District Six

I awoke this morning to a bitterly cold and rainy day. Luckily, the loveLife team and I had survived the week of events and today was really more of an admin day. After doing some work in the provincial office, Marcellino and Zolani (another loveLife trainer) took me to Canal Walk, the largest mall in Cape Town, (think Mall of America in MN) for lunch.

Because we were at a mall, Marcellino and Zolani discussed South Africans' dream of being American and doing what they can to just like Americans. It was upsettling to me because, although I understand their point in that they see America as a wealthy country with all the desires, these people are warm and compassionate like I have not witnessed in America. They possess a strength of character and spirit that not many Americans have. However, they dress, act, and say what Americans do/say in hope of living the life we have in America.

(BET editor, me, Eddie Daniels, Isabelle James)

This evening I attended a media forum about the need to strengthen the collaboration of journalists working on HIV issues and human rights issues across the globe. Prominent journalists participated in the forum, discussing their desperate attempts to bring stories of HIV and human rights to their papers, radio, or tv shows. The forum was followed by dinner at the District Six museum, which commemorates the Sixth Municipal District of Cape Town that was a melting pot of races until the twentieth century when removals began and people were forced to move into areas based on the color of their skin. During the dinner, we heard stories from Ahmed Kathrada, a political prisoner who was held captive on Robben Island for over twenty years, even longer than Nelson Mandela. He discussed growing up in District Six and the hardships he had to overcome in terms of segregation, racism, and crime. He provided each of us an autographed copy of his book, "Memoirs." Eddie Daniels, another political prisoner on Robben Island, also addressed us during the dinner. He told us a beautiful story about the "diamond he found in Namibia," referring to his late wife, and the struggles they went through to be together because he was a black man and she was a white woman. In an engaging love story, Eddie relayed his trials and tribulations of being sent to Robben Island for political activism and then how he and his wife got married when it was not legal for a black man to marry a white woman. He has detailed his story in his book, "There and Back" if you are interested in reading more about his life struggles and how he put himself aside in the fight to end Apartheid.

This is a floor-to-ceiling sheet on which the residents of District Six wrote their names and addresses in District Six. A group of women volunteered to embroider over their names so they would be forever in history.