not Afrikaans. In Soweto, students were outraged. They came together to protest this law, where if it went through any longer they would fail school subjects and matric. On June 16th, between 10,000 and 20,000 black students gathered together to march in protest to Orlando Stadium in Soweto. By the end of the day, the death toll neared 150 and the wounded amounted to over a thousand. The apartheid police had open fired on the crowds of unarmed students and the first of those students to die was a 14-year-old boy named Hector Peiterson. There is the iconic picture showing Mbuyisa Makhubo holding Hector’s body while his sister cries besides them. On that day, hundreds of families were shattered in a barbaric manner with no reason from the police. After that day, hundreds more died in uprisings all over South Africa, where police would enter townships and open fire at random. This museum told the story of that day and of apartheid during those years. I found this museum to be so impactful because of the pictures, the stories and the videos of the Soweto Uprising of 1979. The videos play loudly as you watch and read the testimonies of that day from the police and of the students. It paints a horrifyingly real picture that screams, “Yes, this actually happened and we were never the same”. When you walk out of the museum, there is a fountain with rocks and on of those rocks, a little ways away from the fountain, is a quote from Mbuyisa Makhubo’s mother (the boy pictured with Hector Peiterson). She says her son, who disappeared after that day and has not been seen or heard from since, is not a hero. She explains that as a brother, it was his duty to carry Hector out of there. He could not have lived knowing he was left alone to die.  It’s amazing to see the range of ages and types of people who gave up their lives in the struggle for freedom.

           

Kruger National Park was another experience all together. I have been to zoos before and seen the Big Five in real life before (the Bronx Zoo has had all of them at different points in the past 20 years), but this was something completely different. It is one thing to see an elephant behind glass and another to see a mother elephant and her babies crossing the road less than 15 ft in front of you. The park does not look like the scenery set up in the “Lion King”, unfortunately there was no pride rock, but we did see a mother lion and her cubs relaxing in the grass on a night game drive. While I am not entirely into animals as I am into exhibits about people, it was well worth the 8-hour drive from Johannesburg to mPumalanga.

           

This past weekend, a small group and I went to Plettenberg Bay for a weekend vacation. After a7 hour drive for which we left at 2:45 AM for, we arrived at Cango Wildlife Ranch. There, I got to pet some cheetahs named Mia and Mini. The next day, I had an incredible experience playing with elephants at Knysna Elephant Park. Elephants are the largest land mammal and also one of the smartest. They are highly emotional and cognitively sound creatures. 

At Knysna, the elephants were hurt at one point and taken there to recover, being fed and cared for by humans. The elephants eventually remembered the feeders and the place felt they could open it up to the public to have close encounters with these large and magnificent creatures. There are currently 9 elephants and they have a huge acre of land to roam free and breed on as they please. The Park serves as preservation center for elephants in the area. The ones there are the only ones native to Knysna. You can walk with elephants, feed them and interact with them and you also have the option to ride them. I unfortunately did not ride, as my other co-educators did, but being able to hug, kiss, feed, and walk with the elephants was more than enough for me. I had a long interaction with one of them, Sally, the largest female. I looked into her large, bight brown eyes and you can actually see someone staring back at you. I understood her and she understood me. She stared for a bit and let me pet her, nudging me softly from time to time. The elephants of South Africa were poached ferociously when the English-speakers arrived. The Knysna heard was nearly extinct (out of thousands, only 3 remained at the start of Knysna Elephant Park in 1994). They were killed off, sold, forced to move as a means of “being saved” and stood by while their homes were destroyed. Their story reminds me of the people of South Africa. Why does it seem that humans destroy everything they touch? If not to look at other human beings who have had their basic human rights stripped from them by other people, look to nature. We come and conquer. There is no stone that is to remain unturned, no life unscathed. We cage and abuse animals because they do not have the voice to protest or the rights to protect them the ay humans are protected. And yet, humans become objects to also be mistreated. As I look at the vast expanse of land ahead of me on the way back to Loch from Plettenberg, I think about the race of humanity. We are all racing against time and each other but in the end we all come back to the same place. We all come back to where it all started: in Africa’s old and wise soil.

Ava's reflections on forgiveness

Ava looking out on Cape Town

Well, we are nearly a month until we return home. I am beginning to mentally process this fact. In doing so and continuing my self-reflection that has been an ongoing process, I have thought of the concept of forgiveness quite a bit. The other day I saw the play, "A Human Being Died That Night". I am also reading the book for Marita’s class. This works out well because in our History and Politics of South Africa class, we have been talking about the TRC (Truth and Reconciliation Committee).  As I mentioned in my last post, the TRC sought to give amnesty to those working for and against apartheid as long as they told the entire truth about their actions as well as had some political motivation behind it. This book talks about one apartheid figurehead in particular, Eugene de Kock. De Kock was a policeman and head of the covert operations for the apartheid government, committing mass murders and gruesome homicides. Pumla Gobodo-Madikizela is a psychologist and former member of the TRC who interviewed de Kock about his experiences. The book goes on to talk about the nature of evil as well as the human capacity to commit evil actions and the ability to forgive. Forgiveness, I find, is a most interesting concept. I cannot forgive the CEO’s of Lehman Brothers and Merrill Lynch for indirectly causing economic strife for my family, yet the wives of de Kock’s victims can hold his hand and cry with and for his corrupted soul, forgiving him for brutally murdering their husbands. I cannot forgive a country that allowed thousands to become homeless to allow few to gain unbelievable wealth, yet South Africa embraced those who had oppressed its people, and granted amnesty to mass murders and human rights violators. I try to understand the magnitude of such forgiveness, and I can’t help but think to myself if I would be capable of looking someone directly in the eye who has violated me in such a way and forgive them. How can anyone? I think about my experiences at Christel House, working as a social worker. The same kids who braided my hair, jumped on me and hugged me every day, greeting me with a smile now come to me with deep emotional and physical wounds. The societies that they come from are a product of apartheid. The violence they experience is a product of apartheid. It blows my mind that they are still so loving and forgiving of those around them who look like the people who beat and starved their parents and that they grasp this concept at such a young age.

The interactions of Pumla trying to understand where de Kock became the murderer and how the goodness of him tries to come through in remorse are extremely powerful. It makes me think about those who are trained to kill in the US Army and Navy. When the US officially entered war after 9/11, documentaries were made that interviewed young soldiers who had recently been deployed. They equated killing “enemy soldiers” to playing video games. Our society likes to dehumanize the “other”. If the “other” is no longer human, it is easy to kill and to violate his or her human rights. When you are being congratulated and told you’re a hero, being rewarded and constantly fed information that these are not people, just something evil, it’s easy to see why soldiers are charged with brutal crimes, homicides and human rights violations. Newspaper articles are always saying, “the monster, evil, no remorse, soulless, terrorist”- the person must be stripped of their humanity so that the public can publically bash them. If someone is given a terrorist label, it allows that whole country to be represented in that way and makes it okay for the US to bomb the land and exploit the people. I wonder about the Boston Bomber and Newtown, even back to Osama Bin Laden and the horrible way he was killed- are they no longer humans with families? Is humanity lost after you take someone’s life? If so, is that humanity restored because the person can show remorse? All of these things are reflected in the book, as well as practiced by all of the South Africans that I have met.

I’ve also been going to Elonwabeni Child & Family Centre to do my activist project there. Our activist projects are of our choosing, so my co-educators Kiya, Manuela, Val, Tina and I have decided to do ours there. Elonwabeni, located in Mitchell’s Plain, caters to children who have lost their parents to AIDS and HIV and who have seen substance abuse, domestic violence, and child abuse in the home. There are currently 26 children living there, 7 of which are “teens”. The teens have to take care of the kids, clean up after them, etc. They never have any private space to themselves or have a quiet area to do homework. So, our project is to clear out an old room and paint and decorate it to give them that space. Today when we went, I talked to one of the girls for quite a long time. She had so much to say. We talked about her prom dress, boys, school and friends and the orphanage and she spoke in a way that told me she has not been able to talk about these things in ages. Even though the room will be for the centre use only, I know that it makes a difference to these kids and that is completely worth it.

Lastly, I begin to come to terms with the fact that I will soon be departing this beautiful place. I am starting to think about what I have learned, what I have shared with others, and if I’ve grown as a person. Ben, our RA, mentioned that the growth here would be slow, and that I would not think I had grown until I looked back and reflected. Well, he was definitely right. I still have another month to finish off the final expansions of my comfort zone. Until then. 

Ava many questions remain as she passes the half way point

 

Cassie and Ava more than half way through their time in Cape Town

 

Well, we have already reached the halfway point. In fact, we have fewer days here in Cape Town than we have been so far. Amazing. Time seems to fly here. Before coming, this trip was a distant memory. I thought to myself, “This day is never going to come. This trip is so far in the future that I can’t imagine it happening”. And then, I was packing. Then, I had said goodbye to my friends. Then, I was hugging my mom at the airport, crying. I can’t believe I will be home soon. I don’t think I’ve been away long enough to really miss anything. I thought I would be upset missing my bed, mom, and mom and grandma’s delicious food, but I am actually dreading the day we have to leave (except missing the food—that has been hard). I think a small part of all of us came on this trip to revive parts of our souls that have been chiseled away by surviving in America. Before being in Cape Town, I felt that life had beaten me. Now, I feel more alive than I ever had in my life. I have done a lot of self-reflection while being here, and though I have not noticed a day-to-day change, overall I feel different. In the words of Kgebetli Moele’s, “Room 207”: “You and the city are in perfect connection with each other. Your blood runs in its veins as it runs in your blood”. Cape Town was in my blood and I am hooked on this lifestyle, the people and Ubuntu.

With all of my self-reflection, I have also been thinking a lot about topics that we have been discussing in Marita’s class. I continue to battle with my feelings and thoughts about America. How to can I be proud of such a place with a dark history? Today, in our South African Politics Class, we talked about the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. All of the perpetrators from the apartheid government are able to apply for pardon by the government, on condition of a few requirements. While discussing, we talked about how America seems to sweep all of its wrongdoings under the carpet. We never want to look bad, never want to have to publically acknowledge that we did something wrong; a pure violation of human rights. Should I be proud of that?

 

Ava (top far right )

On the topic of human rights, this past weekend was spent at an olive farm, for Africa Unite Human Rights Training Weekend. We spent the weekend with Africans from all over the continent, learning from each other (a real example of co-education). We had done several activities centered on learning about human rights. One of them involved creating a “new world” after Earth had been destroyed. Two countries had moved to another planet years prior, cultivating the land and establishing their countries. Now, the rest of Earth must leave Earth to go to this new planet. Those countries that are established, and the countries that need to be established, must come up with rules for their own country and the other countries in the new world. I was one of the countries that had to move and become established on the new planet. My team and I came up with universal rules and an idea to create a united planet with a committee of leaders from each country to represent that country’s interests. We had planned to use the fertile land, cultivate it and try to sustain the inhabitable areas. We wanted to ask for permission to enter this planet and have land, and expected it would be granted so long as everyone cooperates in a peaceful manner. When each country had to present their rules, I was utterly shocked to hear some of them. Both of the previously established countries were mostly reluctant to give up their fertile land and had rules such as a 10% land grant and 50 year check points for the new countries to see how productive they are being to society. The other country allowed us to live on their land, cultivate it and participate in society without any rights, and then in five years we could become citizens of their country. This shocked me to see that they were not willing to give up land so that we may keep our culture identity. Under such a law, we could not be our own country, our own people, but we need to assimilate into a culture we did not understand.  The country kept talking about needing to be protective and on guard for their country’s goods and people when letting in strangers on the new planet. I found it amazing that a little bit of power (owning the resources of the new planet because they established it first) could turn people. The breaking factors for entry were based on fear and individual country success instead of the success of the human race.

 

  

Ava's group working on plan 

An interesting concept was explored in this exercise: what it means to be in power, and to be in the position to beg from those in power. As our group was forming rules (recall, we are part of the group that has to enter the new planet), we automatically assumed a role of weakness, believing our rules had to be flexible so that as not to upset the host countries. The countries already there were given a position of power: the ability to refuse us entry. Through this exercise, I feel now that I can almost understand where those in power believe they get their power. There is an interesting concept that concerns being the “first”. Why is it that people seem to feel entitled to things just because they had them first? Why should my country be seeking permission to enter this new planet just because others arrived first? Who grants them ownership of all the land and resources?  What makes a land a property?  The same questions could be asked about the mentality behind apartheid. Why did Dutch settlers believe they were true Africans? Many Questions to be answered in this last month- I hope I’m able to understand it all before I leave.

Until next time. 

Ava receiving her Africa Unite Human Rights Training Certificate from Ntombi Mcoyi

Ava understanding the meaning of UBUNTU in Ocean View

Ocean View: a community, loving people and neighborly lifestyle with a beautiful view of the ocean. Who wouldn’t want to live there? Well, most likely all of you if you actually knew what “Ocean View” is like. Ocean View is a community comprised of houses, backyard dwellers and informal settlements. Its inhabitants are second generation of the forced removals that were done by the apartheid government. During these removals, blacks and coloreds were forced out of certain areas to ensure those areas would be white only. The people were given a few hours or days notice to pack up whatever they could carry and move to designated areas where they could not speak the language and did not know anyone around them. This is what Ocean View really is. This is where I stayed for my valentines day. With all the cultural history that surrounds the people, they are very proud and happy to host us. In fact, they are proud of what they have done to their homes, many of which have been passed down to them by their parents. Renovations, furniture, TVs and computers (all things we take for granted) are some of the extreme proud points of ownership. While the houses did look very much like any house you would see in the Bronx or in Norwalk, there were some things that were missing in the South African counterparts. I have been known by my friends to be high-maintenance, if you will, but to me, I just need to have a shower and sink every day and I am completely happy. Seems basic enough, right? Not so much for people in Ocean View. Most houses only have a bath. No sink, no shower, just a bath. There is also rarely air conditioning. The weekend we had gone was one of the hottest by far. While Allie and I were sweating and wishing for our rooms at Loch, our host family just has to deal with it. They do not get to go to another place with a shower and air conditioning. I only had to deal with it for a few days- I could never imagine having to live like that when I get grumpy and grouchy when my feet are too hot at night. While I am not America’s biggest fan, this was the first time I had ever been grateful for being from the US. So many of things that are a luxury for our Auntie Harriet and Chelsea and Celestine are standard and expected for us at home. If a school does not have adequate air conditioning in the summer when it gets very hot, they shut down because parents will complain about their children being too hot for a few hours. We, as Americans, are very spoiled.

Going further, it seems that eating correctly is also a problem in South Africa. At home, we try to give our children healthy foods in school, encourage physical activity and water consumption. Here, most children are given candy and ice cream and cool drinks every day. I was shocked looking in my host family’s fridge and seeing only soda. I thought to myself, “on a hot day like this I need so much water to stay hydrated” but when I look around at my host family, they are all drinking soda. Even the baby was given a popsicle to keep her cool and feed her. I could understand a money issue if water wasn’t free from the tap but I don’t understand why you would spend money on sodas instead of food. I have heard that having Coke is a status symbol- maybe it is still that way despite the health risks. Maybe they don’t know the health risks. A lot of the foods being consumed were sugary, processed and fattening. How could children be running around all day and only drinking cool drinks? How do they survive and perform in school without any water? I guess it works when your body is used to it. I was told by several of the family members that for my age, I was very tall.  I found that strange as well, considering I am average height at home.

Despite all of these differences that I have noticed, I had an amazing time with my host family. Auntie loves to give hugs and kisses and for me, having a mother’s hug was something I had so desperately missed from my own mom. The family makes do with what’s available and perseveres despite the issues and drawbacks. What makes me most happy though, is how happy they are. Too hot? No problem, we walk to the beach or go to the top of the mountain because it’s windy there. No outfit to wear? Make one. Electricity ran out? Play outside all night. The amount of happiness and closeness and community is astounding. You help your neighbor and your neighbor helps you. Living is communal and basic needs to should be common. Hearing one say that they are lending money to a neighbor is not uncommon, as well as cooking for those who are sick, watching children of working parents, etc. There is never a sense of you are on your own. I find it to be beautiful and comforting to the fact of struggle. Struggle makes you feel like you are alone, the only one in the struggle. Maybe that’s why Americans have such a high depression rate. Here, it seems nearly impossible to feel alone. Under apartheid, the main goal was to separate, to make sure that one group would feel alone. I guess that’s why South Africans now strive for a sense of togetherness, a sense of ubuntu.  In Ocean View, I have really come to understand the meaning of this word and now hope to carry that with me.  

Ava with her two little Valentines

Ava asking many questions

When I came to South Africa, I expected to have an overwhelming sense of emotion that would immediately bring me to tears. What I did not expect was to feel a sense of normality in going through my day-to-day activities. Now the initial shock has come to a close and I am ultimately feeling the sense of “settling in”. Life becomes life, and the effect of a vacation wears off. You might think that that is the worst thing to happen, but now I can no longer pretend that I’m a mere tourist without a greater purpose for my time in Cape Town. Now, there is nothing stopping me from feeling the impact of my surroundings. The reality of my life beyond Long Street (the teen-club area) and to the “streets” of Hanover Park. Monday through Wednesday I go to my internship at Christel House.  Christel House is an organization of schools located all around the world (one in Indianapolis, one in India, one in Venezuela, one in Mexico, etc). The schools take children from the absolute poorest areas and give them access to a 100% free and high standard education. The children shower me with me hugs and beg to play with my hair. In attempt to make a life at Christel House outside of my interactions with the children, I often talk to the teachers about their political views and how they feel about the poverty the children at Christel House come from. Most of them feel the government has slighted them and their children. They feel in 20 short years, the government has not moved far enough. I had met a 15 year old girl at one of our Jazz nights with her friends, all of who grew up in Cape Town. She had strong and very, very informed beliefs about her government. They all talked with ease about Jacob Zuma and the ANC. This was incredible to me, as a good amount of American adults do not even know that “Obama Care” and the “Affordable Care Act” are the same thing.

           

The magnitude to which, it appears, South Africa feels dissatisfied with the pace of change in their country gets me to think about the amount of time it took the US to reach the “racial equality” we have today. I know that comparing is never a good basis for understanding, but America is 200 and somewhat odd years old. Civil rights for African Americans have only existed for less than half the age of the country. I am as old as South Africa’s democracy…. an interesting thought. I wonder how one can expect such huge change to occur in such a small amount of time, especially in South Africa where the country is much older than the US.  Granted, basic human rights have been ignored such as adequate housing, sanitation and infrastructure. But can you expect a country that was solely based and structured on apartheid to be completely unified and problem free after only 20 years? I wonder what they had expected to happen, and what the ANC and Mandela had promised them in this short amount of time. But is it such a short amount of time? The white areas in Cape Town, such as Bishops Court, are fully developed and problem free. They have their basic human rights met (as well as the right to a more than sufficient education) and so much more. Why is it not the same for all areas? Why hasn’t the government been able to put the money it has given the white schools into the black and colored schools? Why isn’t there a system in place to create new public housing, infrastructure, and adequate schools? Why are all children of poverty not entitled to a free and sufficient education when their constitution grants that right? As I sit in my classroom at UConn Stamford and am constantly tortured by the socio-economic inequality that has shaped my life, I realize my country does not guarantee me an education at all. Cape Town’s youth protest and are informed, waiting for the day when they can vote and voice themselves while my peers party and perhaps pick up a newspaper from time to time. Cape Town’s poverty issues are clear and plain as day. Most UConn students could go through nearly 20 years of schooling and not confront a single social issue, if they so choose. Is this something to be proud of? For now, I find myself rethinking where I stand on my own views because despite my own experiences with poverty, I will never know what my children at Christel House go home to. I will never know the feeling of being afraid to leave for winter and summer holidays, not knowing when my next meal will be.  As Marita says, oppression cannot be ranked, but my personal understanding begins with decomposing and comparing my own oppression at home in order to understand it in South Africa. Until next time.