Thoughts At The End Of One Month

This week there's a team here from Charlottesville, VA, leading a vacation Bible school (or holiday Bible club, as we call it here). They're fun to be with, and it's nice to hear that American accent again! We've had between 65 and 85 kids each day, ages 4 to 13. Today (Wednesday) was a little low because we woke up to see SNOW on the ground! It was a dusting, but it's so rare here that everyone made a big deal out of it. I'm hoping this cold snap passes by quickly!

On Saturday evening we had the opportunity go out with Tony and Anne to hear Haydn's Creation put on by the Joburg community choir and orchestra and the Yale Alumni chorus. They are sponsors of the choir, so they had free tickets, and even treated us to a nice meal beforehand! It was beautiful music and a fabulous performance, but while I was there something didn't feel quite right. Then it hit me – the choir, orchestra, and audience were overwhelmingly white. There were maybe 20 black people there. And it made me very uncomfortable. Which is odd, because Mary Washington was unfortunately a 90% white majority and I never really felt uncomfortable there. But I guess my perceptions have changed a bit.

I've mentioned it before on the blog, but race is a big deal here, and I still have trouble with it. People have set ideas about someone based upon their race. I've heard whites make passing comments about blacks, and that always makes me cringe a little bit. They're usually not offensive, but the fact that they're making broad comments about someone based upon their race is unsettling. (Example: “Blacks have such cold hands! It freezes me every time I shake one of their hands in church.”) Even when describing someone, usually the first trait they give is “white” or “black.” I notice skin color, but it's usually not the first characteristic I associate with someone. When I think of the kids at the Centre, I don't think “black kids,” just “kids.” And it's taken a lot of coercing to convince the black staff to eat lunch at the same table as the (white) American team...they don't feel as though it's their place.

But the sad thing is, there are basic generalizations that are mostly true, though it has less to do with the characteristics of the people and more to do with their economic status. White = rich, black = poor. The people that have been entertaining us on weekends and such: white. The concert was a higher culture thing, so obviously the people there had money, and therefore mostly white. I don't know of any blacks with cars. And poverty here is a tough thing to get out of. For example, the education system here is all private schools, i.e. parents have to pay. Where children go to school is not based upon location, but upon how much the parents can pay. Higher cost = better education. So even though apartheid legally ended, the schools are very much segregated due to money issues. There are even some kids who can't go to school because their parents don't have enough money. But if you can't get a quality education, or any education at all, how can you rise out of poverty? And so the cycle continues, for some at least. Hopefully there are some who can change their circumstances.

I've tried to compare it in my head to the States. Race relations there are far from perfect, but they're a little better I think. Then again, our civil rights movements were in the 1960s...we've had 50 years to work towards fixing those issues. And it's taken several generations to change ways of thinking and acting, and we're still not fully there yet. Old habits die hard, and South Africa is no exception. The youth and children we're serving now will be critical in continuing the movement towards change. I just wish that it wasn't such a slow-moving process to change the mindset and perspective people have.

But how did this all start in the first place? Why did people start suppressing others solely based upon race? Why did they decide skin color made such a big difference? And why did some of those people bring God into it, claiming God prefers one race over another and that gave them the right to have authority over those who look differently? It's a ridiculous concept, but one that has cost the freedom and lives of countless people all over the world.

I know I'm not the first to think about things like this. I guess in the States I was able to turn a blind eye to race problems. But when you're immersed in a place like this, you can't ignore it.

An unsettling way to end a blog post...I never promised it would be full of happy thoughts...