A Typical Day

I know that I just posted yesterday but I received an email from a friend who asked if I would blog about a typical day for me at the centre. I can tell you that the only consistent thing each day is getting up and going running. That is if I am going to be at the centre at 8:30. Once I get to the centre my day varies. I think this is what I love about being here. Each day brings a new experience for me. I may not even get the computer turned on and someone wants to see me. These visits can be young people wanting to share their dreams about furthering their education but do not have the funds. Like so many in the townships, they want to break out of their cycle of poverty. The next visit might be a young man or woman struggling with their sexuality and they know that the JL Zwane Centre is a safe haven to be able to talk about who they are. The townships are not a place where people can live openly gay. Like a person diagnosed with HIV/AIDS, they are stigmatized and can be ostracized from their families and friends, that is why there are so many that are not open about their sexuality or their HIV/AIDS status. Johanna, the social worker at the centre, will come and ask me if I can drive her to visit a person dying of cancer, or visit a woman who has had both legs amputated from having HIV/AIDS and whose wheelchair doesn't work, to visiting a school to find out how a young boy of 18, who has been living alone after losing both his parents to HIV/AIDS over a year ago is doing, and finding out he is not passing. He is lucky though, one of the teachers took an interest in him and he will be starting a new school in January where he will learn life skills, ie., how to manage money, a bank account, a checking account, how to shop for food and make his own meals and learn a skill that hopefully will help him earn an income. He was given a new home from the government after his parents passed away, it still does not have electricity or running water, but he is hopeful.

I also have many experiences of hope and joy. We visit the local creche (daycare) where the children sing songs and dance, they are all smiles, just wanting some love and affection even for a little while. Visiting the senior centre and sharing lunch and a conversation. Getting a visit from a young man who just completed his college exams after being given a scholarship from the centre to study for an accounting degree. Taking an orphan shopping for a new school uniform after a donation was made to the Zwane Centre, watching her face light up as she twirls around in the mirror admiring her new look!

What I struggle with most is that at times I think I am becoming desensitized to what I see but what I realize is that I have limitations at what I can do. I struggle deciding what situation needs the most attention. Who am I to decide who to buy food for, how come this person and not that person. Is this little child more deserving of a school uniform than the other one? Which young man or woman will be the one chosen to attend college so they can break out of the cycle of poverty they are living in? I work closely with the staff at the centre because they are the ones I look to for making the difficult decisions. They live it daily, I am just a visitor living in their world for 6 months.

I received a text last week from Mandla Majola who runs the Treatment Action Campaign (TAC) in Khayelitsha. I blogged about TAC in my entry on xenophobia. He was desperate. Over 100 shacks in Khayelitsha had burned down. Four of those shacks belonged to comrades (volunteers) of TAC. "Comrade (he calls me) is there anyway you can help in this situation, they have lost everything! Please, I need your help." I immediately SMSed him that I would help. The ironic thing is that these people are volunteers with TAC, they live in shacks, they have no income, no money and pretty much own nothing, the fire completely decimated their lives. What they owned before the fire was probably similar to when you left college, you had your clothes, mementos of your fun college days, possibly a peach crate filled with your albums (for those of you my age!) and maybe a small piece of furniture. We had support from our families and a future with a college degree and the opportunity to find employment and actually earn money to buy a house, a car, more clothes and CD'S!. They have no support and no future. On Friday I went with Mandla and Kent and David from Open Arms to survey the area and meet the people from TAC who lost their homes. It was overwhelming. One person perished in the fire, it is incredible that there was only one death due to the fact that there are no fire hydrants, sprinkler systems or the infrastructure to get a fire truck into the settlement, everything was destroyed. (The first photo is before we visited the site, note the smiles, the second photo is of Angie (a comrade) and her daughter, they lost their shack, the next 3 are of what we saw as we walked.) Most of the people we met are now living with relatives, so instead of 5 to 6 people in a shack there are now 8 to 9 people. We visited one woman and her son who had a new zinc shack but it had no windows. They couldn't afford that luxury. The weather has been in the 70's and 80's and will continue to get warmer, their shack was already stifling and it will only get worse. School starts mid January and the children lost their uniforms in the fire. TAC is working with the government to see what subsidies are available to the people of the fire. As I drove home from Khayelitsha into Cape Town towards my flat on the ocean, it struck me that it could have been me living in a township which lead to the deep question of who decided it would be them and not me?

Bye for now...