We leave Namibia on Thursday. It's amazing to think how fast everything went. It was a pretty short semester of only 8 weeks of classes. When I leave Namibia, there's definitely some things I'll miss...
I'll miss the sounds of Afrikaans, Otjiherero, Oshiwambo, and especially good old Damara with all for of its different clicks. I'll miss saying Hoe gaan dit, kora, ongipe, metisa.
I'll miss the bumping beat of Kwaito music and the wild dancing Namibians do with it.
I'll miss the meat...the boerewors, goat, sheep, gemsbok, biltong, and beef. And I'll miss the wonders of the braai.
I'll miss the most beautiful sunsets I've ever seen. I didn't even know such colors existed.
I'll miss living in a city surrounded by mountains.
I'll miss walking over the hill to see downtown.
I'll miss not having and not needing a car. Nothing is better than taking a taxi anywhere in town for less than a dollar.
I'll miss weather that is never bad.
I'll miss random walks in Katatura.
I'll miss Mrs. H S Ball's Chutney.
I'll miss drinking the occasional omaere and oshikundu.
I'll miss seeing women walking the streets in traditional herero dress.
I'll miss the kapana of single quarter market. (beef that they grill right in front of you and pay N$1 per bite)
I'll miss cheap cool drink (means soda) in glass bottles.
I'll miss meeting random Europeans who volunteer and internship here.
I'll miss the kids at my volunteer place.
I'll miss my Namibian friends.
I'll miss my Namibian families.
However, I'm still excited to come home.
I'm excited to see friends and family.
I'm excited to sit by a lake.
I'm excited for Valpo's non-soggy, non-winter months. I'm excited to just walk the streets of Valpo in the fall and to stop by Ogden Gardens.
I'm excited for good burgers.
I'm excited for ice cold glasses of real milk.
Cape Town in 6 days.
Saturday, April 28, 2007
Thursday, April 19, 2007
Simplicity
Our internet here hardly ever works anymore, so I have to walk 20 minutes and pay money to use the internet for a limited time. For now, however, we got some internet at our house.
Rural Homestay
This still goes back to mid-March, and is probably the hardest thing yet to put into words. We spent 6 days on a rural farm. My family consisted of Hiskia and Olga, 60 year olds who never went to school because schools didn’t exist for them during apartheid. Thus, they knew no English. Then I had 2 sisters in their 30s, who had Ok english. I also had two nieces who were 3 and 7—no English here. I had a brother that was 17 with minimal English. My main communication was with my two 30ish year old brothers, Daniel and Mulaka who had basically perfect English. I never actually figured out the family structure because everyone is has either a different mother or father. English was a funny thing because they learn it in school, starting around 3rd grade. Thus, young kids don’t know it and the old generation doesn’t speak it either. We did however learn some Otjiherero before going. Thus, every time I talked with my parents, it was basically the same conversation: Moro/Metaha/Hwenda. Ii Moro/Metaha/Hwenda. Kora? Nawa. Wa Penduka. Mba Penduka nawa. Okuhepa. Ena roye otjikwaye? Ena randje o Bret. Gare nawa.
I honestly do not know where to go from here. 7 others from CGE were in my community, but I rarely ran into them. Overall, our community had maybe a few hundred people and was all public grazing for the cattle and goats, however most of the ground was gravel.
We brought the cows to the water every morning. We’d simply sit. We traveled around on a donkey cart. We ate porridge with sour milk in every day. We went to bed around 9 when it got dark and awoke at 7 when it was light. We attended a Lutheran Church service which was under a tree and had no pastor. We traveled to neighboring communities to say what’s up and to check out all their water pumps. There we public and private ones. There were hand pumps, diesel pumps, and one solar panel powering a pump. We climbed the nearby mountain. We slept in the middle of the day because it was too hot to move. We’d fence the goats in at night. We drank Five Roses tea with cups of sugar. We’d bathe in a bucket (rather pleasant) and pee wherever. We collected grass by hand to feed the calves. We milked the cows. We played pool at the bar. We laid bricks on a new hostel for school children from surrounding areas. We turned the community water pump on and off. We tried to fix the pump’s leak.
Life consisted of the day at hand. It was refreshing to lay down any worries of the future and to only think about what I was doing in the next 5 minutes. That was all that mattered. As long as the goats and cows were taken care of, there was nothing else to it.
I mainly pulled away a general understanding of rural subsistence living. It wasn’t extreme poverty, but it was only a life of necessities. The only sources of entertainment were the radio and the one pool table in town. Yet, despite the simplicity of their lifestyle, I wouldn’t say that I’m necessarily better off. There was an amazing sense of community. Everyone was treated with respect. Their basic needs were met. Why do we insist on this need to be so developed and have the latest of everything? Yes, they would have liked luxuries such as electricity for refridgeration and a TV, but they still would cook over a fire because it is tradition. Refrigeration is necessary to preserve foods and a TV would be useful to stay in touch with the world, but lighting and refrigeration means more of an alcoholic bar scene and TV displays negative lifestyles that we could see seriously affected our urban families. Ideas towards sex and relationships are resembling those of soap operas.
So what really does it mean to have development?
Etosha
After our homestay, we headed to Etosha, which is the largest game park in Namibia. We went on a game drive for a day and saw a rhino, an elephant, giraffes, springbok, oryx, wildebeests, impala, hartebeest, baboons, ostriches, kudu, damara dik diks, and probably a few other things. It was a full day of driving around. I simply could not imagine coming to Africa to just go on a safari for a week. Animals are sweet, but driving around get a bit tiring.
Vic Falls
After Etosha, we went to Zambia and Vic Falls, but I don’t feel like discussing it now.
Luderitz
Last weekend, we headed South for a 10 hour kombi ride. The region is dominated by NAMDEB, which is a partnership between the Namibian government and Debeers diamonds. The region consists of lots of diamonds, and debeers basically has a monopoly on the mining because they’re the only ones with enough capital to do any mining. The most fascinating thing we learned while talking to a Debeers representative was the impact of the movie Blood Diamond. The rep described that diamond prices have gone down lately. We asked why, and he said because of the movie. Demand for diamonds have gone way down since people now believe all diamonds have a bloody origin. Debeers has had to spend millions on publicity to combat this idea. Blood diamonds don’t exist in Namibia, and are fairly minimal in the world. The movie, as well, is not very accurate. The rep’s final words were, “Buy diamonds because it puts food on the table for people.” This is true, because diamonds are a big part of the Namibian economy and many jobs come from them. I still don’t have much desire to spend bucket loads of money on some small rock, however.
Oh, and I’m doing Youthworks again this summer (what I did the last two summers on the reservations) and my training is in Birmingham. This means I’ll be in some south-eastern city this summer.
I should’ve been writing papers instead of typing this right now. Whatever. And for some reason, my website where I type this blog is now in French. I don’t know what’s going on with anything anymore.
Rural Homestay
This still goes back to mid-March, and is probably the hardest thing yet to put into words. We spent 6 days on a rural farm. My family consisted of Hiskia and Olga, 60 year olds who never went to school because schools didn’t exist for them during apartheid. Thus, they knew no English. Then I had 2 sisters in their 30s, who had Ok english. I also had two nieces who were 3 and 7—no English here. I had a brother that was 17 with minimal English. My main communication was with my two 30ish year old brothers, Daniel and Mulaka who had basically perfect English. I never actually figured out the family structure because everyone is has either a different mother or father. English was a funny thing because they learn it in school, starting around 3rd grade. Thus, young kids don’t know it and the old generation doesn’t speak it either. We did however learn some Otjiherero before going. Thus, every time I talked with my parents, it was basically the same conversation: Moro/Metaha/Hwenda. Ii Moro/Metaha/Hwenda. Kora? Nawa. Wa Penduka. Mba Penduka nawa. Okuhepa. Ena roye otjikwaye? Ena randje o Bret. Gare nawa.
I honestly do not know where to go from here. 7 others from CGE were in my community, but I rarely ran into them. Overall, our community had maybe a few hundred people and was all public grazing for the cattle and goats, however most of the ground was gravel.
We brought the cows to the water every morning. We’d simply sit. We traveled around on a donkey cart. We ate porridge with sour milk in every day. We went to bed around 9 when it got dark and awoke at 7 when it was light. We attended a Lutheran Church service which was under a tree and had no pastor. We traveled to neighboring communities to say what’s up and to check out all their water pumps. There we public and private ones. There were hand pumps, diesel pumps, and one solar panel powering a pump. We climbed the nearby mountain. We slept in the middle of the day because it was too hot to move. We’d fence the goats in at night. We drank Five Roses tea with cups of sugar. We’d bathe in a bucket (rather pleasant) and pee wherever. We collected grass by hand to feed the calves. We milked the cows. We played pool at the bar. We laid bricks on a new hostel for school children from surrounding areas. We turned the community water pump on and off. We tried to fix the pump’s leak.
Life consisted of the day at hand. It was refreshing to lay down any worries of the future and to only think about what I was doing in the next 5 minutes. That was all that mattered. As long as the goats and cows were taken care of, there was nothing else to it.
I mainly pulled away a general understanding of rural subsistence living. It wasn’t extreme poverty, but it was only a life of necessities. The only sources of entertainment were the radio and the one pool table in town. Yet, despite the simplicity of their lifestyle, I wouldn’t say that I’m necessarily better off. There was an amazing sense of community. Everyone was treated with respect. Their basic needs were met. Why do we insist on this need to be so developed and have the latest of everything? Yes, they would have liked luxuries such as electricity for refridgeration and a TV, but they still would cook over a fire because it is tradition. Refrigeration is necessary to preserve foods and a TV would be useful to stay in touch with the world, but lighting and refrigeration means more of an alcoholic bar scene and TV displays negative lifestyles that we could see seriously affected our urban families. Ideas towards sex and relationships are resembling those of soap operas.
So what really does it mean to have development?
Etosha
After our homestay, we headed to Etosha, which is the largest game park in Namibia. We went on a game drive for a day and saw a rhino, an elephant, giraffes, springbok, oryx, wildebeests, impala, hartebeest, baboons, ostriches, kudu, damara dik diks, and probably a few other things. It was a full day of driving around. I simply could not imagine coming to Africa to just go on a safari for a week. Animals are sweet, but driving around get a bit tiring.
Vic Falls
After Etosha, we went to Zambia and Vic Falls, but I don’t feel like discussing it now.
Luderitz
Last weekend, we headed South for a 10 hour kombi ride. The region is dominated by NAMDEB, which is a partnership between the Namibian government and Debeers diamonds. The region consists of lots of diamonds, and debeers basically has a monopoly on the mining because they’re the only ones with enough capital to do any mining. The most fascinating thing we learned while talking to a Debeers representative was the impact of the movie Blood Diamond. The rep described that diamond prices have gone down lately. We asked why, and he said because of the movie. Demand for diamonds have gone way down since people now believe all diamonds have a bloody origin. Debeers has had to spend millions on publicity to combat this idea. Blood diamonds don’t exist in Namibia, and are fairly minimal in the world. The movie, as well, is not very accurate. The rep’s final words were, “Buy diamonds because it puts food on the table for people.” This is true, because diamonds are a big part of the Namibian economy and many jobs come from them. I still don’t have much desire to spend bucket loads of money on some small rock, however.
Oh, and I’m doing Youthworks again this summer (what I did the last two summers on the reservations) and my training is in Birmingham. This means I’ll be in some south-eastern city this summer.
I should’ve been writing papers instead of typing this right now. Whatever. And for some reason, my website where I type this blog is now in French. I don’t know what’s going on with anything anymore.
Thursday, April 5, 2007
Disparity
Going back a few weeks again...
We began our 3 week break by heading to Swakopmund with our group. One hour before reaching our destination, one of our combis blew a tire. We pulled over and never has popping a tire been so enjoyable. We were in the middle of the desert along a barren road. A water pipe supplying the mines with water ran alongside the road, so we had no other choice but to climb all up on it. It was a simple 20 minutes, but for some reason, it still sticks out in my mind. Life is all about attitude. Rarely do I know of people getting excited about a popped tire, but we were in the middle of a beautiful Namibian desert (it was evening, so it wasn't too hot) so why complain?
We spent a couple of days along the coast in Swakopmund (just so happens to be where Brad and Jen were, not that I care) and Walvis Bay. The highlight here was climbing Dune 7, the second tallest sand dune in the world. Micah and I raced to the top, but it was quite exhausting because with every step, we moved back halfway. The top of the dunes contained one of the most beautiful views I have ever experienced. I think after climbing many mountains out west, they all have their similarities, but to be on top of sand dunes was something entirely different.
The economic disparity here is what's really hard to deal with. Namibia has the highest disparity between the rich and poor in the world. In Swakopmund, beautiful mansions line the coast while 5 minutes away, across a 500 meter barren wasteland, is the DRC. The DRC is a settlement in which its only electric is for streetlights, everyone shares communal toilet, and residents need a special card to pay for water from communal pumps. Trash is dumped on the side of the road and houses are made with corrugated tin and tarps. I've grown accustomed to seeing people living in these situations all across Namibia. Originally when I started seeing poverty of this nature here (and when I first experienced it in the US on the Pine Ridge Reservation), it was natural to think along the lines of, "How can people live like this?" However, billions of people live in these situations and some of them make it work out well. All of them have dealt with their situations. One home in the DRC was just beautiful. Yes, it was made of corrugated tin, but it was full of artistic flair. I feel that when many Americans encounter this kind of poverty, they feel pity. Pity should not be the emotion because it automatically assumes that my life is so much better than theirs and that they are incapable of being happier than me. This may be the case with many people, but having the idea "oh, this is so sad that people live like this" is wrong. It takes away their humanity to objectify them like that. I do feel slight anger, however, because people shouldn't be forced to live in these situations when others don't. The great pains in Namibia come in seeing mansions five minutes away. There is no justice in a small minority of people living their lives full of luxury and the majority simply living to sustain themselves. I am one of these people of luxury, however, and we have similar circumstances in the US. I don't know where to draw the line of living for myself by enjoying some of my luxuries and of giving of my efforts and resources. For example, I struggled about deciding to travel to Victoria Falls. I could go, enjoy it there mostly for myself, or I could have went back to Windhoek, volunteered and donated the money I would have spent on Vic Falls. How much should I live for myself and how much, given my relatively affluent and "priveleged" background, should I give for others? I need to take care of myself and maintain a stable state of mind, but if I'm to truly follow Jesus like I say I do as a Christian, I'm not here to live my life for myself. I should be here as a servant towards others, putting myself last.
Yesterday in Religion class we visited the Desk for Social Development of the Lutheran Church in Nambia. Here we learned about a proposed Basic Income Grant for Namibia. It's aim is to fight poverty and HIV/AIDS by providing every Nambian citizen with the equivalent of US$15 per month. It doesn't matter whether you are rich or poor, you would receive this grant. However, the rich primarily would pay the taxes for it so the money would just go into their own paying of taxes. 62% of Namibians live below the World Bank poverty line of $1 per day. This would basically have the potential to take most people above this line and reduce the economic disparity in this country. By providing money to help them sustain themselves, poor unemployed people will be better equipped to put effort into looking for a job. I was so fascinated at this that I'm doing my final integrative project on it. Sure, you may complain that people will waste it on substances and that it is totally anti-capitalistic, but it will give the majority of people opportunity to get out of the cycle of poverty. It is unique too because it doesn't matter whether one is rich or poor, everyone receives it so it's not a pity vote. It also has huge support from the Council of Churches, the Namibian NGO Forum, and other big organizations as well as from members of parliament. A major hindrance to its taking effect is its rejection by the IMF and Namibia is not ballsy enough to go against international advice. The IMF mainly doesn't support it because they don't think it is economically feasible for Namibia, even though the IMF made incorrect calculations and the Church pointed out where this was. Interestingly, there isn't much strong opposition from the rich.
There are enough resources for everyone, but they are so unevenly distributed that many don't have access. Yeah, I like the initiative, and if you don't cuz you're rich, deal with it. We have no idea what it's like to pull ourselves out of poverty, and if we do, we're lucky because there's only a few limited spots for people to do it. If one poor person does it, it probably means that another who tried didn't because they were beaten out.
Wednesday, April 4, 2007
Catching up
Ok, so there's plenty that's happened in the last month as I already mentioned. I'm going to take it a little bit at a time, and probably update a few times in the upcoming days. We have this Friday and next Monday off for Easter and then we only have 2 days of classes next week because we take a class trip to another coastal town. It's amazing that I've only really been in Windhoek for about 5 weeks and I only have 4 weeks left. If there is one thing I don't like about this program, it's that we really only have 8 weeks in the community we live and even those weeks were split up by 3 weeks. It has made building relationships in the community difficult because it isn't until now that I've really built up good friendships and now we are past halfway.
Going back to beginning of March...
I had previously talked about my urban homestay. The complete stay was 10 days and I was sad but relieved to be finished with it. Despite the fact that I made the house my own, it was still draining always feeling like a guest. However, I mainly wanted to continue my homestay because I came here to spend time with Namibians. Coming back to the house put me back in community with mostly Americans. It was also interesting to become part of a family structure apart from my own. I also experienced this during my rural homestay (which I'll mention later), and in both cases, I eventual came to feel like I was a member of the family. I helped with the chores when they needed help. My urban hs parents talked about how they had to kick a nephew out of their house because he had no respect for helping out around the house. This caused me to feel pretty shitty about how little respect we have for our parents in the US. Here, if a parent asks you to do something, kids basically do it no questions asked. Seeing it here really makes me realize that it has nothing to do with whether I want to do it or not.
Way back when, we also visited parliament and met with the first prime minister of Namibia. This guy was intense, and was definitely a politician. He refused to admit any direct faults of his party and would play off things that they weren't as bad as people claim. It's difficult to challenge political authority in this country because one party, SWAPO, dominates the parliament and the executive branch. Despite corruption in SWAPO, people here still vote for them because SWAPO was the liberator from South Africa and apartheid. People vote on the allegiance rather than issues, but the prime minister admitted this will change with youth coming in to vote because they didn't experience apartheid. So much of politics here and in much of Africa relies on ethnic groups as well. This creates great difficulty in creating unity. ahh, to go into any of this would require a basic understanding of Namibia.
The weekend before we left for our 3 week break, I was killing time on Saturday morning when Courtney asked me if I wanted to attend a picnic with someone from her internship. I'm like, "sure," so we went and I met probably the most amazing and Godly person I have ever met, Taura. She comes from what we would consider a way underpriveleged and difficult childhood, and now she is a 23 year old working as a preschool teacher in mornings and volunteering daily at a youth center with little income to spare. She focuses her life on God and it shows. Everyone that met her couldn't help but say she was amazing as soon as she steps away. I know without a doubt that this comes from her deep Christian faith. I went to Katatura swimming pool on Sunday after she invited me to hang out with kids from the center. I was at the pool, feeling a bit awkward because there were probably 300 kids and I had no idea where to engage, when some kids challenged me to a swimming race. Proud to say a won by a nose, ha. But I started hanging out with some kids and they turned out just to be some local kids not with the center. It is amazing how engaging with people here doesn't matter whether you have connections.
I went to church in the afternoon and God just blew my mind. I was feeling kinda lost in where I'm supposed to go with my life (I've been thinking seriously about peace corps in the last few weeks) and how do I really live this Christian faith seriously. So I sat a prayed during worship about it. Before the sermon, the pastor then goes up and prays that God laid 3 things on his heart and the first is about a young man. He said the young man is questioning his calling and looking for God's presence and that God will make it clear. My heart jumped at this because he was describing me exactly. From a Lutheran background, this kind of prophetic voice is different from what I'm used to but it is still something I've been around my last two summers. Hardly has God spoken to me so directly and yet still I wonder. Taura later told me as we were writing a song that her heart went out to me when he mentioned this. Faith continues to be such an elusive thing to me because despite believing intellectually and wanting to follow on this level, my heart just can't seem to fully seek God. I know what sacrificing for following Jesus should be, but I struggle to pull it to my context.
So yeah, I'll talk about yesterday while it's still fresh. I finally had the opportunity to volunteer. I was going to volunteer with this Young Life-type of organization, so I went on Monday and he basically said there was nothing for me to do. Since this didn't work out, I had another lead on volunteering with the BNC youth center. So I gave Taura a call and asked her where the youth center she volunteers at is. Instead of giving me directions, she quickly says, "I'll pick you up tomorrow at 1:30." I still can't get over the heart of this woman because he had to take an extra taxi to come get me. Then she pays for my taxi. Mind you that this is someone that makes N$600 per month and a taxi is N$6.50 per person. So I go to the center where at least 100 kids were running around. Their max is 250. Somehow there is order despite only having about 6 volunteers who are mainly Germans. I'm feeling lost with so many kids running around until Mary Beth, an American woman who runs the center, greets me quickly and asks if I'll help some kids out on the computers. I ended up spending 2 hours helping kids load random games onto 7 different computers. Magic School Bus was the favorite. It was funny because they lock the only gated door to the computer room for crowd control. After the two hours, I went outside where Taura was playing guitar with the kids. All of the kids were singing along to songs that she had written. While sitting around singing with a handful of kids, Elizabeth, comes and just sits on my leg. She is a 5 year old with a dirty face, she had a constant tear out of one eye, and the tiniest little cough. I didn't need to do anything but just sit there and hold her in my lap and my arms. For all I know, she could have had AIDS or TB, but that didn't matter for the five minutes while I showing her love by simply sitting with her. I had to leave, but the image of the girl has yet to leave my mind today, picturing her holding up her hands to reach around me. The 2 hours in the computer room was fine, but these 5 minutes are making me die to go back.
And sure enough, I left with Taura and when I challenged her that I'll pay for the taxi home, she tells me firmly, "Accept the blessings you receive." And then she made me watch her buy me a fanta. Now that I think about it, she spent 3% of her monthly salary on me for these couple things. God is truly alive.
and for you aunts and uncles that always care and are making assumptions... No, romance is not in the air.
Going back to beginning of March...
I had previously talked about my urban homestay. The complete stay was 10 days and I was sad but relieved to be finished with it. Despite the fact that I made the house my own, it was still draining always feeling like a guest. However, I mainly wanted to continue my homestay because I came here to spend time with Namibians. Coming back to the house put me back in community with mostly Americans. It was also interesting to become part of a family structure apart from my own. I also experienced this during my rural homestay (which I'll mention later), and in both cases, I eventual came to feel like I was a member of the family. I helped with the chores when they needed help. My urban hs parents talked about how they had to kick a nephew out of their house because he had no respect for helping out around the house. This caused me to feel pretty shitty about how little respect we have for our parents in the US. Here, if a parent asks you to do something, kids basically do it no questions asked. Seeing it here really makes me realize that it has nothing to do with whether I want to do it or not.
Way back when, we also visited parliament and met with the first prime minister of Namibia. This guy was intense, and was definitely a politician. He refused to admit any direct faults of his party and would play off things that they weren't as bad as people claim. It's difficult to challenge political authority in this country because one party, SWAPO, dominates the parliament and the executive branch. Despite corruption in SWAPO, people here still vote for them because SWAPO was the liberator from South Africa and apartheid. People vote on the allegiance rather than issues, but the prime minister admitted this will change with youth coming in to vote because they didn't experience apartheid. So much of politics here and in much of Africa relies on ethnic groups as well. This creates great difficulty in creating unity. ahh, to go into any of this would require a basic understanding of Namibia.
The weekend before we left for our 3 week break, I was killing time on Saturday morning when Courtney asked me if I wanted to attend a picnic with someone from her internship. I'm like, "sure," so we went and I met probably the most amazing and Godly person I have ever met, Taura. She comes from what we would consider a way underpriveleged and difficult childhood, and now she is a 23 year old working as a preschool teacher in mornings and volunteering daily at a youth center with little income to spare. She focuses her life on God and it shows. Everyone that met her couldn't help but say she was amazing as soon as she steps away. I know without a doubt that this comes from her deep Christian faith. I went to Katatura swimming pool on Sunday after she invited me to hang out with kids from the center. I was at the pool, feeling a bit awkward because there were probably 300 kids and I had no idea where to engage, when some kids challenged me to a swimming race. Proud to say a won by a nose, ha. But I started hanging out with some kids and they turned out just to be some local kids not with the center. It is amazing how engaging with people here doesn't matter whether you have connections.
I went to church in the afternoon and God just blew my mind. I was feeling kinda lost in where I'm supposed to go with my life (I've been thinking seriously about peace corps in the last few weeks) and how do I really live this Christian faith seriously. So I sat a prayed during worship about it. Before the sermon, the pastor then goes up and prays that God laid 3 things on his heart and the first is about a young man. He said the young man is questioning his calling and looking for God's presence and that God will make it clear. My heart jumped at this because he was describing me exactly. From a Lutheran background, this kind of prophetic voice is different from what I'm used to but it is still something I've been around my last two summers. Hardly has God spoken to me so directly and yet still I wonder. Taura later told me as we were writing a song that her heart went out to me when he mentioned this. Faith continues to be such an elusive thing to me because despite believing intellectually and wanting to follow on this level, my heart just can't seem to fully seek God. I know what sacrificing for following Jesus should be, but I struggle to pull it to my context.
So yeah, I'll talk about yesterday while it's still fresh. I finally had the opportunity to volunteer. I was going to volunteer with this Young Life-type of organization, so I went on Monday and he basically said there was nothing for me to do. Since this didn't work out, I had another lead on volunteering with the BNC youth center. So I gave Taura a call and asked her where the youth center she volunteers at is. Instead of giving me directions, she quickly says, "I'll pick you up tomorrow at 1:30." I still can't get over the heart of this woman because he had to take an extra taxi to come get me. Then she pays for my taxi. Mind you that this is someone that makes N$600 per month and a taxi is N$6.50 per person. So I go to the center where at least 100 kids were running around. Their max is 250. Somehow there is order despite only having about 6 volunteers who are mainly Germans. I'm feeling lost with so many kids running around until Mary Beth, an American woman who runs the center, greets me quickly and asks if I'll help some kids out on the computers. I ended up spending 2 hours helping kids load random games onto 7 different computers. Magic School Bus was the favorite. It was funny because they lock the only gated door to the computer room for crowd control. After the two hours, I went outside where Taura was playing guitar with the kids. All of the kids were singing along to songs that she had written. While sitting around singing with a handful of kids, Elizabeth, comes and just sits on my leg. She is a 5 year old with a dirty face, she had a constant tear out of one eye, and the tiniest little cough. I didn't need to do anything but just sit there and hold her in my lap and my arms. For all I know, she could have had AIDS or TB, but that didn't matter for the five minutes while I showing her love by simply sitting with her. I had to leave, but the image of the girl has yet to leave my mind today, picturing her holding up her hands to reach around me. The 2 hours in the computer room was fine, but these 5 minutes are making me die to go back.
And sure enough, I left with Taura and when I challenged her that I'll pay for the taxi home, she tells me firmly, "Accept the blessings you receive." And then she made me watch her buy me a fanta. Now that I think about it, she spent 3% of her monthly salary on me for these couple things. God is truly alive.
and for you aunts and uncles that always care and are making assumptions... No, romance is not in the air.
Monday, March 26, 2007
Plenty
I gotta keep this short or else I need to pay another 3000 Kwatcha. I became a millionare 2 days ago. Right now I am in Zambia at Victoria falls. They are unbelievable. The past few weeks have been beyond description. I went skydiving above the Namib Desert, swam in the ocean, lived on a rural farm with no electricity and water for 6 days, went on a game drive, and yesterday I got soaked from Vic Falls. Welp, I'm gonna run now...I'll be back in a week to fully update. Just wanted to say I'm doing well, mom.
Monday, March 5, 2007
Boycotting Wal-Mart? questionable
Here’s another post…
This is a basic overview, so it’s not too detailed and maybe a bit confusing.
On Thursday, for Development class, we visited Ramatex. Ramatex is a Malaysian textile company that has a factory location in Namibia. Their location in Namibia is in order to take advantage of AGOA, a trade agreement between African countries and the US. Thus, the Namibia location exports solely to the US and makes brands for about 10 stores including K-Mart and I believe Wal-Mart. We never got a list of the retailers.
Namibia beat out South Africa and Madagascar five years ago for the location of an African factory. The Namibian government paid for the building of the facilities, subsidizes water and electricity, and does not make Ramatex pay taxes. In return, the original agreement stated that Ramatex would provide 8,000 jobs and then indirect jobs would hopefully come out of their presence.
Ramatex never ended up employing that many Namibians. They brought in a couple thousand Chinese migrant workers supposedly to help train in the Namibians. After a strike a couple years ago, hundreds got fired. Since then, Ramatex has downsized and only employs 3,000 Namibian jobs now. Workers were originally paid N$3 per hour (about 50 cents), but now they receive N$4.10. With that wage, workers have to work overtime to afford housing and basic food. Workers complain of harassment from supervision, they have to walk long distances to work and they don’t feel safe on the walk home, they receive one break for lunch, and they are strategically divided by race as a divide-and-rule theory. It creates tensions and racism within the factory.
Ramatex dumps its chemical waste in a small “pool” out back, which is has cracked cement casing. When it rains hard, chemicals run over. After one year of its presence, all of the fish in a dam nearby were dead.
Government refuses to challenge Ramatex and even tries to prevent striking because Ramatex threatens to leave and go abroad to a country where they can run for cheaper. Namibia needs jobs, so Ramatex can get away with all of its crap.
Our actual visit to the factory was interesting. I suppose you might say it is a sweatshop, but not quite as extreme. The director showed us around. He was rather subversive when answering our questions. They specifically said “Ramatex is a business, not a charity,” but where is the line going to be drawn. 60% of their expenses are materials. Only 15% is labor wages. This seems rather small when you are employing thousands, when you make clothes (materials are not the cost of diamonds or anything), and when zero taxes and facility fees are being paid for. Lunches were locked in cages that were divided by ethnicity.
After our visit, we met with a member of a labor rights group that has investigated Ramatex. He explained much of what I already mentioned. When asked what the average consumer can do, he said boycotting on an individual basis isn’t going to accomplish anything. The only way Ramatex can be pressured so that it won’t skip countries is through pressure from buyers such as K-Mart. The only effective way to pressure the buyers is through cooperation and lobbying among consumers and the workers. There must be communication and coordination to effectively make the buyers listen.
I’m not satisfied with my explanation here; it’s a bit inadequate and not well-articulated, but I hope you get the point. I’m off to type several papers that are due in the next week. One week from today, we head to Swakopmund on the coast, then to rural homestays, to etosha game park, and I’m planning on heading to Victoria Falls. I’ll give you the low down on the rest of my urban homestay which I just finished at another time.
This is a basic overview, so it’s not too detailed and maybe a bit confusing.
On Thursday, for Development class, we visited Ramatex. Ramatex is a Malaysian textile company that has a factory location in Namibia. Their location in Namibia is in order to take advantage of AGOA, a trade agreement between African countries and the US. Thus, the Namibia location exports solely to the US and makes brands for about 10 stores including K-Mart and I believe Wal-Mart. We never got a list of the retailers.
Namibia beat out South Africa and Madagascar five years ago for the location of an African factory. The Namibian government paid for the building of the facilities, subsidizes water and electricity, and does not make Ramatex pay taxes. In return, the original agreement stated that Ramatex would provide 8,000 jobs and then indirect jobs would hopefully come out of their presence.
Ramatex never ended up employing that many Namibians. They brought in a couple thousand Chinese migrant workers supposedly to help train in the Namibians. After a strike a couple years ago, hundreds got fired. Since then, Ramatex has downsized and only employs 3,000 Namibian jobs now. Workers were originally paid N$3 per hour (about 50 cents), but now they receive N$4.10. With that wage, workers have to work overtime to afford housing and basic food. Workers complain of harassment from supervision, they have to walk long distances to work and they don’t feel safe on the walk home, they receive one break for lunch, and they are strategically divided by race as a divide-and-rule theory. It creates tensions and racism within the factory.
Ramatex dumps its chemical waste in a small “pool” out back, which is has cracked cement casing. When it rains hard, chemicals run over. After one year of its presence, all of the fish in a dam nearby were dead.
Government refuses to challenge Ramatex and even tries to prevent striking because Ramatex threatens to leave and go abroad to a country where they can run for cheaper. Namibia needs jobs, so Ramatex can get away with all of its crap.
Our actual visit to the factory was interesting. I suppose you might say it is a sweatshop, but not quite as extreme. The director showed us around. He was rather subversive when answering our questions. They specifically said “Ramatex is a business, not a charity,” but where is the line going to be drawn. 60% of their expenses are materials. Only 15% is labor wages. This seems rather small when you are employing thousands, when you make clothes (materials are not the cost of diamonds or anything), and when zero taxes and facility fees are being paid for. Lunches were locked in cages that were divided by ethnicity.
After our visit, we met with a member of a labor rights group that has investigated Ramatex. He explained much of what I already mentioned. When asked what the average consumer can do, he said boycotting on an individual basis isn’t going to accomplish anything. The only way Ramatex can be pressured so that it won’t skip countries is through pressure from buyers such as K-Mart. The only effective way to pressure the buyers is through cooperation and lobbying among consumers and the workers. There must be communication and coordination to effectively make the buyers listen.
I’m not satisfied with my explanation here; it’s a bit inadequate and not well-articulated, but I hope you get the point. I’m off to type several papers that are due in the next week. One week from today, we head to Swakopmund on the coast, then to rural homestays, to etosha game park, and I’m planning on heading to Victoria Falls. I’ll give you the low down on the rest of my urban homestay which I just finished at another time.
Perspectives
This is a reflection I just wrote about a night during our first week in South Africa. I thought I'd share...
While killing time before dinner in Pretoria, about half of us from the CGE group were wandering the University of Pretoria campus. We were on campus looking for rumored floats that were being built. Only seeing a couple floats, Micah and I approached two white ladies to ask if any more were being built. The four of us got into a conversation, and Micah and I ended up following them to help build a float with their hostel. This prompted a night spent hanging out with a group of Afrikaners. It provided an entirely different perspective to the aftermath of apartheid, since we previously only heard in person the black perspective to it all.
The mere turn of events was a lesson within itself. As we met new people, we would not have been accepted in the same way if Micah and I were not white Americans. Our identity as Americans made us popular because everyone wanted to know about the US. Being from the US comes with a great amount of privilege because these people wanted to know about the country where much of their media comes from and about us since we basically run the world. We were ambassadors of the US to them.
Some of the people we met would not have wanted to talk to us if we were black. Despite a few of the Afrikaners thinking racism and apartheid was rubbish, some of them were blatantly racist and some claimed not to be racist, although they still did not have uplifting opinions about blacks. Urbanus later told us that it was not safe for Passat, Moeketsi, and him (as blacks) to be where we were because the Afrikaners have some of their old nationalism come out in them in big groups.
Our most interesting experience came from talking with Werner and Werner, who were blatant racists. Despite their negative opinions of blacks, I could not help but sympathize with some of their worries. We had only heard the black perspective so far, which does not resound with the white perspective, positive or negative. One of the Werners comes from a farm, which funds his college education. Potential land redistribution would leave him with nothing and no money for his education. One week before we talked to him, one of his cows was slaughtered overnight by a black intruder and only a small fraction of the cow was taken, leaving the rest of the meat to rot. His situation did not sound very positive, and he claimed he was ready to take up arms against blacks because he believes a civil war is coming. While I could not agree with much of what he said, I challenged him that it was only an individual that killed his cow. He responded that there are good black people, but they are very rare. He used crime, poverty, and the AIDS situation to justify his belief. This discussion led me to realize just how hard it will be to decolonize the mind of people like him. He is not able to take an objective stance on racial issues. With his own welfare on the line, his defensiveness will make it nearly impossible for him to change his racist beliefs.
While killing time before dinner in Pretoria, about half of us from the CGE group were wandering the University of Pretoria campus. We were on campus looking for rumored floats that were being built. Only seeing a couple floats, Micah and I approached two white ladies to ask if any more were being built. The four of us got into a conversation, and Micah and I ended up following them to help build a float with their hostel. This prompted a night spent hanging out with a group of Afrikaners. It provided an entirely different perspective to the aftermath of apartheid, since we previously only heard in person the black perspective to it all.
The mere turn of events was a lesson within itself. As we met new people, we would not have been accepted in the same way if Micah and I were not white Americans. Our identity as Americans made us popular because everyone wanted to know about the US. Being from the US comes with a great amount of privilege because these people wanted to know about the country where much of their media comes from and about us since we basically run the world. We were ambassadors of the US to them.
Some of the people we met would not have wanted to talk to us if we were black. Despite a few of the Afrikaners thinking racism and apartheid was rubbish, some of them were blatantly racist and some claimed not to be racist, although they still did not have uplifting opinions about blacks. Urbanus later told us that it was not safe for Passat, Moeketsi, and him (as blacks) to be where we were because the Afrikaners have some of their old nationalism come out in them in big groups.
Our most interesting experience came from talking with Werner and Werner, who were blatant racists. Despite their negative opinions of blacks, I could not help but sympathize with some of their worries. We had only heard the black perspective so far, which does not resound with the white perspective, positive or negative. One of the Werners comes from a farm, which funds his college education. Potential land redistribution would leave him with nothing and no money for his education. One week before we talked to him, one of his cows was slaughtered overnight by a black intruder and only a small fraction of the cow was taken, leaving the rest of the meat to rot. His situation did not sound very positive, and he claimed he was ready to take up arms against blacks because he believes a civil war is coming. While I could not agree with much of what he said, I challenged him that it was only an individual that killed his cow. He responded that there are good black people, but they are very rare. He used crime, poverty, and the AIDS situation to justify his belief. This discussion led me to realize just how hard it will be to decolonize the mind of people like him. He is not able to take an objective stance on racial issues. With his own welfare on the line, his defensiveness will make it nearly impossible for him to change his racist beliefs.
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