Keep on Traveling and Don't Stop

Being part of my program we have to have at least one cultural activity a week. Ours for the week was going to a food market and then going to the Peace March Museum.

The Peace March Museum is The Cathedral’s Crypt has recently been rededicated as a Crypt Memory and Witness Centre, a sacred space of dialogue, hope and healing, with an inaugural exhibition commemorating the Cape Town Peace March of 1989.

on, 13 September 1989, a crowd of some 30,000 people from every walk of life gathered in front of the Cathedral and marched to the Grand Parade to protest against the violence of the apartheid regime and to proclaim that another world was possible; a world in which the dignity of every person was respected and her promise of freedom and democracy would be available to all.

Describing the 1980s as a decade during which the apartheid government reacted with increasing violence to those whom opposed it, the growth of mass movements such as the United Democratic front and the churches Kairos declaration in 1985, following the World Alliance of Reform Churches’ declaration that apartheid a heresy in 1982, they paint a picture of a country rendered ungovernable by an unrelenting tide of protest. They tell of the events of 6 September 1989, which triggered the Peace March.  At least 24 people died on that day in clashes with police and army during a boycott of the election of a racially segregated tri-cameral parliament. The following evening, dismayed at the carnage, Archbishop Desmond Tutu retreated to his chapel to pray and seek divine guidance. The next day, at a memorial service in the Cathedral, he called on the people of Cape Town to march on parliament to protest the killings.

The Cape Town Peace March caught the imagination of people across the country. Over the following days 85,000 people gathered in Uitenhage; 50,000 in Bloemfontein; 40,000 in East London; 20,000 in King William’s Town; 20,000 in Durban; 20,000 in Johannesburg; 7,500 in Kimberley; 2,000 in Oudtshoorn and; 2,000 in Grahamstown. The demand for justice was heard across the country.

While the current exhibition focuses on the 1989 Peace March, Father Lester and Lynette remind us that the Cathedral has long served as a place of protest against injustice and as a refuge, earning it the title of the ‘people’s cathedral’. In the 1960s protesters including members of the Black Sash gathered outside the Cathedral with their placards. In the 1970s student protesters were stormed by police and brutally beaten on the cathedral steps on several occasions. In 1982 the Cathedral gave sanctuary to a group of Nyanga ‘squatters’, who were, in terms of apartheid laws living illegally in the area, and who embarked on a fast, vowing to starve to death unless they were granted permission to live in with their families in Cape Town.

The Crypt Memory and Witness Centre is an initiative of the Cathedral’s Justice and Reconciliation Group (CJR) whose mission is to fulfil the Cathedral’s prophetic mission as a place of hope and healing through its commitment to issues of justice and reconciliation. While the exhibition commemorates an event in the Cathedral’s history, the group extends the work of reconciliation and social justice to address current concerns – among others, xenophobia, homophobia and HIV Aids seeking to make these difficult issues visible. Other programmes and activities include developing and an annual observance of South Africa’s Day of Reconciliation, promoting interfaith and other pilgrimages and opportunities including to the Church of the Good Shepherd on Robben Island, for facilitated reflection on particularly social justice issues.

That evening we decided to hike lions head again. It was a great hike. At the top there was a music video going on. It was really cool for several reasons, 1 being that it was on top of lions head and you could see all of cape town so it was a beautiful view. Another reason why it was awesome was that we got interviewed to be put on national tv. So I am kind of famous nbd.

Cape town is known for surfing… so I tried it

Lets just say I should never become a pro surfer. It was so hard to do I literally got beat up by the waves. It was so much fun and hilarious but I suck.

St. pattys day in cape town…

Even though they are not Irish they sure know how to celebrate st. pattys day. Basically take a college campus and put it on 1 street called long street and have the entire cape town population celebrating a holiday that doesn’t even relate to them. Every bar and club was packed. It was quite and evening.

Well now peace out

Durban

Durban… a city on the eastern cape of south Africa. I don’t even know where to begin explaining that trip. I went with my roommate Jeana and we had an amazing time! I will start off by going through each day and what we did and our experiences. Let me start off by saying we brought all of our food and didn’t spend a single penny on food for the whole weekend. On Thursday our plane is delay blah blah blah you know the drill you have to sit in a shitty airport… so on.

Friday we get up bright and early and decide to go to the city. We walk around and go to a really nice memorial park that is across from city hall. It was a little weird because there were a lot of people standing at the entrance of city hall. We go up to them and ask what is going on. The women there were like there is a try out for a movie here. I was going to try out but then I read the sign and you had to be black and have your first language be Zulu…unfortunately I do not fit into that category. From there we walked to a sketchy part of the city that apparently was dangerous… oh well I survived. We eventually made it to the Golden Mile. The Golden Mile is the entire waterfront of Durban. It is extremely long and keeps on going. There are about 5 beaches in it. it is absolutely beautiful. The waves were about 15 feet high and were just crashing on the pier. It was so cool. I have now conquered to swim in 3 oceans. Atlantic, Pacific, and Indian Ocean. It was awesome. We were walking along the beach and saw these beautiful sand castles. Of course as tourists we wanted to take pictures of them but the people who made them harassed us to pay them.

We decided to take the mini buses everywhere because it is only 4 rand a person. On our program were not supposed to take them anywhere o well.

The next day we went to Zululand and got a tour of a Zulu village. It might have been the coolest experience I have seen. We started off by going to the Zulu village and learning about the rituals and their ancestors. The village we went to has around 300 people in it but it is spread over a lot of land. We go to a family’s house and our guide shows us the crawl which is where they keep their animals and have rituals. One ritual that they do is when a baby is born they have to slaughter a cow and the mother has to eat the meat. After that they either cut the baby’s face with 3 marks on each side or cut off the tip of the pinky depending on your families rituals and yours tribes rituals. They belong to two churches the village people. One of them is the Nasserites Baptist Church. It might be the coolest Church I have ever seen. It is outside and they pray inside white rocks. They have to wear their traditional clothing to pray. Their main services are on Saturdays instead of Sundays. When not praying the kids are normally playing soccer in a big open field.

The Zulu culture’s traditional meal is Maize and vegetables. They also don’t use silver wear so I got to eat with my hands which was awesome. After we ate we got to meet the healer who is told by the ancestors that they are to become the healer of the village.

This culture is really the coolest thing ever. I wish I could spend more then a day there with them.

Well that’s all of now folks.

Peace out

p.s. I am very behind in blogs so a lot will come in the next few days.