Southafrica - one place - two worlds
After a flight of 12 hours I finally arrived in Cape Town on Wednesday morning together with Hedi and Claudia, who are employees for the “Kindermissionswerk”, the NGO I am working for. We checked into the Hotel, which is stunning beautiful (the owners are a supporter of the Zip Zap Circus). We drove a little bit through the city, which looks very European.
Directly on the first afternoon we went to Khayelitsha, probably the poorest township in Cape Town. We saw a dancing program for HIV-positive children, which was great. After the program we drove the children back home into their township.
We continued to drive and after about 15 minutes were thrown back in the “developed world”. It was quite a shock to see the poor and the rich living so close together. I have seen lots of poverty before, especially in Haiti (where the slums are much worse), but in Haiti you have poverty, broken roads and street children everywhere – so before I get from one extreme into the other I always have a long flight in-between. Here in South Africa you have only 15 minutes. It makes you question a lot of things.
Why is it still that way many years after the Apartheid? Why cannot more wealthy persons sponsor a child in the township? Why does the world have money to pay millions for the soccer world cup but not to support those people?
Many years ago we Europeans came here, stole their country and forced them to work for us. Now, many years later, we give them freedom and equality - > to live our lifestyle. But they have never learned our lifestyle.
Our way of thinking straight and forward having a goal in mind – this is what our parents, our society taught us. But no one taught it to them, so how should they know when their parents and their grandparents didn’t know. They used to live in the bush before we invaded their country. The only thing they had to think about was to get enough food everyday and to get along with nature. Nowadays you see lots of big advertising signs next to the poorest people – so it’s natural that they also want all of these things – that creates greed, which again creates violence.
Our system doesn’t work in Africa, if we don’t start to teach it to young children.
But if we would start doing that (which would be the only fair way), there would be a break in our system. People in developing countries would get a good salary, so prices in Europe would rice drastically. But as I said, I think that’s only fair. I know many people in Belgium that buy new shoes every month, new clothes, new cars, …. Why? Because the media is telling you that this is the only way to be happy and to be someone.
But isn’t the only way to really be someone to do something with your life that has a deep sense in it? Like helping other people?
Another project we visited is the Zip Zap Circus. I have put pictures on the blog yesterday. Brent (white South African) and Laurence (French), who worked in circuses as well in younger years, started it 17 years ago and they have been helping so many children to get out of the poverty and have a goal in life. To reach that goal, they have to work hard – they learn it at the Zip Zap Circus School. Many of the kids come from townships and without the circus, it could well be that they would be part of a gang and shoot each other in the streets. But instead they are now traveling through the world performing their acts on the trapeze, the trampoline, by joggling, …