Oh Right... School

Hi friends!! So this week has introduced me to the primary reason I am here, to go to school (though this past month has certainly revealed countless other reasons). While I am sure the adventures will continue I have to say that from now on they will most likely be of a more theoretical persuasion. But don’t be too worried, there will be “discovering cool/things/people/places South Africa” adventures interspersed within the coming posts. Like for instance, this past Shabbat I went back to my surrogate family (the same place I was at for the first two shabbatot). Going there honestly already feels like going to a second home. I feel so comfortable and content there, it is really strange how that happens so quickly under such different, but yet such similar circumstances compared to what I am accustomed to. Then on Sunday, four friends and I went to the beach (sorry had to say it) to play some pick up Frisbee. Besides being extremely enjoyable, like my Jewish experience here, it allowed me to connect with random people who I would otherwise have little in common with. And that night, a bunch of us went to a concert at the botanical gardens of an African ska band. Funnily enough, African ska music is reggae with horns of different sorts in comparison to American ska which I think is punk rock or alternative or something I am not properly identifying (but not reggae) with horns… oh please don’t judge me, I listen to Celine Dion and Leann Rimes, I don’t claim to know these things...either way it was another beautiful experience and so on and so forth...but now to the theoretical adventures i have been starved for....

Classes started on Friday and so far I am extremely excited about what each one has to offer and the possibilities of what I will know by the end. I am especially excited for my history class “Liberation n Southern Africa.” Ever since arriving in Cape Town I feel like I have been compelled to analyze where I am and who I am surrounded by because of South Africa’s tumultuous past, but I have yet to develop the full context in which to place all of these observations. I think this class is going to build that framework for me and really allow me to develop an appreciation for the state of South Africa now and a simultaneous awareness of the glaring problems that are still present.

One of the reasons I am really optimistic about this class is that I have already read 600 pages of Nelson Mandela’s 750 page autobiography “Long Walk to Freedom” which is one of the core readings for the class and have gained so much from it. The story maps out his lifelong struggle for the freedom of his people which is interchangeable with the history of the entire country over the latter part of the Twentieth century. The book is incredible evidence of Mandela’s strength, insight, unfathomable faith in what and who is good and lifelong struggle for the well being of his people. He dedicated his entire life to the pursuit of freedom and equality; not only did he fight a prejudiced, terrible regime, but he often had to fight against opposition within his own race and political group. He then was imprisoned for three decades and continued to wage the battle and do so while maintaining the same grace and hope in humanity that he had thirty years prior (well I am only up to 1980, but I am pretty sure that is the direction the book is going in).

One passage of the book that really struck me (well there were like 43, 654, but here is just a taste) was when Mandela speaks about naming his second youngest daughter amidst the height of the struggle and the constant threat of imprisonment. He called her Zenani, which is translated as “what have you brought to the world?” He describes the name as a challenge to the person to whom it is given. One must fulfill their name by contributing positively to the people and the environment around them. Every part of his life was intrinsically related to his plight; it was not just about the marginalized majority (blacks, as well as any other non-Europeans) of South Africa, but about humanity’s potential to be better. This book should be required reading for citizens of the world. When I say shemoneh esrei and get to the paragraph “al hatzadikim” (on the righteous) I think I will forever think of Nelson Mandela, for he embodies the very essence of what is to be righteous, good and giving. I am excited to learn about all of the other key figures in the liberation struggle for I am sure that being introduced to a horde of figures who have followed paths similar to that of Mandela will reveal that when inequality and injustice are overwhelmed by good, the world and all its inhabitants may be able to take the necessary steps to freedom.

Another class that I am extremely excited for is an archeology class called “the roots of black identity in South Africa.” From the first few classes I can tell that archeology is one of those subjects that impacts one’s entire way of thinking. There is a lot of controversy in the field because observations, inferences of various functions and details of entire societies are based on thousand-year-old physical objects. Historical context is not fully present in these observations thus making accuracy of ones inferences uncertain. As a result, over the past forty years, archaeologists have started to study the ethnographic present in tandem with the archaeological past. In other words, by studying societies that have existed over the past few hundred years, it is possible to gain understanding of how various objects from millennia ago were utilized based on societal patterns. Just as we can look to the past to understand how we should or should not act in the present, we can use the environments we inhabit now to increase our understanding of what came before us. I find this to be an extremely interesting concept because we often perceive the past to be complete, a closed book that we open every now and then to understand where we are now and where we hope to go. But within the field of archaeology, present material certainty can be used to make additions to these old books of the past. Parts of our roots have yet to be uncovered and by using the here and now as a foundation it is possible to write more chapters to stories of the worlds we never knew. Perhaps, this paradigm shift can even teach us things about our cultures, our families, ourselves, that were previously foreign. The present can often be just as much of a teacher as the past.

Another fun class that I randomly decided to go to was this African Dance class with a friend… I am in South Africa, I may as well go crazy. While most of the people in the class are legit dancers who tip their toes at the beginning of every dance, there were a few brave uncoordinated souls who worked through the difficult sequences of leg and arm movements that seem difficult enough to do separately. Anyway, after figuring how to not move my body at once, I started to feel the rhythm as they say. It was so much fun, and I cannot wait to become a pro and simultaneously be exposed to a very rich aspect of the culture I am continuing to get to know.

So I am currently enrolled in class called “Religion, Sexuality and Gender” which is quite exciting. We are still dealing with basic gender theory which at this point has become one of my favorite pastimes but w have not gotten into the fun stuff yet. I am registered for too many credits at the moment so I may decided to unregister for this class because the workload along with volunteering (which I think starts next week) and African Dance is quite overwhelming. However I think I am going to simply just go to the class because those are three of my favorite things…gosh if only they added football to the title, that would be perfect. I feel like these things have conflicted with each other slash have been so deeply connected to each other in my experience, and to hear about how others reconcile the relationship between these three institutions from a personal as well as academic standpoint is something I am really looking forward to.

SIDEBAR: Its funny, looking at the title of that class, I just realized that I have not had too many religious/gender clashes since being here. Normally I have them daily. I think this is a result of the creativity and openness of the community that I have discussed in previous posts.

Wow I cannot wait to continue to broaden my perspective, learn new significant facts and alter my way of thinking. And I am especially excited that I get to share it with all of you.

So I am going to spice things up a little and along with your South African Ulpan word of the day I am also going to give you some important cultural fun facts about South Africa.

Word of the day (or week I should say):

Queue – noun- pronounced Q (like the letter) – a line in which people stand waiting for something

Bernard was frustrated that he had to wait in the queue for so long in the super market.

Cultural fun facts:

1. If you want to find eggs and skim milk in the supermarkets, you wont find them in the refrigerated section, they are sold in normal room temperature isles…scary right? But I am still alive so it cant be too bad.
2. People here are ridiculously good looking, mainly the men. The majority of the men here are just objectively good looking, it is so strange, I do not quite know how to handle it.

While these both are rather trivial and superficial I hope that my assessment of my intellectual adventures can cancel your judgments of me out.

As they say in South Africa..CHEERS!!