Where was I?

In 2006 I flew the 6,311 miles from Edinburgh to Cape Town as a volunteer Careers Adviser to a school in a township – Langa. In 1873 a Tribal chief and renowned rainmaker, Langalibalele, was imprisoned on Robben Island. Various prominent people fought for his release and he was subsequently confined to a farm called "Uitvlugt", which is on the site of present day Pinelands. Langa, which adjoins Pinelands commemorates this folk hero as it was developed in 1898 on the land know as "Langalibalele's Location".

1. Langa High School is very, very poor. Conditions are very basic: no air conditioning, so it’s cold in winter and the classrooms boil in the summer!!

2. The politics in the school is like any school, but complicated by religious, racial and tribal factors – Xhosa, Zulu, Asian, let alone normal personal conflict.

3. I needed 2 lots of keys to get into the room and they were really hard to use - I often had to ask the children to open the room up for me!! And when I say children – I should say pupils, as some of the pupils were late teens, early 20s who had perhaps come from the poor Eastern Cape in the hope of improving their education as well as their prospects.

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• I found that many of the young people who came to see me came from the Eastern Cape – very poor, often staying in shanties with no running water or electric light – how did they keep so clean and do their homework. Some had to look after younger brothers and sisters, or mothers or fathers dying of AIDS.

• I gradually realised that there was a terrible lack of information and I decided to put up as much information as possible on the walls of computer lab, where it was available to all, but where it was unlikely to be seen by anyone who might seek to control its distribution.

From 2007onwards, I always stayed in Ma Neo’s Guest House

My landlady Sis Thandi has taken me out and about around Langa and into the city. She gave me insight into what it is like to be black, even now, in the modern South Africa!

APARTHEID STILL LIVES! - it is easier to find work if you are white, asian or coloured – in that order!

• One afternoon Sis Thandi had an appointment with a bank in a nearby township, and Roy, her son, drove us there. Sis Thandi and I were dropped off and Roy went to park the car, an old jeep. She went into her appointment and I sat down on a comfortable settee to wait

• An Asian woman came up to talk to me, to welcome and then went away again. Roy came into the bank after parking the car, and sat down beside me.

• Suddenly the same Asian woman comes rushing up and said what does he want – why is he sitting there? Was he opening an account…….

• There was a silence – I was shocked by the aggression of the same person who had spoken to me so pleasantly. I said he is with me – we are waiting for a friend – that shut her up. But I was deeply embarrassed. Roy started to tell me what it was like for someone like him – he has been to university but he is black – security people in shops always follow him – he told me what it all felt like – this turned my embarrassment into anger for such nasty prejudice!

Langa Township in Apartheid, with Table Mountain behind!

•A man, Rufus Ngwenya writing in the time of Apartheid wrote: “When we were sent to live on a rubbish dump, that indicated to us quite clearly what the white man thought of us”

1976 Riots in Langa

Langa High School pupils of today, celebrating the end of exams.

The despair of parents of a pupil who died in the riots which were part of the struggle to give those pupils equality.

End of Apartheid – or NOT

•In 2006 I was amazed that the same system of townships is still there! Within minutes you can drive from the poverty of Langa to the beautifully kept districts where rich white folk, and an increasing number of black folk live, with their swimming pools, 2 or 3 cars, good schools, clean streets. •I went to see a coloured school – which was much better, warmer (it was winter) and much better equipped than Langa High School! I found that very sad. •In my school there was only 1 secretary to manage and look after the 1300 children and deal with the demands of 45 teachers! But she was the one who knew all about the school and helped me to get what I wanted.

Cape Town’s many faces

Langa Township and its other faces

Coping with the washing.....

.......and the baby sitting!

I can show you lots of unpleasant sights , but perhaps one of thesaddest is this one: