So
here I stand, on my grand pedestal, quite literally. I am on a newly built wooden deck, 10 feet above the grass
lawn below, which slopes down toward the hedges, which slopes northward down
the hill to the street below. The
street runs east/west from Plettenberg Bay to the N2, the highway that runs
along the coast of S. Africa. The
walk from the main part of town, with all the nice restaurants, cafes, boutique
and surf shops and the like, west toward the highway probably takes about 20-30
minutes, uphill. Across and down the highway lay the townships. The
collection of temporary and semi-permanent settlements is where the ‘coloreds’
(those Africans who have lived in this area and mixed with the white colonists
– similar to the ‘mestizos’ of Latin America) and newly settled of other
African descent live.
So
here I stand on my pedestal. I
gaze at the scene below me. The
tiled roofs of beautiful, modern homes pop out amidst the tips of trees,
rolling downhill towards the bay below.
The river, coming from the ridge-toothed mountains at the very distant
horizon, turning into softer rolling green hills, empties into the bay. Rolling clouds about the hills reflect reds, oranges and yellows from the setting sun. The waves create a never-ending break
of white foam upon the shore.
Cars
drive up and down the street that leads from town to the townships. Groups of blacks, I don’t know if
they’re coloreds or Africans, walk back up toward the highway, probably going
home, probably coming from one of the many service jobs in town, or even
possibly coming from an afternoon of playing in the ocean.
The
physical positioning of myself, relaxing on a deck enjoying a drink and the
view of the mountains and sea as the sun goes down, in contrast to those
walking on the street below back home after a long day of work, quite literally
reveals the contrast in our lives.
Monday
through Thursday our group scatters into the various townships surrounding
Plett, walking around with caretakers from the nonprofit Hospice Plett, which
provides palliative care to patients with incurable diseases. Each day we’ll visit anywhere from
three to fifteen patients in their homes, often the size of one of our
bedrooms. We sit on the
deteriorated second-hand couches and chairs, often covered by a blanket or
sheet to hide the tears in the finishing, and watch and listen as our
caretakers talk to the patients in !Khosa, gathering information since their
last visit: Any new pains? Did you
take your medications today? Blood
pressure is recorded, along with blood-sugar levels. Data jotted down.
Notes taken. Gossip exchanged. Next house. Next patient.
These
patients suffer from any number of the following diseases and conditions:
hypertension, diabetes, TB, AIDS, cancer, paralysis due to stroke, mental
illness, arthritis, elephantitis of some limb or organ, amputees, gun-shot
victims, skin disease, ring worm – the list goes on and on. Many of the patients are old; many are
young. There is one main clinic in
one of the larger townships that serves three to four townships around. Patients that go for one ailment or
another when they don’t have a scheduled appointment will often be turned
away. There aren’t enough
doctors. There are 40,000 open
nursing positions in S. Africa’s government run hospitals. There aren’t enough rooms to carry the
load.
The
townships seem nice compared to the slums of India that we worked in. The houses seem bigger; each house has
its own lawn. There are plants and
trees around. It is not
crowded. Mostly dirt roads and
paths connect block after block of houses, from phase 1 (super temporary, built
of mismatched wooden planks and plywood) through phase 4 (permanent, built of
cement block and concrete). The
natural environment seems more incorporated into this living situation. The sun shines. The wind blows. The openness of the layout seems
healthier than the dark, dank squalor of some of the dwellings of families we
visited in India.
Everyday
there is a new story heard from one of the patients. Four houses caught fire this morning. There was a violent confrontation
between two women at the clinic, one of whom was suspected of cheating with the
other’s husband. A boy across the
street broke into the paralyzed woman’s house and stole her dvd player; he was
on drugs and planned to sell it to get money for more drugs. An older woman was raped by three men
last week in the middle of the night.
The men were arrested and went to jail. Bail was set at 100 rand each (about ten dollars); they were
released the next day. The police
arrest some from drug use, and sell drugs to others.
I
don’t tell these stories or describe this scene to be sensational, or to paint
a picture of a violent, poverty-stricken, substance-abusing people; these
things happen in all cities in every country by and to every race and creed to
some extent. I tell these stories
to show the contrast between these townships and the more affluent community of
Plett just a stone’s throw away.
We
spend our mornings during the week interacting with the sick in their small
homes, hearing stories of violence, pain, and suffering throughout the
community.
We
spend our afternoons and weekends studying in a clubhouse overlooking the
ocean, playing on the beach with the healthy and capable, taking hikes on
breathtaking peninsulas, swimming with seals, visiting monkey sanctuaries,
browsing the internet sipping tea at cafes, and finally retreating to our
large, clean homes for a home-cooked meal and a comfortable bed to sleep
on.
The
contrast, I suppose, is easy to point out. Most of us feel it to some degree or another. The reasons for the contrast seem just
as visible. A brief overview of
Africa’s past 500 years is pretty convincing: a slave trade, colonization, natural resource exploitation,
apartheid; all to some degree or another rooted in racism - a feeling that this
world was/is for the taking by the superior races – which is itself to some
degree or another rooted in the idea that our personal health and success, and
that of our family and our country, must and can come before the well-being of
another.
This
contrast, which could I suppose be described as stark inequality, does not
solely reside in Plettenberg Bay, or in Africa. It resides in most communities, in most countries, where
there is a mix of people of different races, some of which have power, some of
which don’t. The contrast is just
as stark between San Francisco and Oakland in the Bay Area, between Russian
Hill and the Tenderloin within San Francisco, between Fairfax and the Canal or
Marin City in Marin County.
It
seems that in our normal, everyday lives, we make a choice to cross the lines
of that inequality or stay within the bounds of our own privilege. Staying within the bounds of our
privilege, we may remain virtually unaware of the suffering of others. Buffered by the comforts of our nice
cars and paved highways, we move from home to work, in between stopping at
cafes, restaurants and shops, all there to serve us and those like us. Never needing to face the realities
that exist in the in-between spaces, underneath bridges and in the busy streets,
we remain unscathed, able to continue on in our existence without the slightest
acknowledgement that something is not right in this world.
For
those however that cross those lines, you are inevitably faced with a
question: what do I do now,
knowing that I have, and they have not?
(to be continued…)
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