Now, before you furrow your brow and give me the “you should
know better” look at how politically incorrect this title is, let me explain (I
can hear some of the mommas who were raised in the fifties softly gasp).
In South Africa, there are three different types of races
represented, and they are all proud of where they came from. There are white
South Africans, who originated from Eastern Europe, mainly from Ireland and the
Netherlands, and are decently respected in the larger cities. Then you have the
coloreds, who basically have the complexion of a Dominican (dark tan), and
originate from one single Dutch nobleman who came to South Africa and
impregnated a bunch of black slaves. Can you say selfish? Hmm, I’d like to
start my own race. Yeah, I’ll just take it into my own hands. And then you have
the black people of South Africa, who have migrated down from deep in the
African bush, such as Malawi, Zambia, and Mozambique.
Now that you know this seemingly unless historical mumbo
jumbo, I can explain to you where I lived for the month of January. As I noted
a few blogs back, my team and I were living with our adorable contacts and
their family. My contacts (Ma and Pa) are colored, and are very proud of their
heritage. All month, we’ve lived in a colored community, with train tracks
separating the neighboring black and white race neighborhoods. If you could
step out of this blog for a minute, stand up straight, and bend your neck to
look directly down at the floor. Picture three sections; on your far right, a
block of black people. Draw a vertical line separating this block with a
caramel colored block in the middle. Envision another vertical black line, and
place a large white block of people on the far left. This is the geographical
break-up of the races in the district we lived in last month.
It literally goes, black neighborhood on far right, train
tracks, colored neighborhood, train tracks, white neighborhood on the far left.
One, two, and three. Just like a having
a sweet chocolate chip, separated by a liquorish stick, separated by a
Werther’s candy, another liquorish stick, and chunky bar of white chocolate,. As we all know, a chocolate covered Werther’s
candy would taste delicious, and I’m sure a liquorish stick would have
interesting taste if you dipped it in melted chocolate chips, but we will never
know if we always keep them separated.
Ma and Pa have an incredibly level head when it comes to the
whole matter, and graciously accept any and all races into their home
(obviously, they had 7 pasty whites living with them for a month!). But there
are still South Africans who battle with racism everyday, on all sides. White
people are discriminated for looking too white, coloreds are discriminated by
the blacks for being the “lesser” of their appropriate race, and blacks are
judged for taking over the workplace and monopolizing jobs. It’s just
interesting to me. This isn’t meant to be a political piece; I’m just left
scratching my head at what Nelson Mandela spent all of those years in prison if
South Africans whites, coloreds, and blacks are still going to live separate
lives?
Brining the glory back
to God, however, the church Ma and Pa attend is a perfect picture of
redemption. It is led by a white South African pastor who was raised in a
colored community and speaks slang Afrikaans. He laughs and jokes about the
different colors of our skin, and pointedly brings to light the silliness of it
all. Aren’t we all a member of the same body, the same family? His biggest joke
all month was that a bunch of white people (us) rode in the back of an open
pick-up truck driven by coloreds (our contacts). The whole church thought that
that was the funniest thing considering it has always been the other way around.
Pastor ‘G’ as we called him, made these remarks to bring it
back to a deeper issue; that we are to look at the heart of people above
anything else. ::Sign:: Cheesy, I know, but it was such an interesting month to
see people stress over something they can’t change. And why would you want to?
It’s God’s beautiful and perfect creation. Can’t we just trust that God knew
what He was doing and love our neighbors, no matter what the color, race, or
favorite Mexican dish? In the end we’re all going to be a part of one big
Heavenly enchilada, so we might as well enjoy the party and bring on the guac!
