Goodbye, Cape Town

So. I made it. I have escaped Africa alive, unharmed, and in one piece.  I don’t know exactly how many people actually feared for my well-being during my semester in Cape Town, but I’m sure that there were some. “Don’t die, don’t get AIDS” was some actual advice that I received before my departure to the great continent of Africa. But please, don’t ask me when I return how Africa was. I have no idea. I have barely even skimmed the surface of the largest Continent on earth, but I can tell you about Cape Town if you’d like! 

Kirstenbosch, my favorite spot in Cape Town.

During my time here, I took public transportation every day to and from school. With the walk to the train station on either end, the entire journey took about an hour each way, and let me tell you, I dreaded it every single day. In truth, every time I mentioned that I was taking the public transportation system to a South African student, they wrinkled their nose and asked, “oh wow, how’s that?” At first I couldn’t see what the problem was, but after a few weeks of experiencing being so stuck between the packed masses of sweaty bodies that I could barely breathe, I began to understand what they meant. It was pure drudgery, there’s no other way to put it, but I experienced getting to university the same way that many students whose families can’t afford a car, and experienced the daily commute of a typical middle class worked in Cape Town. I will never again look at the rats in the New York City subway system with disdain.  The large pile of human feces left on the seat by a passenger that I encountered one day, which had been clearly been sitting there for the entire day, was not only more unsanitary but also much more repulsive.  Every day I would lug two large bags, one filled with workout clothes or clothes for the night, and one filled with books for school and my laptop onto the train. I was clearly an outsider: no one carries that much stuff in Cape Town, but I was never robbed or mugged, which just goes to show how safe Cape Town really is if you’re careful. 

That time i saw Prince Charles lecture at UCT

I also took classes at the University of Cape Town: Applied International Trade Bargaining, South African Political Thought, and the Politics of International Trade Relations. I met a plethora of South African students, and in two out of my 3 tutorials I was the only American student. In the third, I was one of two. I was completely immersed in the South African university system, and learned politics and economics from a non-Western perspective. Many of my professors scoffed America and looked down on capitalism, which was a complete departure from the style of teaching to which I am accustomed.

I volunteered teaching Xhosa speaking 9^th graders English in the township of Khayelitsha and found that volunteering is not the happy, rewarding experience I had always found it to be before. Finding proper ways to help people is not easy. You can’t just march in with a pre-tailored plan and expect it to work. A man I met while here in Cape Town put it rather interestingly, “if you want to make God laugh, make plans.” I’d worked with 3^rd and 4^th graders in inner-city Philadelphia before, but was given so much guidance and support on how to tutor and help them. They were under strict rules to listen to me, and I was under given an exact role. Here I was given a booklet and a group of kids and sent to work. That was difficult, and the frustrations I encountered with the program I was supposed to be teaching, as well as with the difficulty I had in actually teaching English to these students made me realize that implementing actual, sustained change in both the South African society and the South African educational system is going to take a long, long, time. 

I did an independent study while here on the relationship between the South African education system and the economy. Though South Africa invests the most money per student of any nation on the continent, it also scores incredibly poorly on international standardized tests.  Since apartheid, students have been able to go to whatever school they would like, but few take advantage of this opportunity and schools are still largely segregated. There is a massive teacher shortage, so class sizes can be upwards of 50 students per class, and the teachers are ill-equipped to prepare their students for the working world. Memorization is stressed while students never learn critical thinking skills. This poor preparation on the behalf of the education system cripples the economy because most of the student of South Africa are not being prepped to be innovative and creative skilled workers who will boost the economy and bring unemployment out of its current slump.

As I look out the window while I’m typing this, I see the Sahara stretching itself out below me. In a few short hours I’ll be in London, and a few short hours after that I’ll be reuniting with Russell for the first time in 4 months. Even though this long distance thing was actually painless for us, seeing him in person will be unbelievable.

With all the adventures I had in Cape Town, when it was time to start saying goodbyes a couple days ago, I was ready.  I didn’t have any emotional, tear filled goodbyes in my last few days. I was too excited to be sad. I’ll be back to Cape Town, but for now I’m ready for my next adventure and the final chapter of my junior semester abroad. Bring it. 

Cape Town as I was taking off.