The children at the House on the Rock are wonderful and it has been great to spend time with them and the 7 Americans. Things work very different here and I find myself comparing the situation of the country to the United States in the 1800’s. Especially in the area of Social Work and children’s homes. Another thing that I have noticed is who does the back breaking physically strenuous work here. All of the physical labor workers at the House on the Rock are black and they are paid basically a dollar an hour. This is not just at the [View Full Entry]

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Let the fun begin! I have started at my agency which is the House on the Rock. It is a home for children that have been orphaned from AIDs. They have 48 children and about a third are HIV. Currently there are 1 million orphans in South Africa which poses a huge problem for the country. They have the most AIDs orphans in the world. According to the secretary the vibe of the home was off when I came out for a visit. Both the director who’s home is the House on the Rock and one of the children were in [View Full Entry]

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We may have internet, cell phones and cable t.v. but I feel like I am in the 1950's in the book "life is so good". specifically the part where the main character who is an African American is expected to eat his lunch on the porch of a white families home with the family dogs. The discussions I have had with the privelaged white South Africans are very disturbing. Mind you I am still focusing on listening and try not to steer conversations in any direction. This morning I talked with a former policemen who now works for the cancer institute. [View Full Entry]

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Yesterday we went to a Baha'i devotional and were finally able to spend some time with local residences. Usually devotionals in the states or the ones I have been to last about 15 minutes to a 1/2 hour max. The one we went to here was about an hour long and there was alot of singing. there were about a dozen of us but it felt like a lot more because we were in a very small hot flat. I enjoyed it a great deal and it was strange to feel at home so far away. Afterwards I had a good [View Full Entry]

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