Over the past few days I’ve been inspired by very different people within the communities of Johannesburg and Cape Town. It started with Lebo. As I described in the last blog Lebo created his backpacker’s hostel to bring the world to Soweto and Soweto to the world; to tell his story and to help his community members tell their stories to the world to let them know that Soweto welcomes people to go and see for themselves what life is really like there.
When I got to Cape Town (CT) I found that there were more and more people taking this individual/local level community initiative to make their communities better places to live. The second time I encountered this phenomenon the group and I visited a part of CT called Bo-Kaap. Bo-Kaap is the cultural heart of CT. This was the area of the city where the freed-slave population was confined during the 1830’s. People from South Asian countries, such as India and Malaysia were mainly the types of freed-slaves living there. Our tour guide took us on a walking tour of the area. Two interesting things I was able to experience for the first time was a Mosque and a Muslim cemetery. The Mosque in Bo-Kaap is the oldest (1794) Mosque in CT (and I think in South Africa). There is a very long story behind it, but the gist is that South Africa’s colonial society established anti-practicing laws so that people were not allowed to practice their religion freely. This Mosque was established while disregarding this law, and has been successfully open ever since its establishment. Bo-Kaap is also well known for its colorful buildings and cobblestone side streets (pictures to come). We were also invited to join Bilquees (tour guide’s name) and a friend of hers for tea and to try traditional food from the community. Bilquees then told us about their involvement in the community and it happens to be something very similar to Lebo’s idea. She has created an organization for women to take control of their own financial situation by either making and selling their own food items within the community or creating and selling jewelry or other arts and crafts to sell within the community or markets as well. Just like Lebo, these women were able to find a way to benefit Bo-Kaap’s community members. These women are also empowered and gain independence in their financial situation.
The third time I encountered this phenomenon was while visiting the townships around CT. Townships in South Africa aren’t exactly the same as townships in the U.S. Townships are in this case specific areas or communities within a city. You could compare it to cities that have parts named certain things like Brooklyn or Queens in NYC. These townships vary from shantytowns (lower class) to the “Beverly Hills” (middle-upper class) of shantytowns. Our tour guide on this excursion was a former freedom fighter during the Apartheid and recently established a non-profit organization called Direct Action Center for Peace and Memory (DACPM). This organization hopes to create, or move towards creating, a world where the historical, structural and systemic injustices of opst-conflict communities are adequately commemorated, addressed and transformed to ensure greater peace and human security for everyone. They hope to achieve this through education, psychological and economic development. They also hope to reduce violence against women, men and children by improving the capacity of black men, specifically those who have been directly affected by political violence in South Africa.
On our tour we drove through different townships and had lunch in a very interesting community. This specific community had an organization that devoted itself to improving the housing situation in their township. Three women started the organization called South Africa Homeless Peoples Federation. In the 1990s these women decided to take the initiative to put money aside to be able to by building materials to build more sustainable houses for their community members. How is works is everyone in the community pitches in and sets money aside for their own house. These women then teach them how to go about building their own houses. A really neat part is that these community members can design their own houses. For the most part each house in that part of the township was unique. The saving takes a long time, and the government has not made any effort to help them accomplished this. This organization is a completely grassroots movement to make their community a more livable space. These women took the initiative. They’ve also created educational programs for their children to receive help, through the community, to do better in school.
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