Capstone

I apologize for the lack of updates since the last apologetic post about the lack of updates, but ever since returning and getting stung by reverse culture shock, the routines of life here in the US have a surreal way of putting what was once something so moment to moment on the proverbial back burner. Well, that bubbling pot has been stewing long enough, so I will endeavor to resume more regular work on this blog, it's portrayal of our experience in South Africa, and where the project will soon head.

While dedicated to the cold truth of South Africa's poor, 80% of the previous blog posts make it seem like all we did was tour the countryside and take pictures of semi-wild animals and semi-wild people. It was intentional to highlight our experience this way to portray the desperate need of these families and individuals in an honest light, but our time spent away from the missions was actually the most insightful view into the South African social and cultural spirit. This post will be about the other face of South Africa, the one that isn't shown on travel brochures for game lodges nor staring at you with emaciated eyes from the television on Feed The Children charity drives. Because after the shock of everything new fades away parts of South Africa might as well be down the block and around the corner from wherever you are while reading this post. And in that weird transference, you are suddenly aware that the people around you are just like the ones back home, and only then do the problems faced by the communities we worked and lived with come into true focus. That said, I hope you enjoy the following posts. The theme explored only really came to light late in the trip, in that limbo where one slides from tourist to traveler and traveler to inhabitant. Once the country lost it's new car smell, only then could we make true comparisons to life both in and out of Africa, and what those differences mean.

To better give you the reader a grasp on what our daily life was like apart from the mission work, I will try to describe in both pictures and words the locations we spent the majority of the time at, the people we interacted with, things we did, etc. Some of this has been described in earlier posts, but I will try to summarize it here for sake of convenience. And so we begin...

Our first experience with South Africa consisted of us stumbling off of the last flight from Heathrow into Johannesburg's empty international airport, legs shaky after sitting for 12 hours and tired eyes being burned with the remnants of all things World Cup as we walked the halls of the concourse trying to find baggage claim. Yes, vuvuzelas were strewn about, and yes we all cursed them to ourselves, but after the bags had been collected the fact remained that our connection to Durban wasn't until the next day, and we were either going to have to set up camp in the terminal or try to find some kind of lodging. Each one of us contemplated another 14 hours of cold floors and aching backs, so we decided to ask the sole employee behind the tourist information desk about our options. We didn't have many, it turned out. 30 minutes and 1 halfhearted argument about the virtues of bunking at JoBurg Int'l later, we found ourselves bracing the cold mountain air of the sidewalk as we shambled to our waiting taxi to take us to a traveler's lodge 5 minutes from the airport. Having just come from posh London with it's metro, fish and chip shops, cute girls with cute accents and fine English ale, we left the florescent glow of the airport and were plunged immediately into the surreal void of our first South African night.

There were no street lights, no moon, nor stars; not even the headlights of opposing traffic to brighten the way save for one grisly accident scene we passed on the freeway where a car had careened off the shoulder and ended upside down in a ditch. The local police were there too, just kind of standing around, looking at it with indifference. I want to say it was on fire as well, but I truly don't know if that is an embellishment of my imagination or not. Passing the accident in a strange taxi and recounting horror stories of cutthroat Johannesburg life in our heads, we all silently wondered if we had made a huge error in judgement. "What was the name of the hotel?". "They didn't say". More silence.

We finally pulled up to a neighborhood however and our spirits rose slightly. No hotel or lodge in sight. They sank back down. We passed rows and rows of yellow brick houses behind gates and walls topped with shredded glass. No picket fences here. Our driver continued on until he stopped in front of a house like any other on the street, and the gate opened to let us in. We got our gear and were guided through the sparsely decorated living room and out into the back yard, where three little guest bungalows with sliding glass doors looked out over a dead lawn and a dirty pool. Rats the size of small dogs scurried on the border of yard and wall, and beyond that loomed what looked like an abandoned apartment building. We each tried to get some sleep, but paranoia made it nearly impossible.

We awoke after a few hours of fitful sleep to a slate-grey morning. In the early light, the area the guest rooms we had slept in looked like a prison yard, the wall from the night before had seemingly grown a foot or two and was outfitted with an electric fence. Already feeling out of place, we politely tried to eat the runny eggs and mealy breakfast sausages that the owner of the "lodge" put out for us, paid our bill and headed straight for the airport. The ride back during the daytime didn't reveal anything more than our ride in did the previous night: since it was the dead of winter the countryside was almost barren. The horizon was dotted with faraway buildings dressed in grey, and everywhere the brown earth looked as cold as the air felt. The few people that walked about were dressed in coats and scarves. Even though the more experienced travelers of us knew not to make the cardinal sin of having expectations, this bared no resemblance to what we had innocently daydreamed Africa to look like.

As if the surreal picture of Africa we were wading through since the previous night wasn't odd enough, our attempt to get out of Johannesburg took an even more bizarre twist. While trying to check our baggage the two ticketing agents for South African Airlines started to make a fuss, whispered between themselves and then finally looked at us and stated deadpan that a police hold had been put on Williams' ticket because the sniffer dog had alerted on his bag. As the color drained from our collective faces and our minds started to form the shocking expletives our mouths would soon hurl, the ticketing agents added that "we shouldn't get angry or try to run, it will only make you look guilty in court". I remember looking at John and then Ryan and seeing on their faces a kind of unnerved dismay I had never seen before. Since it was his bag in question, Darryl's face was delicately contorted, his reason trying to work out what was happening like he had just been told the sky was green, that up was down or some other fundamentally impossible fact. Drugs? Police? Are you f*cking kidding us? Our shock must have been total, because even after their stern looks melted into wry laughter not one of us seemed to process the change. "We joke, we joke!". "They ah no drugs, you may go to your plane", they said in unison while smiling wide. After several moments we all managed token smiles and thin laughs in reply, but their humor was lost on us. Being falsely accused of drug smuggling in a foreign country halfway across the earth was not the way we wanted to start the project.

To Be Continued

Words: Hamrock

Update

Sorry for the delay in posting anything new since mid September, but the last month and a half of the project was perhaps the most hectic of the lot. Further traveling abroad has also made any updates near impossible to do, and in fact as of last week all of us who participated in the project are now back on American soil once more. This does not mean the blog will end however; since the last post there have been quite a bit of updates, insights, trials and tribulations. Look to the coming days for posts ranging from how the middle class lives in South Africa, to the debacle (and eventual resolution) that is South African import law and how it almost deep 6'd our clothing ambitions.

From neighborhoods where every house has barbed wire and most people are armed, to myself wandering the port of Durban at dawn, still hazy from a late night, flanked by shipping containers stacked 4 stories high and looking for the warehouse to clear the clothing from customs... Things get a bit more interesting.

Words/Photos: Hamrock

Star/Cliffs/Swaziland Pt. 3

Having given our thanks in letting us tour her home, we waved goodbye to the old woman and children as we rode away in the back of the bakkie once more. Her smile and her wave faded as we drove further down the hill, stopping for errant farm animals and passing the day laborers who trek in and out of town. All stared at the spectacle of 3 Whites, one Coloured (RSA's legal classification for "mixed race") and our Black guides crammed into the cab and bed of the pickup flying past them at 50 mph. We unabashedly stared back, trying to understand the driving force that compels these men and women to town everyday while they probably tried to guess as to why so many disparate colors were mixing in the same car.

The amount of people walking in these groups bears mention and explanation before the rest of this post continues- as part of a government program to create jobs and lessen the impact that unemployment has on poverty and crime in the townships at large, 20 people are tasked to do a job that can be done by 5. Cutting grass on the side of the freeway? 12 people with weedwackers and butcher's aprons. Sweeping dirt roads with brooms to make the game parks nice for the tourists? It didn't make sense to us either, but thats 6 ladies, 6 brooms and 6 very large sunhats. I took econ twice -begrudgingly- but even to my admittedly number-phobic brain, that doesn't sound like a recipe for success, especially when money isn't really being generated by these jobs. The flip side is worse though; idleness generally leads down set paths in the slums, and that thought races through all of our minds when we tour the townships and see the hundreds -if not thousands- of primary and high school students walking home from class. What is to fill their time when they matriculate? Fr. Loftus rhetorically asked us this same question the first week we arrived, and we have yet been able to answer.

Uncertain futures are not a deterrent to these people though, and what we were about to pull up to put it all into perspective for us. Speaking to our driver through the little glass door between the cab and the bed of the truck, Charles told us we were in for a treat. We were flying down a rocky road atop the spine of this ridge, white-knuckling the sides of the truck, trying to duck from the dust and not let the previous bed's load of dried compost manure get in our shoes and socks. We finally skidded to a stop and hopped out. The left shoulder of the road sloped a little and our driver guided us down the decline while motioning with her hands to be careful. What we came up upon was absolutely breathtaking: were we standing on a cliff that extended as far as the eye could see north and south, with all of Swaziland splayed out a few thousand feet below us. We had come to the literal edge of South Africa, and were all awed by what we saw. While not a garden of eden, vast farm fields stretched here and there, and the glint of water in lakes, rivers and aqueducts shone in the distance. Charles explained that of the 2 major South African dams and reservoirs nearby, nearly 70 percent of each one's water supply went to wet Swaziland's fields. I am sure there was a compelling political reason for this, but one couldn't help comparing the rocky ledge and the country attached to it with the much greener one below.

After everyone had a moment with view and his or her thoughts, the conversation absentmindedly turned to things like how far the drop was; someone threw a rock, someone tried to spit all the way down to Swaziland. Normal guy stuff. "How do people get back and forth"? Our driver replied "well, the schoolchildren can make the climb in about an hour, but for older people like myself, it takes a little longer". "Oh", everyone nodded. "That makes sense", we thought. "Schoolchildren have tons of energy to use hiking up and down a mountain between two countries to get to school and receive the education they need". I think the sound of a record player scratching could be faintly heard in the distance. "Wait", we all replied at the same time. "Schoolchildren"? "Yes". "Hike up and down this mountain"? "Yes. An hour and a half each way". "...every day"? To this she just laughed, now aware that we were having a hard time processing this newfound fact of South African life. John, Ryan, Darryl and myself all visibly took this revelation in and wrestled with it. I know I compared my own remembered desire to attend Servite and measured it against 2000ish feet of mountain and sweat and heat... and homework. I am sorry to admit my desire was found lacking in this case. I am sure my fellow companions came to similar conclusions.

And in that moment, at least for myself, the bigger picture of South Africa came into focus that much more. The entire country and it's ethos might best be distilled into one kind of mantra that applies to everyone we have met up until now: Do what you need to get ahead, because the options otherwise are always at your heels. This driving force accounts for the hundreds we see walking miles to work everyday, the schoolchildren we see crowding the rural roads mere feet from passing cars, the 5 people we see doing the job of 1. The desire to better their land, their towns, their country, their life; it is most definitely alive. But like a lot of things in this country, it is hampered by the circumstances the government creates for the people. Corruption, inefficiency, and utter disregard for the people they are elected to serve runs rampant in all governmental circles. This translates to sometimes darkly comical misuses of money- go down any street in Durban, and you will see several street signs for the same street. One in Afrikaans or English crossed out in red, and the now-official one in Zulu above it. We were told that several hundred million Rand were alloted to each major city to change the signs. This kind of gesture may appease an annoyed public in a country whose economy and government run relatively well, but in one where the poor don't eat for days or ring the city limits in shanty towns several kms wide... you can imagine the general sentiment.

It is this position of addressing the cosmetic problems facing South Africa while ignoring the much more malignant roots that damns many of the people on the lower end of the economic spectrum. It is a bittersweet juxtaposition; the government may create jobs, but they do not have any system in place to effectively train the people to perform them. This problem becomes crippling when they mandate the advance of that grass cutter or road sweeper to positions originally held by "non-previously disadvantaged" business people. The effect is like promoting the custodian of a fortune 500 company to CEO; the business eventually crumbles, and the economy along with it- leaving more and more people destitute and trapped in poverty.

But in the face of all that, the spirit perseveres; the kids get up before dawn to walk to school, to go to work, to climb that mountain, to better their life. It is a lesson humbly received by us as we stand out on that cliff edge, backs to the cane smoke and rock, looking to the horizon.

Words: Hamrock

Photos: Hamrock

Star of the Sea and the cliffs of Swaziland Pt. 2

After two days and more than a few customary whiskeys with Thulani and Toland, it was time to continue our journey eastward to the mission in Ingwavuma. We awoke early to beat the midday heat, and after a few more conversations of future projects together, we said our farewells and took off. With most of the missionaries we have talked to, it has been a battle to try to warm them up to prospective ideas about how some Californian High School a world away can help them with their own causes; it seems the older generation is wary because of past experience and promises unfulfilled, the younger generation more hopeful but wary just the same at our suggestions and the work involved with committing to unproven relationships. Results are not out of the question, but this kind of mindset just makes one more obstacle to get passed in any case.

The road East out of Mnguzi was even more desolate than the one coming in, and as is par for the course, the landscape began to change immediately from sandy soil and palm trees and clear blue skies kept clear by ocean breezes to angry red soil studded with jet-black rocks, and thorn trees. As if to add insult, the cane smoke that plagues the midlands of the country seemed to follow us from Mtuba and sat with us the entire rest of the drive to the mission. This is funny because the nearest cane field was some 300 kms away at this point. The path itself posed a challenge as well with whole sections of road almost impassable in our little micro machine; with every pothole that ate our wheels we all held our breath to listen to any telltale sounds of escaping air. The road got better however, but the isolation of the potholes was replaced by locals driving up and down the mountain that Ingwavuma sits on with rallycar-like speed and absolute disregard for lanes, shoulders or the cliffs that plunged ever higher the more we climbed in altitude. Not too fun.

Once we got to the mission, we met with Fr. Charles, a native Nigerian and sole priest at this particular mission. He was a kind man, wearing knock-off diesel jeans and shorter than most of the South African Zulus. Since he was not a Zulu or Xhosa, it was interesting to hear his take on how matters in the country were progressing, with both the elected Zulu president, the semi radical ANC and the traditional Zulu monarch. We got a short tour of the mission grounds, saw the bat-piss ruined roof of the chapel, and then hopped into the back of a bakkie to visit the surrounding township and the houses that Fr. Charles helps out with. The woman who owned the vehicle and who was currently driving down the rocky roads at breakneck speed actually turned out to be sister to one of the 30 or so wives that was married to the Zulu King. She acts as Fr. Charles cohort, and sees it as her duty to help her people out. Pretty simple, pretty noble, but her conviction became clearer once Charles told us that the Zulu King receives something like 30 million Rand a month in government funds as his royal stipend to help out his people. Needless to say his people are left wanting while Ferrari, BMW and Mercedes ship their latest models to KwaZulu Natal. This fact was appalling because in the desolate mountain top we were now touring, people living among the scrub and smoke and rocks eeked out the sparsest living we had seen yet.

There was no fertile soil to plant gardens like in Mtuba, there was no sand like in Kozi Bay to make cement-making easier and less costly. No, here there was only heat, dust and rocks covered by a thin layer of soil. This geological makeup posed several obstacles, from the obvious to ones that we as Americans never faced until this moment. Let me frame it for you: have you ever played the game mine-sweeper on a Windows laptop? Or for you older folks and nostalgia freaks, a game of Battleship where you guess the position of the opponent and sink accordingly? Well in Ingwavuma, digging foundations for houses works much the same way, but in reverse. Not hitting rocks mere inches down in the soil is considered a victory, and a rare one at that. And like I wrote earlier, houses are the obvious thing that comes to mind when taking into consideration digging depth. I would give you a gold star if you mentioned water wells, but this is taken care of by pumps and a communal cistern up the road. No, the thing that blew our minds were the piles of rock we had to step over and pass to visit the first site that Charles took us to. With each step, we were passing over generations of the buried dead that had occupied this small little spot of land overlooking the green plains of Swaziland for decades. The question was so practical yet so foreign that it took most of us by surprise: where DO you bury someone when you can only dig a few inches into the soil? Well the answer was passing us by in the form of waist-high piles of rock mere feet away from the huts and the kitchen and the clear spot that served as the children's play area.

Initial shock aside, we strode into the clearing and met the matriarch in charge. As we walked up, this gnarled woman was busy mending her chicken coop, and after several minutes of translation learned that she had built most of the other structures there as well. Busy woman. She wiped her sweaty brow and took us on a tour of her little kingdom, then plopped down in the shade of her hut. Before doing so she gracefully thanked each one of us and stated that it was her great honor to receive guests, adding that it had been years since anyone else had come through. As we rode away from that meeting Fr. Charles explained to us that her husband had died some years prior and it was only her holding the family together. Someone asked her age and Charles replied with "93". With the conditions she lived with, I couldn't help but to think about how long it would be before she joined the mute piles of stone that served as sentinels to her rocky home...

Next post wraps up our trip to Ingwavuma and puts the words "hike", "hill", "school" and "2 hours up and down" into perspective.

Words: Hamrock

Photos include: Blurry street scene, Batpiss roof, Fr. Charles explaining Zulu royalty, Rocky clearing Rocky soil Rocky grave, Most stoked little kid ever- Ryan's luscious locks won him over, Matriarch with baby.

Photo Creds: C, H, H, H, H, H, C, H, H

Star of the Sea and the cliffs of Swaziland Pt. 1

So far in our travels for the project we have never trekked more than a hundred kilometers or so to visit the missions in the surrounding areas. Since most of you reading this are from our native Southern California, think of a tropical Corona-esque landscape painted with red earth and dotted with multicolored huts, cows and the occasional elephant or rhino and you can get a pretty accurate picture of what the scenery is like. Mtuba is more lush, closer to the sea and sitting amongst the eucalyptus timber orchards, while Hlabisa is more inland and situated in the hills a bit more. The human landscape remains the same however, huts and shanties and government housing, swarmed with scores of people winding their way through the scrub and brush walking. To school, to work, fashionably dressed or wrapped in rags, thumbs out trying to hitch or crammed into dangerously overloaded taxis, but always on the move; it is the daily African commute.
Having spent time at the local missions, our project turned to the missions out on the periphery, and while the landscape changed, this African dedication to get to where you needed to go by any means remained the same. We became jaded to it ourselves, and it may seem like business as usual to those reading, but it was very dramatically put into perspective for us on this last expedition...

We started out on the road early in the morning two weeks ago because our destination was the former Servite-run school and current mission of Star of the Sea up near the Mozambique border in a town called Mnguzi and just south of Kozi Bay. During the 3 hour car ride through game reserves in the middle of nowhere, the land slowly began to change. The eucalyptus gave way to small squat thorn trees, and those eventually gave way to even shorter palms, while sandy soil replaced the red clay. Townships spread further and further apart, and the road became a slalom course with the many potholes and skinny free range cows blocking the road. Finally after endless straightaways and two big roundabouts, we entered the town of Mnguzi. It looked much like any town we passed, but somehow different. More smiling faces than blank stares.

After driving through town and almost inadvertently crossing over into Mozambique sans passports, we finally spotted the cone dome of the mission, gunned it down a sand road, up a small hill and made it to the front steps. The mission itself sat atop the biggest hill in the area and the view it afforded was amazing. To the west you could just make out the coastline and spot a big lake a Km or two inland, while the rest of the horizon contained rolling hills and small farms. We headed to the mission house and met Fr. Toland, an Irish priest who had been at the mission for 40 years or so. The man we came to see, Fr. Thulani, a young and energetic Zulu Servite, was out at the moment so Toland took us on a tour of the adjoining high school. On the way out we rung the bell by the church which was salvaged off of an old dutch ship some time ago. Within seconds Fr. Toland's phone was ringing asking who had died. Apparently it is a sad bell, but Toland seemed amused. At the school we met with Michael the principal, who actually had visited Servite HS in Anaheim a few years ago and remembered it fondly. We told told him of our prospective plans for connecting the mission to Servite via internet, and he was pretty bummed because he is set to retire this year. Our tour concluded and we headed back to the mission across the sand path.

Fr. Thulani had come back during our tour, so as we sat down over a few glasses of whiskey and a dvd of traditional zulu dance, we discussed our plans with him. The man has a big laugh and even bigger personality, and talk was easy. He was receptive but undeniably wary though; throughout the 2 days we spent with him it became apparent that he hasn't had the best experiences with mission appeals abroad or promises of financial aid. We went to bed that night unsure of how our proposals were met, but stoked that Thulani would take us on a tour of some of the communities he serves in the morning. Ryan and myself lucked out and had to sleep in the former nunnery down the road, which would have been mellow except for the divebombing mosquitos all night. And then there were the explosive groans of the metal roof contracting in the cool of the night at 3 minute intervals. And then the chaotic and bizarre dreams brought on by our malaria medication; Ryan thought he was in some voyeuristic hidden camera African "Hostel" movie with a video of him sleeping projected onto the curtain of his room, while I dreamed of a child Zulu General in full military dress standing by my bed staring at me all night. More than once each of us thought of moving his bed into the other's room. "In case someone tried to mess with us" we told each other in the morning as we unlocked the razor wire gate to the compound we slept at.

We survived the ordeal though, and in the morning began our tour of the extreme bush that Thulani's Catholics live in. We traveled through town and about 50 kms into the bush to pick up one of his Caregivers, usually a local lady who lives in the bush herself but earns a few Rands by acting as Thulani's spokesperson and administrator in the area. Back on the main highway she told us to go down a sand path hidden by scrub, and 5 minutes later we came upon a clearing where a rural family scrounged their daily existence. The situation here was the same as any we had seen already: shacks fashioned out of sticks and stone and mud, most in disarray, with families of 8 or more crammed into spaces no bigger than office cubicles. The government supposedly provides free outdoor toilets, but in all the shacks we toured full chamber pots lay like landmines, and the air was thick with a night's worth of funk from the 8 people using them. Going outside at night was a risky option; this area was far enough into the bush that animals aren't confined to fences. We sat down to talk with the matriarchs of the family before heading off to tour the rest of the day, and what they said was pretty much repeated at each little settlement we visited: there weren't any jobs, whole families had to make do with what they could scrounge, and more often than not whole groups of people had to merge into one family because so many orphans were left behind due to aids, crime or premature death.

During the car ride back into town the topic somehow switched onto how Fr. Thulani reconciles his traditional Zulu heritage with that of a more structured Catholic ideology. His answer was eloquent in it's simplicity and pragmatic in what it implied, something that we can use ourselves as the weeks go by in this project: "I have to respect the culture that I come from. Through my education in theology, I can make sense out of the traditions we Zulu's have". And with that he said no more, but nothing else was needed: to reach his people, to make that impact, he molds his dogma to fit the people it is intended for. Not in ways that betray it's core tenants, but in ways that the people of his area can benefit from. In much the same way, this project needs to be molded as well, to better fit the people it strives to benefit. Our original goals have since been shaped by what we have encountered here so far, and only time will tell what the end result will be...

Next post sees the continuation of our journey through the NE corner of the country, our brush with Swaziland, rocky soil and 93 year olds, and the "hill" that schoolchildren get to climb to go to class everyday.

Words: Hamrock

Photo credit from the top: C, H, C, H, H, H, C, H, C, H, C, H, C, C, H, H, H, C, H

Photos include: The mission, Bell closeup, Landscape, typical street scene, Fr. Thulani showing us the first clearing- bush fruit in hand, typical hut, medicinal bush tea in teapot, sunset at mission, water jugs, new house next to old shack, lonely shoes with Fr. Thulani, walking with Fr. Toland, meeting with the matriarchs, school desk (advanced econ was on the chalkboard).

Month one.

I think this pic has been posted, but it's my favorite so here it is again.
The four of us left our humble and comfortable lives in sunny Southern California for a country that which I've heard 3 common themes from; the highest HIV/AIDS cases in the world, the highest crime rate in the world and great surf accompanied with the most sharks in the world. Those are some excellent selling points if you ask me! I was asked 100 times if I was nervous and the answer was always no. I can't lie and say I was not a little unsettled and anxious, but it always just felt like I already knew what we were going to do and it was just a matter of carrying out the act. I am more nervous now with the knowledge of what needs to be done upon returning home to truly make this project a success than I was before I left. The four of us have talked about this trip for the last 8 months or so and it has always been the same, "let's just take it as it comes and let everything work itself out." There were huge ups and tough lows we had to face in preperation, but everything seemed to fall into place at the last minute and we never lost faith. A month now has passed since we waved goodbye to Sky Harbour and set off onto what for the most part was a leap into the dark. After what seemed like a blink of an eye in London, we were right back on the flying British Vessel en route to Johannesburg without even a place to spend the night for our over night layover. This over night layover turned out to be the first of many unforgettable stories. We arrived in Joburg around maybe 7pm wearing shorts and tees and stepped out onto what I was sure was the tarmac somewhere in Antarctica. I thought to myself, "maybe the pilot took a wrong turn." When I hear Africa, the last thing I think of is freezing cold weather, but that's exactly what we got, 3 degrees celcius! Once we reached baggage claim we found a very helpful man and asked if he knew of any accomodations we could take advantage of near the airport for our one night in Joburg. He was quite convincing from what I could understand when he told us that all hotels were booked, but he knows of a beautiful "guest lodge" (aka someone's house) we can stay the night at and not only is it less than a 5 minute drive from the airport, but they will pick us up and drop us off! We were too tired and jet lagged to shop around so we set off in a mini van onto the highway... Well about 15 minutes into the "5 minute" drive, the 4 of us all started to silently question what we got ourselves into. 5 minutes later when we are turning onto a dirt road and heading into a neighborhood with nothing but homes, I think we all started to really dislike our decission not to shop around... Once we saw a garage open and us begin to pull into that garage I think we all said a silent prayer and tried to pretended like it was no big deal. After all was said and done the house turned out to be pretty comfortable, we had 2 rooms in the back and Scott and Darryl slept like babies. John and I however, had a broken heater, broken tv and a sliding door that didn't lock. Even though I was more tired than I can recall ever being, I still stayed up late into the night with my 3 inch pocket knife on my bedside table listening to what was no doubtly dog fighting matches in a park across the highway and endless drag races. The host in the house made us a nice breakfast in the morning and got us to the airport with plenty of time to spare and just like that our adventure was off! Leaving Los Angeles, we had little communication with anyone in South Africa, I wasn't even totally convinced Scott and I didn't get conned out of an $800 deposit for our accomedations untill we had the keys in hand! Once we arrived and got settled, everything seemed to come almost too smoothly. The 4 of us got into a groove and got on with what we set out to do. We visited the Servite missions, saw endless African countryside, delved into the African culture (both Afrika'ans and Zulu), ate local food, made new friends and even surfed twice now! This past month has flown by in what seems like no more than a week and sadly, Scott and myself had to see Darryl and John off just a couple days ago. We have seen some things that would make you cringe, some things that would make you cry and no doubtly some of the most amazing things you could imagine. When the 4 of us sat and watched the children at one of the scools do their traditional African dance, not a single one us spoke, just smiled and took it all in. Watching them so happy to dance and sing was a picture we will never forget. Most of the kids in that room have either lost one or both parents, friends, or family members, most likely lives in a house the size of many of your closets, eats one meal a day, walks about a mile to and from school and who knows what other unimaginable experiences- or all of them! Even with everything they are going through, they yelled, danced and smiled like the richest and happiest kids in the world. Just seeing this scene made the entire trip worth it. I knew going into this knowing there was going to be horrific disparities in every aspect of our trip and even with this knowledge I was still shocked. As cliche as it may sound, you can see stuff like you see here on a television all day long, but it doesn't really hit you untill you see it in person. Seeing exactly how good each and every person reading this truly has it in comparrison makes it almost an insult to complain about anything. I'm not saying anyone's life is easy, but some of the people here live a life that makes me feel like the most spoiled person alive. One month in South Africa with another month ahead of us. South Africa is a beautiful country with endless potential, but there is also just as many hurdles. There is a common phrase I've heard numerous times since I've been here, 'T.I.A.' This short phrase is used in times of triumph, glory, dispare, pride, hatred, disgust, sadness or hapiness. 'T.I.A.' is both a possitive and a negative. I've only been here a month and I already understand exactly what they mean when they say 'T.I.A.'- THIS IS AFRICA.

-R

Cruisin' the ZA

Traveling through South Africa, like everything else, is a far cry from state side travel. No congested freeways with a 20km trip that takes well over an hour. No carpool lane or 24 hour taxi service. Instead its endless 2 lane highways with sparse exits throughout burnt "bushland" and game reserves... Unnamed routes are often times identified only by fixed landmarks, not street signs... and these are just the paved roads. Anything off the main roads is a coin flip whether or not you will be off-roading in a mini compact "Corsa Killa" (our loving 4 door micro machine). The majority of these side roads are just tire-tracked dirt with 3 feet of bush on either side. Driving through these areas is guaranteed to get you lost unless you are with a local. Along with the chaotic and borderline NASCAResque car passings (which are totally common and acceptable here) are herds of local villagers hoofing it miles upon miles to reach unknown destinations. Monkeys, cattle, goats and sheep line the roads, no sidewalks or fancy billboards- just pure terrain. We are currently about 40km outside of Mtubatuba on R22 heading to a mission on the border of South Africa and Mozambique. The last "town" we passed was about 5 miles back and still we see random groups of people walking along the side of the hwy. If the constant burn of bush, trash and sugarcane didn't plague the air and cause a mirky horizon, these stretches of hwy could continue on for an eternity. As the 4 of us zone out in our own minds listening to the White Stripes for the 4 hour drive, we all silently still hold a bit of reserve for both safety and curiosity from all the stories we've heard of the "open bush" and highways in Africa. 27 degrees Celsius (ill let you convert that one) on a warm WINTERS day, 4 guys in a micro machine and 300km of open road... Just another day in ZA.
10/4/2010

-R

Check out a short video of what it is like: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nSfmhvIuFN8

Cuttin' Rug

Most mission visits we do for this project all follow the same basic routine. We go and introduce ourselves, make our pitches, talk about what existing aid that particular mission has in place, take a tour of the areas that this aid benefits, then see where Servite HS can fit into the equation. The areas we have toured have all been similar as well: extreme poverty, shacks for housing, little to no sanitation, high crime, etc. Through it all, children have been always present, and it is usually them that offer up the easiest smiles and friendliest waves. These glimpses of friendliness are like little points of light in an otherwise foreboding setting, as most of the time everyone else just stares back vacantly or with extreme skepticism as a couple of white guys walk around the favelas with cameras and notepads. We have to be delicate with our movements and questions. Body language goes far here, the prospect of free housing even further, and this all affects the people we are surrounded by. The children seem oblivious to it all however, and their stoke and attitudes help ease us into a comfortable space as we tour around.
Well, if those little smiles and waves were just glimpses, we got to witness a full panorama of the spirit behind those gestures a week ago as we visited the Bishop Jose Luis Ponce de Leon who stays at the mission in Hlabisa, about an hour north of Mtubatuba. After being led to the town by a young local Servite student in the area named Sifiso, we met with Fr. Jose Luis to discuss possible sites for the communication arm of our project. After the meeting we took a tour of the adjoining primary school, and as we walked up the small slope that separates church and state (the school is government run but sits on mission property), we started to notice a growing din. Clapping singing, stomping, whistling; it all got clearer and exponentially louder the closer we walked towards this one classroom. By the time we got to the door, the noise was so loud none of us could hear the other talk. Once that same door opened to let us in, we were all physically jolted as we entered by a rush of sound and an air thick with sweat, dust and intensity.
Thats really the only word you can use to describe it. Intense intensity. We had stumbled upon (or so the Bishop maintains) a dance rehearsal by the local students of a performance they had been learning for the past week to use in a contest that Saturday. We entered the classroom and kind of just filtered off to the left side of the room since that was the only space not vibrating with students dancing, jumping and singing about. The dance was a mix of traditional Zulu moves and calls. We all sat there with dropped jaws and took in the unreal moves steps kids were doing. Backbends, high kicks, twists, yelling, getting gnarly; it was plain as day that these kids were having a ball performing for their guests, and their enthusiasm was contagious. By the time it was all over, you couldn't help but wipe at misty eyes and grin like an idiot. Or at the very least someone who just witnessed something very special. We filed out the door with the performers and through the Bishop speaking Zulu told them we were blessed with having seen them practice and wished them luck in competition. With that they erupted in hand clapping and high fives, and almost ripped our arms off with handshakes. Literally- just take a look at the pictures. It was the closest any of us will ever get to being "boy band" famous.
The tour of the school went on after that: we met with the principal, talked about how the one meal they served there was the only food the majority of the students ate all day, how most were orphans making the commitment to go to school against daunting odds etc. Our thoughts kept returning to what we had just witnessed though, and it was hard to concentrate on the conversations that followed. The vibe of the dance was just so antithesis to the hard and ugly reality of what these children faced on a daily basis that we almost couldn't wrap our heads around it. It is naive to reduce this country and it's problems down to such a simple idea, but you get the impression that if you could get to these kids before Life knocks them around a bit and jades them out like a lot of the adults, then the future would be a brighter one countrywide...

Words: Hamrock

Photos include: Radical b/w by Ryan, dance practice, smiles, laughter. Last Supper-esque lunch with the Bishop, Sifiso and the deacon Mandla, Students playing, students cleaning.

Photo creds from the top: C, H, H, C, C, C, C, H, H, H, H

3/5

In between project business last week, we had the opportunity to be given a tour of the local Umfolozi/Hluhluwe game reserves by Fr. Loftus. He was a great tour guide, and must look the part because the people at the front gate didn't believe him when he told them he was just a priest. Within the first five minutes of driving we saw a hyena and several deer off in the distance. Pretty cool, but lacking in the excitement department. We were all on alert for bigger game because the rangers at the gate let it slip in Zulu that lions were seen feasting on a giraffe carcass a few kms from the entrance. We drove to the spot but failed to see any flowing manes, hear any roars or see any carcasses being feasted upon.
We DID however see a family of 3 white rhinos scurry off into the bush, and not 10 minutes later we came upon a little pack of giraffes. The rest of the day consisted of deer, some buffaloes, more lame deer, impala, zebras (which look a lot less noble up close. Think "exotic donkey"), washboard roads and lots of dust. We stopped at Hilltop Camp within the reserve and had some decent burgers and sampled some African beers overlooking the park and the Umfolozi river that snakes it way through the scrub and brush. The view was pretty hazy from the ever-present cane smoke, but if you squinted hard enough and added a bit of imagination, you could almost see herds of elephants and prides of lion roaming the landscape.
We paid the bill and left, all of us exhausted from the constant neck craning and rough roads; happy that we saw 3 out of the famous Big 5, but bummed we seemed to have missed out on lions and elephants. But by some insane stroke of luck, the shape of an elephant cresting a nearby ridge came into view just as we rounded a bend on the downhill. The road we were traveling on was actually taking us on an intercept course, and by the time the our two paths converged, the lone bull elephant and our truck were only 30 yards away from each other. We braked to a stop and all just sort of quietly stared out the window while the bull sized us up. He was magnificent, every bit as noble a creature there ever was, his white ivory glinting in the afternoon sun. Our collective moment of awe came to a close with Fr. Loftus honking the horn and getting the old bull to flap his ears in return. "Thats what they do when they are about to charge" he casually added. And with that comment we shifted into gear and rumbled off, leaving the flapping ears unchallenged... Next week sees us visiting the Bishop in Hlabisa since he is the authority on technological advice in the area and we are eager to move forward with our communication goals. Stay tuned.

Words: Hamrock

Photos include: Zebra, kudu and impala drinking from the Umfolozi river, a shy white rhino, impala closeup, lounging buffalo, giraffe striking a pose, elephant on the ridge from a distance, elephant getting ready to charge

Photo creds from the top: C, C, C, H, H, H, C, H, H