Conversations and Observations
As I’d hoped, I’ve been having a lot of conversations with the people I’m meeting along the way. Some things I’ve heard and seen:
- Sitting with a couple Indian twentysomethings at a local bar, I asked, so, “What do you think of the new South Africa?” They replied, “We get to go where we want… and we get to speak to people like you.”
- At a market in downtown Durban, I stopped to watch a lively outdoor performance with several hundred others. I thought it might have been an evangelistic crusade. Someone was passing out flyers, so I asked for one. He grinned, then handed me a flyer advertising the amazing tribal cures of the witch doctor who was performing. He told me he was from Malawi, that he’d been traveling from place to place and that he was passing out flyers just to get a few rand to survive. He told me he wanted to come to America (and this is hard to say) to “work for a white man like me”.
- Looking for fish in the tidal pools at Umhlanga Rocks, I ran into two small Indian boys who were doing the same. None of us were having much luck, so I ran to a beach shop and got some nets for all of us. Their mother insisted that I join them for some Kentucky Fried Chicken and that I visit them at their home.
- Speaking to two white South Africans at a café on the beach, I asked about their experience in the new South Africa. After griping about how difficult it was for them to get their black African clients to pay their debts, they lamented the terrible reality that because of AIDS, the death rate in South Africa now exceeded the birth rate. I later heard on the radio that life expectancy in South Africa has dropped from 64 to 46.
And some observations…
- Overall, I’m very impressed with the state of things in South Africa. It seems like there are new initiatives and new construction everywhere I look. The roads are in excellent condition. I’ve heard and read that the economy is booming. Everyone is friendly. And as always, the natural beauty is stunning and still mostly unspoiled.
- Like in the US, there is a great deal of self-segregation. If you walk the beach from south to north along the Durban beachfront, you’ll notice that the first beach is almost exclusively white and that the subsequent beaches are almost exclusively black. The surfers, however, break the color line for the waves at Battery Beach and there are a few other white families in the paddling pool and on the amusement rides. Umhlanga Rocks, an upscale beach further up the coast where I’ve been staying is mostly white and Indian. On the other hand, in some places, like the Gateway Mall, you will see exactly why South Africa is called the “rainbow nation”. There are many places where there is intermingling and interaction… the difference from the past is unmistakable.
- The pervasiveness of American culture is striking. The music and entertainment, even the trivia questions on a TV gameshow, are largely from or abouut the US. And, I’d even say, unlike in Europe, there remains in many an awe and reverence for the USA. At a locker rental, a young teen asked me to tell me everything I would about the US, and of course, if I’d met any celebrities. Talking with a young surfer in the waves with me, he too was so curious about America.
