This was, by far, one of the many highlights of the trip.
We spent a day doing a bicycle tour of Soweto, which stands for the Southwest Township, being southwest from Johannesburg, or Joburg as the locals call it.
Soweto was where all the blacks were sent during apartheid. This is the home of Nelson Mandela and Archbishop Desmond Tutu. The two colorful coal smoke towers are the landmark of the city.
25 people and their bicycles
Our friend Eric and Jonathan
After making sure everyone had a bike that fit, we were off!
Various signage I snapped with one hand while pedaling
This was what we saw over and over and over.
After a while, I started to get a little choked up. A little because it was such horrific living conditions, but more for the realization of how happy these people were...with nothing. Sewage and dead rats in their dirt streets. Houses made out of tin and cinderblock. Community outhouses. It became very clear by the end of our tour that happiness is a choice. Stuff does not make us happy. We were feeling rather sheepish remembering that we had been complaining about the slow wifi earlier that day. Talk about perspective.
The beautiful faces of these amazing children. Most of them would give you a thumbs up as we rode by. One of the professors told us at a stop, that they like to touch thumbs, so that's what we did.
These were our tour guides, and they were awesome. Love the whole entrepreneurial spirit they had to start this bike tour through their town. They were very informative and quite entertaining!
This is Shepherd with the bucket of Joburg Beer. He was explaining that this bucket of beer is something that brings them together as a community and they share a bucket for various occastions to celebrate. They passed it around the group and then they gave the leftovers to the row of men hanging out sitting on this bench.
Enough said.
On our bike tour we made a stop at a grocery store to buy water and snacks. This girl came up to me and said, "Shoot me." Luckily, our tour guide had mentioned that they will say "shoot me" to get you to take their picture, so not to pull out a gun. She struck a pose and I took her picture, then showed her on my camera. She seemed pretty pleased with herself. Too cute!
Our next stop on our bike tour was the Hector Pieterson Memorial.
This picture was taken in 1976. These students were protesting the mandate given that all were to learn in Africaans (the white language), when the police open-fired and killed Hector, who was 13-years-old at the time. He was picked up by Mbuyisa Makhubo, 18 years old, who ran him to a clinic with Hector's sister by his side where he was pronounced dead. More than 400 people total were killed during the uprising. It's a rather graphic photograph, but leaves quite an impression.
We then went to Nelson Mandela's house which was his family's home from 1946 until the 1990s. They have this thick fence all around it, so I just did my best to snap a pic between the bars.
Outside the Mandela house were these crazy street performers.
We also saw a couple who was competing in the Amazing Race.
Our next stop was Wanda's, a great local restaurant for lunch. We were front and center for some great music. I need Jonathan to send me those pics.
After lunch we went to another little town called Klipton. Didn't think it could get much worse than what we saw in Soweto, but this was a step down. We went to this village to visit an orphanage.
Eric giving the kids some candy.
Inside the library of the orphanage. The man who ran this place was quite amazing and inspiring. He had lost both of his parents to AIDs by the time he was 6-years-old. He has instilled in these orphans that they can be whatever they want to me and that they have a very bright future.
They sang and danced for us.
One of these things is not like the others. This made me miss my kids.
After the orphanage, we went to the Apartheid Museum. I remember when I was in 7th grade discussing current events and talking about how apartheid had come to an end. I only knew a little about it, so it was very educational to come here and learn the extent of their segregation.
Our tickets segregated us into whites or non-whites to enter the museum and then went through various real-life scenarios that these South Africans had to go through. The majority of the museum was an homage to Nelson Mandela...and rightly so, that man was prepared by God to lead this country.
"To be free is not merely to cast off one's chains, but to live in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others." Nelson Mandela
No comments:
Post a Comment