Sarah Luke's Weblog

was written on the side of the first combie taxi I took in Durban. I usually ride the Mynahs, but wanted to give the mini-bus taxis a try... and the name totally sold me :)

It's been a while since my last entry, because my laptop is currently in Jo'Burg being fixed! Hopefully I'll have it back in a few weeks, and my entries will become more frequent again.

The trip to Jo'Burg went well. Monday was a public holiday, so Amanda and I spent the weekend in Jo'Burg visiting the interns there, as well as some South African friends. We went to the aparthied museum, and also toured Soweto. It was a very difficult weekend, actually.

When we entered into Soweto, we stopped at a grocery store to buy some bottled water etc. About 15 small chidren surrounded us and started singing, with their hands folded, batting their little doe eyes. Some of them didn't have shoes. They told us that if we gave them a little money, they would all share it -- but when we gave them money, they fought eachother for it. The ones that didn't get any followed us the rest of the tour. I cried.

June 16 is an important day in South Africa, not because it's my birthday, but because it marks the beginning of the youth activism against aparthied that started in Soweto. Both in Soweto and in the aparthied museum, I saw pictures of police beating children, releasing tear gas, and treating black people like animals. All this happened in 1976, only 30 years ago.

Today many of the black South Africans I meet are scared of dogs, because the white people here train their dogs to attack black people. They aren't ashamed of it either. They think it's fine... and that burns me... There's something wrong with a society that condones such behavior; where white people believe that their racist actions are justified and such behavior is socially acceptable in order to protect their wealth (weath that is a direct result of aparthied).

I'm back at work now, and am realizing more and more the importance of the commission and how amazing the changes the government has implemented really are. I talked to one of my coworkers about the trip to Jo'Burg, and he told me, "We lived through that, and it's better now. So, it's not time to be sad anymore." I'm trying to take that advice. It's time to move forward. South Africa is a country full of hope; perhaps it is an example for the rest of the world. It's time to move forward and make things better.

Cheers.