“Some journeys are so inspiring that the very course of our life changes.”
Welcome back! After an intense two months of travel, work, and life-defining moments I finally have time to recommence a regular posting schedule and I can think of no better way to kick it off then with a brief overview of my trip to South Africa to take in the 2010 FIFA World Cup. I am not going to speak too much about the actual football – the tournament was wonderful, some of the games spectacular and the thousands of Kiwis were blown away by the passion and determination of our All Whites in finishing the ONLY unbeaten team in 2010.
What struck me most about South Africa was the massive contrasts that you do not experience in the more developed world. For every negative stereotype of Africa, there is an equal, and positive experience. For every example of racism, there is another example of inclusion. South Africa is a country of great wealth – from their people, natural beauty, mineral wealth and great cities – and great poverty. And, unfortunately, South Africa is completely misunderstood by those who know nothing about the place.
The Stereotypes
1: South Africa is a racist country
Yes … and No. I will preface this by acknowledging that I have no experience of South Africa during the Apartheid years so my reflections are necessarily going to be coloured by that – and by my own perspective as an indigenous Maori New Zealander. Race and South Africa is a complex issue and everywhere you go you see that people struggling to come to terms with it. I was speaking to a black man during our final match in Polokwane and he made three very interesting observations to me about the relationship between blacks and whites in South Africa.
- Whites live in the cities, Blacks in the Townships;
- Whites work for the foreign and private companies, Blacks work for the Government; and
- Whites do not really want to be friends with Black people.
Now, I should stress that that is just one perspective. But, nonetheless, some of it resonated with my experience. The whites do live predominately in the cities, in their gated and fortified residences, and the black community remain in the townships. The townships, however, are certainly not what they are made out to be. The residents are happy, friendly, and have formed a true community around each other – something money simply cannot buy.
In a sense, there still is an element of segregation but you do get the feeling that this is slowly changing. Throughout our travels we spent a lot of time staying with friends of friends, all white, and all showing the new face of South Africa – that of black and white living, working, and socialising together. For them, race was not an issue at the social level, only at the political level.
As you can see, there is more than one story of South Africa – there are thousands. Each demonstrating the complexity of the issue of race and reconciliation in the country. Regardless of these stories, when it came to Bafana Bafana, and the other Africa teams for that matter, every South African was united in support.
2: South Africa is unsafe
Yes, there is a lot of crime, and a lot of violent crime. But at no point in my 2.5 weeks there did I feel unsafe. While there were a few instances of foreigners being attacked, it was nowhere on the scale predicted by many, mainly European, nations. One of the frustrating elements, however, was the amount of propaganda on South African state television. There was virtually no mention of crime on any of the news bulletins and very little political discussion. South Africa was presented to the visiting world as an all-inclusive, safe, and developed nation. No doubt the story that South Africa wants to believe in, but you cannot hide all the unsavoury elements of your nation simply because the world is watching. With the Rugby World Cup coming to New Zealand next year, I only hope our media does not attempt to hide the problems our country faces.
3: South Africa is a poor country and will always be one
This is just plain wrong. Yes, there is poverty – and in cases, extreme poverty. But South Africa shows all the signs of quickly becoming a well-developed nation. In many respects, it already is. Wonderful highways link every corner of the country, great mineral reserves is bringing wealth to the country and to local tribes, tourism is thriving, as are the big cities of Johannesburg, Durban and Cape Town. My main impression of South Africa is that it is little different from most of Europe. Slums, poverty, social inequity and racism is not restricted to the African continent – these all exist in Europe, North America and in Australasia. The economies of Greece and Spain have been destroyed; racism is rife throughout continental Europe; and poverty and social inequity is a problem affecting the entire world.
We cannot sit in the comfort of the western world and cast South Africa in such a stereotypical light when the exact problems they face are blighting our own society. Yet, such stereotypes exist – on my return I was at a dinner party and an elder man made the comment that South Africa will be a basket-case in 20 years because “it is being run by the blacks”. He attributed all the success and wealth of South Africa to the whites and believed that black rule would see the destruction of all the gains made. Despite no first-hand experience of South Africa, he felt confident enough in the superiority of whites and the inferiority of blacks to make this comment. As I explained to him, the experience is vastly different from the stereotype. There are multiple stories of South Africa, but what cannot be doubted is the shared goal of both whites and blacks to ensure the prosperity of South Africa. That is something to be celebrated, and supported.
Top 10 Highlights
10: Having time for long, philosophical, discussions with my travelling companions about life, love, and travel.
9: The friendly South Africans we met everywhere out journey took us.
8: Living behind barbed wire and electric fences for two and a half weeks.
7: Touring the beautiful Blyde River Canyon with our wonderful local host.
6: The utter elation felt by every New Zealand supporter during our three draws – we were so pumped that after each match everyone stayed in the stadium for up to an hour singing and chanting our support for the All Whites!
5: Watching Invictus on the flight to Kuala Lumpur. It only takes one person to forever change the shape of the world, truly inspirational. After seeing what it meant to South Africa, it helped me be at peace with being on the losing end of that 1995 Rugby World Cup final.
4: Chatting to a local during our match in Polokwane about racism, life, and the impact of the World Cup on the local black population.
3: Seeing three lions during a 6:00am game drive in Kruger National Park.
2: The a-mazing journey with Josie and Nat, and all the other people we met along the way.
1: Watching New Zealand hold the reigning World Champions to a 1-1 draw in Nelspruit.
This post is really interesting because I’m trying to correlate it with my experiences in South Africa almost 10 years ago during a two week vacation. While we didn’t notice any element of racism (I was too young to notice these things through mere observation), we were told not to travel to certain parts of town at night. On the face of it, South Africa seems pretty well developed, but it’s only once you travel to the suburbs that you notice it’s like any other African/Asian country; unemployment rates are exceptionally high (over 40%) as is the poverty rate. The world cup may have done plenty for the country in terms of infrastructure development, but the greatest benefit (as I recently read in the newspaper) is the strengthening of the feeling of community, of social unity, of overlooking all political/economic differences and celebrating the prosperity of South Africa.