Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world - NM

Section 29 of the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa states:

Everyone has the right to a basic education...

Two weeks ago (sorry that I was slow on this), I ventured out into some of the very rural areas of KwaZulu-Natal to visit some schools. These are schools that the LRC has previously had a relationship with or is in the midst of developing a relationship. Throughout my time at the LRC, the right to education has crept up on numerous occasions. Although I have not worked on any specific education cases, there are numerous issues that others in our office have been working on. In addition to discussions concerning these matters, I have also learned a lot about education in South Africa from my colleagues and their educational experiences. I think what continues to amaze me is the disparity between the standard of education received by children in South Africa - from the posh private schools that I have trouble even imagining to exist in a place like Canada, to little mud huts without proper roofs, lighting or supplies. I still question how you can possibly come from one of these little rural schools and have any chance at success when the cards are so stacked against you right from the beginning. 

I know that we have disparity in Canada, but I have to say, as a public school product, I am so thankful to be from where I am from. I received a wonderful education at Mike Mountain Horse Elementary School and Winston Churchill High School. And in the grand scheme of things, my time at Hamilton Junior High wasn't all that bad either. I was given opportunities that allowed me to continue on and have a chance at success. 

This is not the case for everyone, and even in Canada kids are sometimes failed by the system, but it's different here. As I write this, teachers in the Eastern Cape (another province) are taking action in the form of a 'go-slow' that has been going on for a month, and yet the government is not acting. Kids are being left behind; they are being failed by a system. But, unlike in Canada, this is not a single kid here or there, but a whole generation of rural kids. How are these kids ever going to change their world?

So, like I said, two or so weeks ago, a group of us from the office ventured out to one of the rural areas to do some site visits. 

Thandeka was excited about going... 

MK appeared to be angry and about to hit me, but in fact, was not angry and just wanted the snacks back. 

He may have been a little angry that we kept sending him off to ask for directions (a hazard when you are on a trip in rural KZN with three white girls who don't speak very much Zulu). 

This is Inkolovuzane Primary School. Looks pretty decent eh? Well, first you should know that it was paid for by a local business man who was tired of waiting for the school that had been promised by the government. The government clearly did not argue with this gentleman when he offered to pay for the school. 

The reality though, this school has two major problems - one you can see on the top of those kids' heads. 

The school lacks access to clean drinking water. The day we were there the temperature gauge in the car read 36 degrees. So the kids bring the water up to the school from the near by river. When we saw the river, there were people bathing in it, others washing their clothes, one washing his truck and another just driving his truck through the water. Seems like great drinking water. 

Unfortunately, we haven't been able to help with that problem as of yet. The other problem is one that the LRC was successful in helping with. Like I said, the school is located up the hill from a river. The majority of the students are from the other side of the river. In order to attend school, these kids would have to cross the river - without a bridge of any type. For part of this year, the worst result of this was wet feet, but during rainy season, the crossing became much more dangerous, with more than one pupil being caught up in the current and drowning. Remember - this is a primary school, little kindergarten aged children trying to cross a river. 

This is where the LRC got involved and successfully argued to have the Minister of Transport build a bridge in order for the children to get to school safely. I have to say, the Minister clearly decided to do a little more than build a foot bridge for the children, and soon vehicles will be able to cross the bridge as well. But the really important part, these kids will now be able to get to school safely, the first step in obtaining an education. 

This is the bridge...  

Still being worked on, but well on the way to being completed. 

And for good measure - here are the kindergarten kids who will benefit. 

 

We'll have to tackle the issue of kids walking along the highway another day...

My South African Birthday

So it's been just over a week since I turned 29. I am not upset about this birthday, it just seems completely implausible. Although, as my mom has reminded me on numerous occasions, I've squished a lot of life into the past 29 years, especially because it didn't start out so cheery. Anyways, my Durban family took very good car of me in celebrating the beginning of the last year of my 20s. Ellie was wonderful and organized a bunch of people to head out to Barnyard Theatre on Saturday night, which is a dinner theatre that I find quite fun. At the theatre Willene surprised me with an amazing chocolate cake with my favourite colour as the icing.  

Behind me, that's Emma, and she is clearly thinking - that is a big friggin cake. And it was a big cake. I finally finished eating it 6 days later. 

This is what Barnyard Theatre looks like - reminds me of New West Theatre at home. 

On Sunday morning we were up bright and early to introduce Ellie's parents to one of our favourite places - the Drakensberg. While her parents went ziplining which we had done previously in January, Ellie and I went to the Birds of Prey show. At the entrance the guy asked if we had been to a birds of prey show before. I said yes, we always had to go with school when I was younger. He laughed and said well at least this time it is your choice. It was a beautiful setting and I actually learned a lot. But I have to say, lots of the birds look really similar to the ones we have at home.  

But my favourite part of the show was the dogs. They made me miss Peggy. 

See - don't tell me that doesn't look a little like a great horned owl. 

Bahaha - loved the dogs. 

After fetching Ellie's parents from ziplining, we headed off on a hike and the weather was great. We had done this hike before in reverse with Cesar, but the clouds cooperated a bit more this time. 

And we weren't rushing so much so we got to see some more waterfalls. 

This part reminded me a bit of one of my favourite places in Waterton Lakes National Park. The rock was worn really smooth and it felt so nice to dip your feet in the very cold water. 

Ellie's dad takes a lot of photos and is regularly looking for the best shot. Sometimes he gets himself into precarious situations because of it. 

So beautiful. This will likely be our last official trip to the Drakensberg as we leave SA in about a month. We will be taking a trip to Lesotho though, which is really just the reverse side of the mountains. But anyways, I will say again that I just find this place so incredibly beautiful and have had many of my best days in South Africa in the Dragon Mountains. 

Day 5 in Cape Town - the Winelands

Last day in Cape Town. It had been a really wonderful trip so far. I heard a lot about how beautiful the Cape Winelands are and I quite enjoy South African wine, so I decided to do a half day wine tour before heading to the airport and back to Durban. I was picked up at the hostel at 8:15 (I know, seems a little early for wine, but whatever). After picking up a number of other people, we headed out towards Stellenbosch. Our first stop was the Zevenwacht Estate. The draw for me here was actually the cheese not the wine. I have met fewer cheeses that I don't like than wines that I don't like and this proved to be no exception. In addition to a variety of wines, Zevenwacht also makes a variety of cheeses. Yummy.
Turned out that I liked all of the cheddars that we tried. I liked the Sauvignon Blanc and the Syrah, not so much the pinotage or the other white one (can't remember what it was). But we also went on a little tour of the wine-making facilities. Next stop was Saxenburg. I had high hopes for this place as their labels have Guinea Fowl on them, and I tend to pick wines based on the labels (clearly a wine connoisseur). Problem - this estate didn't make cheese. But their wine turned out to be pretty good. I especially liked their Shiraz and their Sauvignon Blanc. They also had a very pretty estate. We then actually headed into Stellenbosch, heart of the Cape Winelands. I was a little jealous to think that one of this year's CBA interns is getting to live and work in this beautiful place. But then again, Durban is pretty nice too. 
Anyways, as you might be able to tell from my very brief descriptions here, the wine tour was not my favourite Cape Town activity. Not really sure why, but I just wasn't really into it. Anyways, after getting back to Cape Town, I wandered around a bit more before heading back to Durban. The Mother City did not disappoint. I had an absolutely wonderful time, and like most good things was left with wanting more. Until next time Cape Town. Until next time. 

Cape Town Day 4 - Sharks! Sharks! Sharks! (and a Lion's Head)

In early August this past summer, I was sitting at my aunt and uncle’s in Calgary. My cousins Kevan and Brayden were hanging out with me before I left for Ottawa again, and then on to South Africa. Some of you will know that my relationship with B & K is a little different than many cousins. In many ways, they are like little brothers to me. I have lived with them on numerous occasions through summers and for a whole year awhile back. We also get to spend a holiday in South Carolina most years together. Four and a half years ago when I was headed to Africa for the first time, Kev took a great deal of time to educate me of all the possible animals I may encounter. This trip was no different, except this time, Kev had one focus. Back in August he told me that I should really go see the great white sharks and that he would really appreciate it if I could get a picture of one breaching for him. I said I would try… Last Tuesday I followed though with my promise - or at least for the most part.

It was an early morning and 10 of us were waiting in the hostel common area. We piled into a van, with lots of anxious chatter and discussion about how scared people were. I fully admitted that there was a good chance that I would not be getting in the water. After two and a bit hours, we arrived in Gansbaai, the launching point for shark alley. After breakfast and a briefing session, we were kitted out and headed out to the boat. I was starting to get excited, still super nervous, but excited.

I was surprised how quickly we arrived at our anchor point, but it was beautiful and there were a few other boats around, clearly having some success in finding sharks. We were told to start getting our wet suits on and the first ones ready would be the first ones into the cage. I was not particularly anxious to be first, so had a few moments to relax on the top of the boat and wait for the sharks to arrive.  And then…there one was – a GREAT WHITE SHARK! It was totally surreal. At some level, I was waiting for the music to start playing, but nope, just a beautiful majestic creature. 

I started to quicken my getting ready pace and headed down to the main area of the boat to get booties and such (the water was cold, much colder than our comfortable Durban ocean temp). I took a ton of pictures from the boat, so hopefully you enjoy these. I don’t have any under water ones for two reasons – first, I am not particularly comfortable in really deep water, even if there is a cage and such, so I decided not to worry about taking pictures and just try to be ok with being in the water; two, taking pictures under water isn’t particularly easy if you don’t have the right filters and such, so if you want to see what it is like to be in the water with a great white (or four), you should do a cage dive at Gansbaai.
Sequence shots ...

We ended up seeing four different sharks, varying in size from approximately 2.7 meters to 3.9 meters. They were amazing. And I have to say much of my fear was gone once they were there. They are beautiful majestic animals. I was surprised at their size. For some reason I pictured them to have much bigger heads (clearly Jaws has impacted my perception). I guess I just pictured them to be bigger around. They definitely get much larger than the ones we saw, but the perception of them being these absolutely massive creatures, bigger than boats, that is generally false.

I’m not going to write much else about this, just know that I thought it was amazing and definitely think people should take the opportunity if it is there. Thank you so much Kevan for being that voice in my head saying, Ali you should totally do this. There aren’t any breaching pictures as it is apparently the wrong time of year for that, but we did take a little boat ride further out to Dyer Island, which for you shark enthusiasts (or Shark week watchers) will know. The seal population is huge out there and it stinks to high heaven, but I enjoyed the baby seals.

Back in Cape Town five of us from the shark trip and an extra from the hostel decided to make the hike up Lion’s Head to watch the sunset. Did not occur to us that because of the full moon there would be ridiculous numbers of people up there. The hike kind of circles the mountain, so you have to be on the Camp’s Bay side to see the sun set, with the moon rising over the City Bowl side. 

Part way up the hike (on the City Bowl side), we encountered something I have never experienced – a line-up on a hike. 

Of the 6 of us, 3 decided to head back lower to the Camp’s Bay side, 2 of us decided to head up to the Camp Bay’s side and we all thought the sixth was with the other group. Oops. Well, after some skirting of the trail, and following the locals, Gavin (an American) and I made it up to see the sun set. It was really beautiful. 

After some pictures and such, we headed back onto the trail to head down, headlamps in tow. Well, the line-up had not dissipated at all, we had to wait quite some time to get down the ladder areas, 

but eventually found our way back to the other three. We promptly asked where Stephan was. We thought he was with you. We thought he was with you. Uh oh. We waited for a good chunk of time (and took some pictures), 

but no sign of Stephan. We decided with this many people on the mountain he must be ok and the five of us headed down. We eventually, after a late dinner, found Stephan at the hostel. He had also gone up the mountain, but somehow lost us (probably where we followed the locals not the line). Anyways, everybody was safe and sound and exhausted. It was a really awesome day – adventure, adrenalin, interesting people, what more can you ask for. Another great day on the Western Cape adventure week.