So I have
officially landed in Barberton and this week has been crazy busy! I’ve been
meeting with lots of our project partners including the teachers, home stay
hosts and other community members. Barberton is quite a small town and is
surrounded by huge, beautiful mountains! It’s got all the resources you would
ever need a large supermarket, a smelly off licence, a KFC, a pizza palace, a Victorian tea room (for when
you’re feeling extra fancy) and a clothing store which appears to stock
Fleetwood markets’ cast offs. A little home from home.
A lady called Bets picked me up from Nelspruit and I got to spend two wonderful days with her and her aunt Ellie in Barberton.
Ellie has set up a missionary called New Hope and it compromises of around 35
buildings. Ellie’s husband built the whole thing himself and was an amazing
painter. Their house was littered with gorgeous paintings. For some stupid
reason I didn’t take any photos (sorry dad), but that was my home for the
weekend. Their were also four American students who were also staying on the complex which gave me a great
opportunity to bond and make long lasting friends (who I have not seen since).
Everyone was so hospitable and that evening I had pizza (for the fourth time in
a row) and the American’s treated me to ice cream sandwiches and smores around
the fire. Despite the laughter, memories, great food and great company, the
electric blanket was defiantly the highlight of my evening.
The next day
I woke up like a groggy teenager after watching far too many episodes of modern
family (dam you Katie), but I decided that I would pull myself from the bad
mood and go to church with the Americans. The four of them were on a school
project and had to spend 70 days in another country doing missionary work. They
were all lovely, but they had a VERY, VERY, VERY, intense relationship with
god. This should have deterred me from deciding to go to a two hour sermon, but
I thought what the heck. The experience started out great. We spent a good hour
singing songs in Sisiwati which incorporated various dance moves. True to my
dyspraxic soul my rhythm was out, in fact at one point even the preacher
pointed and laughed. Things got crazy. A
preacher called Elvis was playing all the backing music, to the songs, on his
keyboard. I felt like I was listening to Marbella anthems or something from the
Ministry of Sound as Elvis kept dropping heavy, HEAVY beats. The nightclub feel
certainly got us into the spirit and at one point all the white people were
ushered onto the stage dancing and singing to the entire congregation. Then everybody jumped on stage and joined in
with the glee and no word of a lie, we burst into the Macarena. The bloody
Macarena!
I was having
such an amazing time and was considering coming back next week. I was even
enjoying the sermon delivered by one of the Americans. I was pondering about
making a major life decision. Could I start going to church? Was god actually
really? Could I see myself as a Christian? Then things turned sinister and in
the words of Jay Z and Kayne West ‘that shit [turned] cray’. There were a bunch
of new people to the church (myself included) and the preacher decided that she
wanted as many people as possible to make the decision to let god into their
hearts. Anyone who wanted to take part in this pseudo spiritual rebirth should
step forward now. Everyone rose except a few teenage boys at the back so I
decided (being front row) to also stand up. I fumbled my way to the front and
saw the madness unfold before my eyes. The americans were grabbing members of
the congregation and whispering (with their eyes closed) prayers in an almost
spell like manner. Being white and clearly foreign, some thought I must have
also held the spiritual powers and chose me to help guide them to god. Confused
and dazed I grabbed a little girls hands and just stood there with my eyes
closed for the most awkward two minutes of my life. I didn’t know what I was
doing and I’m pretty sure she guessed that too as later she came back to the
house to grassed me in to the preacher.
I swiftly sat down with the disappointed little girl and waited for the
ritual to end. However, things somehow got crazier and the preacher started
crying. Full on sobbing. At one point she had to be removed from the altar. She
was angry at some of the youth who had not stood up to accept god into their
hearts and I couldn’t help think this speech was somehow also directed towards
me. It was the most surreal experience of my life to date.
That
afternoon Bets and Ellie had prepared a wonderful Sunday dinner where we ate
antelope. Poached antelope to make matters more interesting. It has been lovely staying with Ellie and
Bets. They have both worked as missionaries and have done some amazing work all
over South Africa. At dinner Bets told
us some tragic stories about her work in Tongo. She said that 7/10 people who
went to hospital in Tongo had HIV or Aids, a shocking statistic. Bets has
helped many families and was even given a baby from a dying woman who she
raised as her own! Ellie worked in a
hospital in her youth and has delivered 3,000 babies all of which survived! She
also worked in a hospital in Swaziland where she revealed that it was common
practice for the Swazi’s to kill their children if they were born with a disfigurement,
such as an extra finger. She worked hard to try and challenge the Swazis perceptions
surrounding disability. Some truly inspirational women.
Monday came
around quickly and I met with some of the principles who we are going to be
working with. The volunteers are essentially working as teaching assistants and
will be helping to assist with the national South African exams. The average
class size in South Africa is around 45 pupils to one teacher so we are hoping
that the volunteers can make an impact on working with children in smaller
groups. The volunteers and I also have
to work in non-formal placements. Two days a week, after school, they will
either be working at a resource centre or a library. The resource centre is amazing and the woman
who runs it, Calia, is looking to set up an extracurricular club for the
children as well as implement her reading programme. At the library the
volunteers will be working with Sydney in running a homework club and
employability skills workshops. The library is based in the location, a
predominantly black area. So, another objective we have is to try and encourage
community integration and get other racial and class sects to interact with the
library.
On Monday
the principles and I started looking around for a new home stay and we
conducted our meeting over a bargain bucket of chicken at KFC.I was then taken
to my new homestay and met the family. I will be living with Mama
Eliza (yes that is her name. I have to call her mama) and her husband
Robert. She is a lovely woman and has
done everything to make me feel at home. She’s working hard to make my break up
with the electric blanket a little less painful and is showering me in blankets
and hot baths. Her son and daughter in
law live literally round the corner with their two year old son, Sato. Who is the definition of the word CUTE. Rosette, Mama Eliza’s daughter in law, is
lovely and she has been taking me around town and showing me the township. At the moment it’s the holidays so Mama Eliza
also has her other son and daughter staying here and her grandchildren. It’s a
busy house, but it’s great!
Sato being cute
Already wearing my hair like I did in Ghana . hideously
I have
already made several cultural faux pars. Apparently sitting in the sun is
maddening and you do not put your knickers in the washing machine. But I’ve also
learnt several lessons. Don’t assume the
liquid in the coke bottle is coke it could be an herbal medicine made from a
tree and don’t nervously mumble that you don’t know the name of your church.
I’m kinda glad I can justify these social faux pars with the excuse of cultural
difference to hide the fact I’m a clueless idiot. Pretty sure the entire family
now think the English are not good cooks and that we can’t go five minutes
without dropping, spilling or generally struggling with every -day life. I have done a disservice to my country. I’ve let you down and for that I apologise.
Its been
interesting learning about their perception of England. On the first day we
crossed the first cultural hurdle when I explained that, “no I do not have a
chef… nor a maid.” They also find it crazy that we don’t all live in mansions
and that homelessness is a problem. However, they are very up on our political
issues I’ve been asked my opinion on the Scottish referendum several times as
well as England’s stance on the Israeli–Palestinian conflict.
Rosette took
me round the township the evening I arrived and I have to admit it was scary.
It’s not that I feel unsafe it’s the staring that is more unsettling. I knew
that South Africa was still living in the shadow of apartheid, but I had no
idea just how segregated it would be. The township, called the location, is
where all the black South Africans live. There is not a single white face here,
so at the moment I’m the class clown. It does feel weird having people judging
me on the colour of my skin, but I guess it something I’m going to grow used
too. Apartheid plays such a big part in
the South Africans lives. Nearly every person I have spoken too will bring it
up in one way or another and it’s so interesting to hear their perspective. Its also not that fact I'm white, but the fact that I'm living and socialising with a black family which appears to be provoking the stares. Its really weird! Even Rosette said to me today she was finding it irritating the amount of people staring at us.
But enough
of the serious political talk. When we get to the crux of it, I am a big name
round the location. A celebrity some may say. (I’m kidding).
Pictures from the location. Fish and chips. Everyday essentials
This
afternoon I went to a hair salon in the location with Mama Eliza, her daughter,
rosette and Sato and the salon owner was apparently boasting that she has
broken into the white market. However, despite suggestions from Rosette I
regret to inform you I will not be getting my hair braided in the near future.
Nevertheless, I am not ashamed to admit that I am now a little in love with the
weave. What a wonderful creation, needle and thread, defying nature’s laws,
transforming people’s lives since the 1950s. In just a mere couple of hours you
can change you entire look with no chemical damage to your hair. Long black
braids to short blonde bombshell. Curly to straight. The best part? You don’t
have to wash your hair in a whole month! The sense of freedom, the liberation
from the needless routine of washing, conditioning, drying, straightening.
Gone. I am now making it my personal
mission to bring the weave into more people’s lives in the UK and will be sure
to set up a KONY style campaign in the near future.
Weave Shopping. Where the magic happens.
The food has
also been amazing! I’m really enjoying Pap and am getting used to full fat milk
(sorry mum). However, they now want me to make them an authentic English meal.
Which has led me to conclude that we have some truly crap dishes. Curry? Not
ours. Stir fry? Not ours. Tagaletili? Not ours. Let’s not even joke about
coronation chicken. All we are left with is Sunday dinner, pie and the most
boring meal in the world cottage pie. Due to my poor cooking skills I decided
against fish chips and mushy peas and made the duller and harder to mess up
choice, cottage pie.
I decided to
also make some scones to add at least a little flavour to the meal which the
kids really enjoyed. I made sure they washed their hands about twelve times and
spent the majority of the time scraping cake mix of Cepay’s hands. Everything
was going well. We’d got the scones into the tin we’d even glazed with egg! The
problem came with the baking. The scones were in for about five minutes when
thick black smoke came pouring out the oven. Running to the defence of my
mother’s recipe I made sure that everyone knew my scones were not the cause of
the fumes. We collectively decided that we would open the oven door to let some
of the smoke out and then resume cooking.
However shortly after, the operation got abruptly stopped and my scones
were left half cooked and miserable.
I then moved
onto the cottage pie. One of Mama Eliza’s great nieces is staying for the
weekend and she was great help around the kitchen. The cottage pie didn’t turn
out too bad. Obviously the oven was out of bounds so all we were left with was
mincemeat and mashed potato, but we managed to find a way to pull through. I
felt it looked a bit like dog food, but it somehow went down a treat. Probably
due to the fact that the bubbling liquid in the pot was seventy five per cent
fat. I also introduced them to stuffing which provoked some curiosity. (It worked
dramatically on my side they had never tried the dish before). The scones had somehow
magically survived, we had left them in the turned off oven while we were
cooking. It had taken me two hours to cook mincemeat and mashed potato, so they’d
had sufficient time to thicken up. I tried slicing them in half and lacing with
jam. Not all the scones survived and even the ten year old niece told me the
baking had been a ‘disaster’.
Onion shades
My apprentice and I. Now scared with bad cooking tips.
