Church, the Township experience, and GreenPoint Market

Today, on this misty Sunday morning in South Africa, we made our first trip to a township where we attended a church service in the township of Langa. The service incorporated a large amount of singing and dancing, which made it seem very community oriented. Most of the service was in the Xhosa language; however there were a few sections during the service that were in English. Even though there was a language barrier, we felt that the congregation was more than accommodating to us. Through out the whole mass we all saw the true meaning of “Cape Town Time” where you can show up an hour before or after the designated time as parishioners came through the duration of the mass.

In the Catholic Faith, every mass has allocated time for the priest to stand and give his homily. During this mass the priest gave us a homily that our group took to heart. He spoke about how the mouth is 10 centimeters from the brain and the heart is 10 centimeters from the stomach. So if you put poison in your mouth, you poison your stomach. In the same way if you poison your mind – with propaganda and false information – you poison your heart. In this way, he was responding to the xenophobic incidents in South Africa and the unnecessary spurs of violence against immigrants. The priest was very articulate and conveyed his message well. The mass allowed us to interact with locals, both during the mass and after as we spoke with them about our goals and theirs, in South Africa. We even played with some of the local children afterwards (Robbie pretended he was NBA star LeBron James and played basketball outside the church).

After church, we took a brief bus tour of Langa, which is the oldest township in South Africa. Langa was originally an all black township, which consisted of some small houses, but also contained a great deal of shacks. What was so interesting was that just across the freeway there was an originally coloured township that was created with much better conditions and housing structures, however grave social problems exist in this township that does not appear to be problematic in Langa, namely a high percentage of drug abuse and gang violence. We also drove through the township of Gugulethu where conditions appear to be improving, but there are still many shacks and high rates of unemployment. The government also appears to have a misunderstanding of the appropriate political, social, and economic priorities that are necessary to address community issues. While the township experience is plagued with many social issues, the government created a monument in memory of seven political activists that were killed during a political protest that cost 9 million rand. Although, this is a generous memorial, the money could have been used to build affordable housing for people living in the townships or create and support programs that educate or spur job growth.

Our last stop of the day was at the Greenpoint Market. The market was extremely large and consisted of countless shops selling handmade goods, such as jewelry, carvings, bags, and art. The market is located next to a location of the 2010 World Cup, which is in turn taking up some room for vendors. We all had a great time bartering for souvenirs and talking with the vendors.