this weekend brings two other roommates to the house (both s. african); yesterday one said to me "what's the difference between a tourist and racist? Two weeks." I know, damn. On Monday I would have just blown him off as a douche bag and moved on. But what's so upsetting is, I don't think he's all wrong. Maybe I just expected too much out of this country; I really thought I was coming to a place like Europe or the States, but with a whole lot of color. There are places that look like the developed world, but the places that count dont. For instance, our building (the dept of health of the entire country) has over 15 floors and only one of the four elevators work... if that. There is an x-ray machine for our bags when we enter the building, but no one to watch it. I set my bag down and pick it up on the other side... there could be a gun, a knife, whatever in it and it would go right through. Half the time there isn't even any internet in the building. If the workers want reliable internet they should go out and purchase 3G cards on their own for their computers.
I find myself getting visibly frustrated everyday. Things were worse in Ghana and Haiti for sure, but I expected that. I finally let the thoughts running through my head get the better of me at work and just asked "is this how things were when the whites ran S. Africa?" The reply was, this is an old building that's why things are like this. Bullshit! It's not a matter of white and black it's a matter of education.
My german roommate (she loves s. africa, dates a boy from the township, dislikes the white S. africans) blames apartheid for the problems I bring up. I really think her white guilt has gotten the better of her. She's not wrong, apartheid bares the bulk of the blame, but... I don't know. I see a lot of unqualified, unintelligent people in really important positions. I understant black should have political power here; but why not keep a blacks in the upper echelons and then hire people(black, white, indian, whatever) that know what they are doing for the rest of the positions. To me this is a situation of affirmative action gone ridiculous.
These are all the ramblings of some privileged American whose been here less than a week.
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I love how love of the place was validified by both her romantic affinity and her ability to hate one group)
ReplyDeleteIt all sounds well beyond my scope of understanding but keep talking so later in life I can pretend to know something about it. Don't worry I'll give you credit. Enjoy yourself more. Talk to you later.
first of all...miss u muchisisisimo.
ReplyDeleteabout the affirmative action. give it some time Mon Cherie. think about our great EE.UU. the whites in this country when forced to give up their jobs to minorities where pissed too. first thing they did was not help them and made their lives miserable for taking such jobs. then what did they do? filled the minorities' positions with educated internationals. africans for blacks, spaniards,argentinians,chileans for mexicans and other hispanics, pacific islanders with chinese (ok exaggerating w the last one)
one of the nigerians i did research with told me the way he fled nigeria was by south africa giving him a job since they needed to fill the A. action quota unfortunately south africa didn't know he was planning to leave south africa to come to the EE.UU. Why stop in SA if he can then go to a 1st world country.
ok gonna stop now, because all my info in based in a very unreliable Journal.......My Brain journal. and you know how deceitful that one is. but... if anyone can contribute financially to it to make it more reliable go for it...or atleast dress it up and make it more fashionable.
by the way i went to have shisha tonight with some arabs celebrating Ramadan.. bring on the holidays.
miss you