From LAX to Soweto

Before anything else happens, I must thank you all.
For all the encouragement
For all the affirmation
And for all the love
I have received from every one you—in one way or another—this past year or three or more.
Without it none of what I am about to tell you would be possible.
It has meant a thousand times more to me than I could ever tell you.
So thank you.
Every last one of you.

Now where to begin?

I am in South Africa.

I will be spending the next month or so in Cape Town, which may be just about the most gorgeous city in all the world.
Then I will be heading to the African Enterprise Center in Pietermaritzburg to carry out the semester through December 10.

Needless to say, it is all very exciting.
Even borderline overwhelming.

The journey began just last Thursday, with a 4 am bus ride to LAX. I said my goodbye to the states in typical American fashion with one last caffeine fix at Starbucks and boarded my first of three planes in two days en route to Cape Town. In part because my memory is hazy and in part because air travel is bad enough on its own without someone giving a painfully boring account of it, I will spare you all of the gruesome details of my travels. The gist is this: Twenty hours of flight, nine time zones, and one short layover later, my body surfaced somewhere in Johannesburg International Airport on Friday afternoon.

On Saturday, after a much-needed shower and night of quality rest, our group quickly repacked and headed for a day of sight seeing before catching an evening flight to Cape Town. With the Apartheid Museum and Soweto—a poor black township in the Johannesburg area famous for its role in the fight against the apartheid—on the list of destinations, the tour promised to be a rather solemn one. And of course, it delivered. It also, however, was far too brief to do any sort of justice to the apartheid’s indescribable significance in South Africa. In fact, it was ten minutes into a very inspiring short documentary about black civil uprisings in the 1980s that I was told we needed to get a move on for the airport.

It’s kind of like subtly mentioning to an eight-year-old during his surprise birthday party at Chuck-E-Cheese boy that his favorite dog has died.

I mean, it’s really great to be playing Ski Ball and everything, but I wouldn’t mind addressing this whole dead pet business.

But I’m sure I’ll have all semester for that.

Another word on Soweto though before I move on:

Though some parts of the township have certainly improved since the end of apartheid, a great deal of the community still lives in extreme poverty. Crammed into tiny shacks, the poorest sections of Soweto are breeding grounds for infection and disease. HIV/AIDS blazes through the poorest townships in South Africa. As far as percentages are concerned, I have heard a wide range of numbers thrown into the conversation (anywhere between 30% and 75% of them will contract HIV). But no matter what the statistics, the notion of a growing AIDS pandemic in Africa is soon becoming a concrete reality in my mind.

And all I did was drive by in a cushy, air conditioned, tour bus.

It really speaks volumes to our disconnection with the level of poverty, disease, and injustice around the world doesn’t it? That we can come face to face with living hell in Africa and still be more or less consumed in our own little amenity-filled world.

It is a revelation, no, a reality that—I pray—will continue to confront me and even, at times, haunt me throughout my time here.

There of course, is still much more to write.

But I will save that for a later post.