A few brief thoughts before I return to NYC . . .

Molweni,

So my time here in Cape Town is rapidly drawing to a close.  My flight for London leaves Cape Town at 8:05 p.m. TOMORROW (that's 1:05 p.m. Monday in New York City) and I'll land in Newark some 23 hours later.  I've found it a little hard to pull my thoughts completely together and, as a result, this posting will be shorter than my last several postings have been.

If you've been following along these past few months, you know that I have gained so much from my time in Cape Town and South Africa; I feel recharged, refocused and ready to begin a new chapter in life.  I am grateful that I had the opportunity to come to here, to participate as an international volunteer with Cross-Cultural Solutions, and to work for what feels like such a brief moment at the Scalabrini Centre.  And I am also thankful that I allowed myself to take this opportunity, and that I did so with an openness and zest that had been increasingly rare for me . . .

But now, as I sit here with my things mostly packed away and ready for the return trip home, I feel anxious to return to the States, excited to catch up with as many of you as I can, and eager to get the next step sorted out in my life.  My time away from home as made me realize that my frustrations with the City were less about New York itself and more about how little I enjoyed my work (and how much I foolishly let the ill-fitting profession consume me personally).  So, as much as I'm torn and would LOVE to stay here for a longer block of time, the desire to get my own professional life in order and to reconnect with everyone back Stateside keeps that longing in check.  Plus I already have enough frequent flier miles for another round trip ticket from New York City to Cape Town, so the reality is that I'll likely be able to return at some point within the next year.  All this has made it a bit easier for me to leave the Mother City.

I will have a longer posting up once I get back to New York City and recover from jet lag, and that will have the list of similarities that I see between South Africa and the United States that I mentioned in my last post.  My apologies for not having the list available for you now, but I just didn't have the concentration to pull it together this week.  And, knowing me and how much I've enjoyed my time here, my next entry will also probably be a "ndiyakuthanda" (Xhosa for "I love you") posting to Cape Town, South Africa, and the people I've met here.

So, until the next posting, all of my best to each of you.

Sala kahuhle,

Troy

South Africa Week 8 - Safari!

Finally, safari pictures! It's only part of the mass of pictures I took but it's an uncaptioned start!

The Capacity of the Human Spirit - Week 9 in South Africa

Molweni,

Well, I’m now in my final week in Cape Town.  And the reality that I’ll be back in the New York City area almost exactly one week from now looms so large that I can no longer pretend to not think about it.  Truth be told, since I’ve returned from my week of traveling, I’ve reflected more on my entire time here than I had prior to my trip to Jo’burg, Kruger and Victoria Falls.  And this posting will reflect some of that thinking . . .

The Employment Help Desk (EHD) at the Scalabrini Centre reopened to clients last Monday, the 8th of November, and we were busier than I’d seen since my arrival.  Part of the reason was simply a result of the fact that the EHD had been closed for an entire week, and that had lead to some pent-up need for the desk’s services.  On top of that, last week was the deadline for foreign-qualified teachers to register with Scalabrini to be considered for part of the centre’s teachers program for the upcoming term, which places a select number of teachers as sort of “teaching fellows” in South African schools.  There’s a shortage of teachers in South Africa, and a sizeable number of refugees and asylum seekers who were teachers in their home countries (many of whom have been working as waiters, cashiers, housekeepers or nannies since they got to South Africa); the program acts as a way to address the local teacher shortage, while serving as a possible route to suitable employment for some of Scalabrini’s clients.

I worked on doing new client intake all week, and there were between 35 and 40 of them who came through.  Not only did the new client intake work keep me focused on the very real, and in some cases almost desperate, need for the EHD’s service, but it also was a vivid reminder of the enormous capacity of the human spirit.  I’m sure that probably doesn’t make much (if any!) sense, so let me explain by sharing a v-e-r-y watered down version of what I was told by two clients last week . . .  Each client came from the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, where each had been living in close proximity to his or her extended family (i.e., they lived in the same neighborhood or town as their parents and their siblings’ families).  In the continuing violence that has engulfed the eastern D.R.C. as part of “Africa’s World War,” the client saw his or her entire immediate and/or extended families killed.  The client was “spared” to tell the tale, was hidden in the back of shipping trailers, and then was driven overland (or, more appropriately, “shipped”) to South Africa.  Each arrived in Cape Town around the time that the 2008 xenophobic attacks against refugees flared in South Africa, so each spend several months in temporary refugee camps here in the Western Cape. 

Each client shared this story with me neither with detached emotion nor with emotional outbursts; the stories were relayed in a quiet, deliberate and determine way.   And their desire for a better life – to my American way of thinking, a brighter future – was conveyed to me with this same quiet and deliberate determination.  And it is because of this that the resilience of the human spirit is so fresh in my mind.  I have said it many times since I’ve been here, but I’ll say it again – I have been spiritually humbled and reborn as a result of my time here and my interactions with Scalabrini’s clients and staff.  This last week, a week which I had thought I would not have much to write about, was no different and I am a person further transformed as a result.

Before I go any further, I feel that I need to back track a little bit, sorry.  Up until this posting, I haven’t even tried to share any client stories with you.  I have a tremendous respect for all of Scalabrini’s client and, as a result, I have been and am hesitant to share the details of their stories here online (after all, who am I to tell THEIR stories?!).   So, the collective story that I just shared with you was only the bare minimum of facts – devoid of the personal details that make the individual stories all the more compelling and the clients’ determination to move forward all that more profound.  At this minimal state, the story I just shared reflects the basic facts of stories that were shared with me by no less than four clients during my time at Scalabrini (and not just the two who happened to come in during the same week).  By stripping out the often horrid personal details from the stories, I don’t feel as if I’m conveying an individual’s story to you.  Rather, I am trying to voice concern over the level of atrocities that are being committed by our fellow man and, in so doing, hope that both your and my consciousness are raised ever so slightly.   My apologies for the digression . . . now back to the main stream of thought in this posting.

When I decided to volunteer in South Africa, I was more aware than your average American about South African history, culture and current state of affairs.  But that was still woefully inadequate, and I have to thank the South Africans (and Africans from elsewhere on the continent) that I’ve met for opening my eyes and my mind to some of the complexities that have existed, and still persist, here.  As I’ve thought back over my time here, I keep noticing many odd similarities between South Africa and the United States (I’ll try and pull together a list for my final pre-departure posting for you all next week).  I will leave here more convinced than ever that the similarities that we all share all as humans – no matter where on the globe we live – by far outweigh the cultural, ethnic, language and religious differences that we all too often focus on.

So, with that, I’m going to finish this posting and try to get some of the safari pictures up for you all.   I hope to post again just before I leave on Monday, so best wishes to you all until then.

Sala kahuhle,

Troy

The Big 5 & The Smoke That Thunders - Week 8 in Southern Africa

Molweni,

Sorry for an almost week-long delay in getting a posting up.  My internet connection is a bit more limited these days (sort of like my finances are at the moment . . . LOL!), so it's taken me a bit longer to finish the post.  Last week was my week of holiday, so this posting will be a little different that the others I've had so far.  That out of the way, let me get started -- finally!

I won't bore you all with the play-by-play travel details; I'll save those for conversations over coffee or smart adult beverages with each of you (Gramma, perhaps you'd fire up the coffee maker now!).  Instead, I'll just give you some random thoughts from the one week during my time in Southern Africa where I acted like a tourist for the better part of the week . . .

• I continue to be happily startled out of that "New Yorker silence" by South African's friendliness.  I wasn't even halfway to Jo'burg and I was already talking a mile a minute and listening intently to the two men who were sitting next to me on my flight from Cape Town.  It only continued as I engaged in a lengthy discussion about some of the similarities between the United States and South African with Tsepho, the 22-year-old driver who picked me up at the hotel at 5:30 in the morning as we started the nearly eight-hour drive from Jo'burg to Kruger.  And, as I mentioned in my last post, I met some wonderful people while on Safari and have managed to stay in contact with nearly a dozen of them.  Oh, and, yes, I still am sorting through the safari pictures and I'll try to upload a collection of them to a web album tomorrow (Anneke and Owen, sorry for the delay)!

• Jo'burg isn't the prettiest city I've visited, and it certainly is nowhere near as beautiful as Cape Town -- the pictures I posted tell that story more clearly than I can describe -- but I'm glad that I got a chance to drive around and see some of the city's sights.  It took me a bit to adjust to the busier rhythm of Jo'burg and it reminded me that I'd best brace myself for the return to New York City (which, by the way, I still don't want to think about all that much!), but I was able to adapt and to take the city in.  All that said, staying at the Hands on Retreat made it easy to settle in and relax a bit!

• The Apartheid Museum in Jo'burg was among one of the most informative things that I've had the opportunity to see during my time here in South Africa.  The museum's design and layout alone were impressive and they did a good job of conveying the sense of growing darkness, foreboding, tension, fear, mistrust and isolation of life under Apartheid.  I had forgotten that the Apartheid regime had declared a state of emergency in 1986, which was followed by another round of brutal repression for several years (you can watch a clip of some of the unrest by following this link), and then the mass student demonstrations once the restrictions were eased in 1988.  This was during my time at the University of Rochester, and it brought back for me the sense of urgency that the UofR's South African Awareness Committee had about its work putting pressure on U.S. companies to divest of their South African business until Apartheid came to an end.  (Seriously, with all the crap that rattles around in my head, how did I manage to forget THAT?!?!?!)

• Victoria Falls -- the "smoke that thunders" -- in Zimbabwe was breathtaking, and I was there during dry season so I only got to see half of the falls!  The Ilala Lodge in Vic Falls was fantastic and the staff was immensely helpful and incredibly friendly.  Visiting Zimbabwe gave me just a teeny, tiny, fleeting insight into why so many Zimbabweans venture south of the boarder to South Africa.  As friendly and as quick to laugh as Zimbabweans were, there was a hushed code that quickly came about when the subject turned (read, when this foolish American asked) about the current state of the country.  The following are perhaps the easiest and quickest examples of the precariousness of the situation in Zimbabwe:
• After talking with a local for about 45 minutes, I asked if the next election was to take place in 2011.  The response I got was startling -- the local confirmed that elections were supposed to take place, but then wasn't sure that they would be held because the country doesn't have the money to hold the election (and see this from the Voice of America).  And when I was at the Vic Falls airport waiting for my return flight, the power at the Vic Falls airport went out . . . twice.  Keep in mind, this was in Victoria Falls, less than a 1.5 hour flight from Jo'burg, the tourism capital of Zimbabwe, home to a world heritage site and one of the seven natural wonders of the world!  And I hear that things are worse off elsewhere in the country.

As much as I enjoyed traveling, I happily returned to Cape Town and to my volunteer work at the Scalabrini Centre.  This week, my ninth in Southern Africa, will be my last week on the Employment Help Desk and I'll spend next week, my tenth and final full week here, doing work on the skills training database for Scalabrini.  I can already sense that the next several postings will be weighted with my trying to sum up, and to wrap my head around, my time here, the wonderful people I've had the privilege to meet, and how lucky and fortunate I am to have had this opportunity.  But I will cross that bridge soon enough . . .

So, until then, may peace and happiness be yours.  All the best to each of you and I look forward to catching up with you very soon.

Sala kakuhle,

Troy

Southern Africa, Week 8 (Vic Falls, Zimbabwe)

Here's a link to the web album of photos from Zimbabwe. As with most of the other pictures I've uploaded this evening, I haven't had a chance to put the photo captions on these pictures just yet (sorry!) but I'll try to do so this week. I hope to have pictures from the safari, and a posting about last week's adventures up within the next several days.

All the best,

Troy

Week 8 - Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe Photos

South Africa, Week 8 (Jo'burg)

And here's a link to nearly two dozen pictures from Johannesburg. A link to pictures from Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe, to follow . . . Week 8 - Jo'burg Photos

South Africa, Week 7 (final week with CCS)

Here's a link to the first set of pictures (finally!) from the last two weeks. This set is from two weeks ago, so they're all from my last week at CCS. The captions will follow...as will pictures from last week's adventures!

South Africa Week 7 (final week with CCS) photos

Reflections - Week 7 in Cape Town

Molweni,

Sorry that it's been about a week and a half since my last posting.  Last week was a bit of an odd week, as I'll explain more fully below, and I didn't have the time to pull my thoughts together to post anything before the weekend.  And, as I'll also explain in a bit, once the weekend sent in, I was off to Jo'burg for a day and then off to a game reserve near Kruger National Park for a four-day safari.  So, today is the first day that I've been able to sit down with a reliable internet connection and get a little something up.

So, why was last week an odd week?  The Scalabrini Centre is holding a week-long training session this week and, as a result, the Employment Help Desk (EHD) is closed to clients.  I had the option of attending the training session run by the Alternatives to Violence Project, but that would have meant that my eighth and final week of volunteer work would have been spent at the training session.  So, I offered to switch around some of the travel plans that I had after placement so that I would be out on "holiday" this week and then return to Scalabrini next week to work on the EHD my last week.  This meant that I formally had to end my Cross-Cultural Solutions (CCS) placement a week early -- the program doesn't allow for breaks during a volunteer placement (meaning I would have either had to attend the training session at Scalabrini or volunteer for a week with another community-based organization here in South Africa) -- so last week was my final week in the CCS Cape Town home base.  And now you have a little color as to why last week was an odd week.

Week seven in Cape Town would up being a week where I felt increasingly "settled" in the Mother City.  Captonians have made it very easy for me to fall in love with South Africa and I am finding it difficult to grapple with the thought of winding things up here.  As I've noted before, South Africa and South Africa's Mother City are physically stunning -- to the point of being almost intoxicatingly beautiful -- and I feel as if I have been welcomed with a genuine warmness and graciousness that has been as refreshing as it has been disarming.  And the people I've worked with at Scalabrini -- both the volunteers and the clients -- have taught me so much more than I feel that I have been able to offer in return.  So, I am trying NOT to think about my return . . . but the reality is that I will be sitting in Brooklyn in less than 20 days.

Leaving the CCS program was a bit harder than I'd envisioned.  First and foremost, the in-country staff at the CCS Cape Town home base were absolutely fantastic and I've gotten to know most of them and consider them part of my circle of friends.  Fortunately, I have the chance to head back to the home base next week to stop in, to say hello, and to give my personal thanks to the staff, and I will most certainly be doing so. 

Add to that the fact that I developed strong connections with almost everyone in the second group of volunteers who came to the home base in October, so that only added to the emotions.  Amanda, Krupa, Sheila and Tracy, here's hoping you either made it home safely and have been able to hold on to some of the spirit of CCS Cape Town as you return to work, or that you're enjoying your pre-return travels!  Dana, Elizabeth, Erin, Jessie, Kera, Laura and Nikki, here's hoping you get just as much -- if not more -- out of your extended stay with CCS Cape Town as I did!

So, I'm now in South Africa traveling a bit.  I thoroughly enjoyed my four-day safari and I met some fantastic people who I plan to keep in contact with.  I'm actually heading to the Apartheid Museum and taking a tour of Jo'burg with Dorinne and Elio, two of the other travelers who were on safari the same time I was, tomorrow.  And I should be able to meet up with Anneke and Owen (two other fellow safari travelers) for coffee, dinner or some more Amarula once I get back to Cape Town.  I'll post pictures from my last week with CCS, and from the safari, Jo'burg and this upcoming weekend's trip to Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe, as soon as I get through my travels.  I'll also have another blog post once I get back to Cape Town (so hopefully the post will be up on Sunday or Monday evening).  That post with have more on my travels in this part of the world.

I'll spend next week staying in the City Bowl and giving Scalabrini the eighth week of volunteer work that I came to South Africa to provide.  I can only hope that I'll be able to begin to collect my thoughts about this place and the people that have gotten to know in a way that allows me to convey those thoughts to you.  For now, I'll just wish you all well from South Africa, the place where the oldest traces of humankind have been discovered.

Sala kahuhle,

Troy