Brett on Cape Town's challenges and contradictions

Alright. Anything and everything to write about. Tonight is spaghetti and meatballs, and I look forward to it with a homeward nostalgia. Now and then it’s nice to pretend you are in America, as we do by nights like this, and our trips to Fat Cactus, a Tex-Mex restaurant that serves hamburgers and fajitas.  One of the burgers is called the Obama, and oddly it has slim-jims on it. I don’t plan on trying it.

I am sitting on the couch in the pool house, a box spring couch, and the door of the pool house is open wide. Tonight is chillier than it has been, but not to cool to enjoy. Everyone is chilling around the house, talking and hanging out. This morning it struck me that my time here is limited, and I walked around with wide eyes trying to absorb every second as I walked towards the train on my morning commute.

Later on I rode that same train home, tired and frustrated with the weight of the problems of the country. I talked with a man today, who came into the office wanting money for rent. The office doesn’t like to give out money, unless the person either can’t take care of themselves, or will invest the money into a business. The man asked for rent money, and told me his story. He is from Somalia. He came to South Africa and with his brother opened up a business. In August, his business was destroyed, and his brother was shot and killed. He said that his brother was shot in the chest and blood came out his nose and mouth. He wanted money for rent and to start a new business. 

To listen to his story today was one of the most puzzling situations of my life. On the one hand, if his story is true, this man needs not only sympathy from me, but support and grievance and counseling. But on the other hand, if this man is making up a story to win my sympathy, in order to get money, I am not about to be swindled.

To walk the line between sympathy for someone’s death and challenging the authenticity of the story was a situation that I found almost comical in its absurdity.  The answer was as real as dice, so I gave him the benefit of the doubt, and while not outright asking him whether he was making it up, asked him why he never pressed charges, or reported the case to the police. He said that he knew that if he pressed charges the people who killed his brother were apt to find him, a plausible situation given the prevalence of xenophobia in the country.

One family the other day who came in told me that their daughter was threatened at school, with a knife, by some gangsters, because of her race. A man today told me that he didn’t want to apply for a teaching job at a predominantly black high school because he feared for his safety. This man was from Rwanda, and his skin was as black as any South African. So, for all of these different groups of oppressed peoples, to be oppressing each other, is terribly defeating.  

And so, after this long day today, I came back to the house, and walked upstairs to chill in the common room. Some people were watching ‘family guy’ so I chilled and watched family guy for an hour or so. I did nothing for a few hours, played guitar a little, cooked some potatoes for the week ahead, and then dinner, spaghetti and meatballs.