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The photos here are a tour of the people of South Africa, with some thoughts on cross-cultural integration. I have always laughed at Charles Dickens’ absurd characters. I read a few more of his novels last year and discovered that the author was not trying to exaggerate their characteristics. Dickens explained this in his foreword to
Martin Chuzzlewit where two English men are duped by American con-men and then helped by another American. He said something like this: that his story is not as much a caricature as it is an exhibitionof the American character--of that side which was the most obtrusive, and the most likely to be seen by such travellers. I think what he meant was this--that against the backdrop of an unfamiliar time or place, people seem so different from what we think of as “straight-and-ordinary” as my brother-in-law says. I am sure that my brother-in-law would make the perfect character in a Charles Dickens novel about an American housebuilder with his carved wooden bear holding the sign “GET TO WORK” in his immaculate back yard. So, look at the photos and think of who you know in your own country that would inspire
Maria Kwakwa, Agric Science
She leads the assembly and is absolutely as vibrant as the photo shows. the same feeling, just in a different context.
I have mentioned that other teachers and learners think it strange that I spend time alone in my classroom getting work done. I have become very conscious about how the culture of individualism is so American. People’s perspectives on many things differ accordingly. The first meal I prepared for a South African was for the family I was staying with during our three months of training. Living in the house on the weekdays was Lena, the ugogo (grandmother) and Fenzi, the two year old grandaughter and a daughter, Manunu. Fenzi’s mother, Nomthandazo, lives and works in Pretoria and Lena’s husband, ubaba Jim (grandfather) lives and works in Johannesburg. Both the husband and daughter had travelled from the cities to spend the weekend at home. They didn’t expect the meal at any specific time; I just started cooking my cabbage rolls after church and hoped they would like them. Nomthandazo was in the kitchen when I decided the food was ready to eat, but I was unsure what to do next. There wasn’t a table for all to sit down to. Lena and I usually just pulled up chairs to the kitchen
Mama B
Mem Mabunda is our maintenance person. counter. (In the year since then, they have finished the kitchen and have new cabinets and a table.) I said to Nomthandazo, “It’s ready, and everybody can help themselves.” She very kindly told me that it is the custom to serve the elders first. So we prepared plates of food and carried them outside to Lena and Jim. Think about the phrase; “Help yourself.” It sounds gracious to me: to prepare a meal and let each guest take the portions they wish. But in this culture when one of the first verbs I learned is ukuphakela (to serve food), it is rude to tell someone to help themselves when you could serve them instead. Get it? -- “Do you get it?” is another example of the dichotomy of the individual/group. When Mem Kwakwa speaks to the assembly of learners before school each Monday and Friday morning and she gives the devotion, she will say “Are we together, good people?” The greetings for Sepedi also mean “We are come here together as friends.” (Or something like that...from the Sepedi teacher Laze (Lazarus) Ramelefo who is the most diligent, motivated Home Language teacher you could meet.)
After
Mapule, principal's assistant--wedding
with her sister and Miriam Banda, Life Science teacher four months without a science teacher at Sele School, Mr. Fanky Makpo was hired. He has a very deep voice and speaks well. At assembly, the principal said that his learners wanted him to speak to the school so all could hear what he had to say. His impromptu motivational speech was to say that each one of us is a winner. He said that thousands of sperm went their way at the moment a person was conceived, so that in itself makes each one a winner. And for the sperm that didn’t produce life, those are our “dead brothers and sisters” who we must not disappoint. Well, the image has stayed with me...I was quite dumbfounded..but the rest of the teachers were laughing, too. So he got his point across. He also calls me “de beautiful one” which was disconcerting at first, until I heard him use it to address other female teachers. He even SMS’d (texted) a message to me with that address. I don’t have a photo of him, but it is his voice, like James Earl Jones, that is distinctive.
Reviewing my photos you will see:
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Simelane family -- Birthday party
Grace and niece Rhetumetsu (sp?) Rhetumetsu turned one year old. She wasn't afraid of me then, but as so often happens ..there came a time when she was about two, when she cried if I even looked at her. The beadwork and skirt are Ndebele work.
mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;">Colleagues at school: Two women teachers in traditional dress (and you will see me in the blue dress I hired a woman to sew for me.) Mama B, the maintenance person wearing pink has been away for training as a sangoma (traditional healer.) Last year’s office assistant, Mapule, in white at the maths teacher’s wedding. Mapule is Sepedi for Mother Rain which is the same as my isiNdebele name Nozulu.Family members: A birthday party for a one year old girl, dressed in isiNdebele beaded skirt. My host sister, Zanele, at Christmas with her daughter, Thandeke. And a Lobolo function where the groom and bride’s family celebrate the completion of financial obligations which may include a number of cows.Various shots of learners, children and community members. I feel at home in the musical and political arenas. But I’m not in sync with the fashion world of South Africa...especially the shoes! And I don’t share the enthusiasm of most South Africans with sports. The FIFA World Cup is big news every day,
and there was a countdown on the radio each morning the week before it started.It’s always back to the humor of the people here; especially how the learners crack me up! Do you see the mask one of my learners made from a wildlife calendar? He was working on something else with his back to me, and when I asked him something, he quietly turned around with this mask on...It’s a moment I will always remember. Then I got a photo of two of them with their T-shirts.
Hope you have enjoyed the photos.
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D MJ Binkley
Dave and Merry Jo Binkley
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