traditional dancers at Emathulini youth center

Church daycare center in Durban

Dinner with the Zulu King (seated second from left) in Durban

Scope of AIDS epidemic in area around Isolabasha youth center

Staff and NJ delegation at Isolabasha youth center in a very rural area of KwaZulu Natal

Meeting with community leaders at Isolabasha youth center

Home of one of our hosts at Emathulini youth center

Cows blocking the way

Committee members and global partners at the Emathulini youth center

Winning debate team at the Emathulini youth center

Partners having lunch at Zenzele training center where community members receive job training

Zenzele training center

Local telephone booth

Traditional dancers at Emathulini youth center

Laura working with a student in the cyber Y training room

Two amazing sites

May 26, 2005

It is hard to begin this diary. I don’t know that there are words to express all that has happened today. I will try doing this justice and hoping that I can.

Today, we visited two amazing sites.

The first was a refugee center where Planned Parenthood uses this captive audience to offer programs on sexual health issues---today’s lesson was on HIV/AIDS. In French, Freddie the peer educator spoke to a group of 20+ adults on modes of transmission. We were invited in to observe. They came from Somalia, the Congo, Ethiopia and other parts of Africa where war had taken over their lives. As political refugees they were accessing services at this center and happening to learn about important life skills simultaneously. The questions, the intent listening, the confusion, and the need for answers were exactly the same as what we experience in our groups in the US. It was incredibly clear that we are all people—sexual beings—that need clear information because we all have the same needs---no matter where we are. The refugees were absorbing the information.

The feelings I expected to have begun to develop and I was carefully aware that this was just the beginning of the day.

Our next stop was at the “townships”. These are shacks one on top of another with mostly no water, electricity, or sanitation. These townships came into existence to support the most disadvantaged S African blacks many years ago because the S African government bulldozed their homes and they were pushed out. They are still around today because they are so poor and they are no resources to move away.

As we pull into the vast township all you can see for miles and miles are these structures.
Julia is talking and giving us information and background but I become overwhelmed by the scenes. Children running around, women washing clothes in a basin, many dogs, chickens, and cows walking about. We speed by for what seems like an eternity until we come to a large colorful structure of the Planned Parenthood center in this township.
We get out and are greeted by the most amazing staff. Beautiful men and women that have dedicated their lives to this work. They tell us of their programs – men as partners, youth programs, child – headed household support, refugee life skills, and women’s wellness. I listen and am impressed, but am still feeling the effects of what we have just driven through and I know the next few hours will be significant.

Esther, one of the PPASA staff, tells us she will take us to two programs in different township homes.

We drive back through where we came from and make many turns through the developments. It seems like an eternity and I begin to cry. Overwhelmed, sad, and fearful I silently weep. We pull over on the dirt road and get out our cars to enter into a shack where we are told that a peer educator is doing a program on domestic violence with a group of community women and girls. She is using a kerosene heater and the smell is so overwhelming that I am not sure that I can be in there for long.

As we are getting settled on benches squeezed into this tiny room filled with kerosene the group stands and breaks out into a beautiful African song. They clap, sing, and move together. It is intense and again, I begin to weep trying to hide my face unclear what my tears may mean to them. I see my colleagues doing the same.

We are introduced and she begins the program in the Afrikaans language. Occasionally she stops and the content is translated to us. Again, they talk about the very same issues we do. Physical violence, emotional abuse, sexual abuse, and even financial abuse. The women express their concerns that if they tell their partners to leave, they have no provider. If they tell the authorities that their kids are being sexually abused, they will have no support and be ostracized by their neighbors. The peer educator and Esther explain that the child needs to be the focus and there are places to get help. I weep silently and feel as if I can’t take anymore. They are the most beautiful faces I have ever seen. Wide eyes filled with an eager need to learn and make a better life for themselves and their families.

We leave that home and are told we are going up the dirt road to another home of a child-headed household. As people take pictures and talk for a moment outside their cars, I get in my car and weep. Can I go to this house? How will I react?

We pull up to Ncosi’s house. She is a 20 year old young woman raising 6 young people, a mixture of siblings and cousins as her mother and aunt died last year of AIDS. As we file into her very cold and cement based living room the rain begins to pour down onto the tin roof. It is so loud that it is almost deafening.

As the rain quickly subsided, Esther begins to tell us that Ncosi lost her mother and aunt to AIDS and she is raising this family alone. Ncosi is astonishingly pretty. Esther tells us that because she lost her mother at 18, she can become the foster parents for her cousins and siblings and she has chosen to do that. If she had been less than 18, a neighbor would have been appointed as guardian. She lucked out and got the house because it was government built and the house was finished before her mother died so they can continue to live there as a family.
Ncosi tell us that she has saved R1,000 (about $170.00) so that she can become a police person to have trade that she can pursue while still living at the house and taking care of everyone. She needs only a bit more to get the necessary credentialing to pursue this dream.

Her 11 year old brother is there and stares down at the ground. What must have he endured seeing his mother and aunt die in that cold, tiny shack? I being to weep and hold my head so I am not noticed. Ncosi is not crying and I don’t think I should either.

We leave silent and breathless. There are now words to say to each other—just silence.
We head towards a place for a traditional S African lunch and make small talk and pleasantries with our hosts still reeling from the day.

The reality is that there are no differences—just geography and opportunity. They have the very same needs, questions, issues, and desires. We can pretend that they are different because it eases the fear, but they are not. They want what we want. What feels so raw is that fact—this could be me or you. They are not faceless tragic souls, but real people with smiles, interest, fears, and dreams.

Darrah

Reception for PP suporters in Capetown at Twyla and Jeptha law firm. Honored guest was the Deputy Commissioner of Corrections who was interested in NJ PP's juvenile justice programs as she is developing partnerships with PPASA to reach incarcerated and vulnerable youth.

Free condoms

NJ delegation visiting the clinic at Kyelitsha youth center

Women's program on domestic violence at Kyelitsha project

Peer education program in Kyelitsha

PPASA Youth Center in Kyelitsha that has been growing with computer classes, recreation programs and adolescent peer education.

Race Matters

May 25, 2005

We hired a driver to take us around the Western Cape of South Africa on Monday and Tuesday. We visited Table Mountain and the National Park, The Cape of Good Hope (the most breathtaking place I’ve seen) and the Wineland region. Ryan our personal tour guide was Afrikaner and a former policeman right after apartheid ended and during reconstruction.

He was also willing to talk about race issues at the drop of a hat. Driving around the national park, Ryan would point out protea, a beautiful flower native to the region, wild baboons and ostrich. Just as easily, he would bring up the subject of apartheid, segregation and oppression. The car would turn quiet. “What did you say that flower was called again, Ryan?” We were floored that he would bring up the topic while leisurely sightseeing, he was amazed we hadn’t.

We soon found out that all South Africans, not just Afrikaners, but Coloureds and Blacks alike speak openly and freely about the dark days of apartheid. He talked honestly about his role in helping to maintain segregation and incite conflict between communities, about homes being bulldozed and people forced out to the rural provinces. About the poor conditions in townships where blacks were concentrated in large numbers without running water, electricity, transportation and most importantly good employment and schools.

A new democracy is taking hold in South Africa – just ten years young and change is happening, new homes, jobs, educational opportunities, participation in a global community, and a stronger economy. Ryan explained his openness in this way; in America race was political. The people wanted segregation. In South Africa it was structural, the government wanted segregation, not the people. After Nelson Mandela’s release in 1990, he preached over and over not to cover up the past, but talk about it. Talk about it to understand and to heal. And that’s exactly what they do.

Coloured and Black South African’s should have much to be angry about. But all I’ve seen is hope. I’ve met proud people, ready and willing to participate in a new democracy and the global community. I hope they keep talking, especially to us, so that we may learn from them too.

Laura

Fruit and vegetable market outside Capetown

Beautiful Capepoint, Capetown, South Africa

Day one-New Jersey to Capetown, South Africa

After a 40 hour trip we were welcomed to South Africa by a beautiful view of the cape and table mountain from the airplane approaching Capetown airport. An even more welcome and beautiful sight was our host Julia Zignu. After nine months of email communication, we were delighted when our conversation started as if we had only been apart for a few days.

We had a few hours to settle in and then Darrah, Jane, Phyllis and Julia met for a working lunch to plan one of our programs. Planned Parenthood Association of South Africa has nine provincial offices, including our partner, PPASA-KwaZulu Natal. All nine provincial directors and board leaders, national board members and the new national director will be joining us in Durban for a two day leadership workshop.
Phyllis

Workgroup meeting in New Jersey fall 2004

PPCNJ, PPAMA and PPASA-KZN dinner during the exchange planning meeting fall 2004.

A little about Global Partners in Local Communities

RIGHTS HAVE NO BORDERS
Global Partners brings U.S. based Planned Parenthood affiliates together with family planning providers in the developing world to share:
Expertise ~ Experience ~ Ideas