The last two weeks have been a bit more relaxed because we are back in Howick and not doing daily work. We have been taking walks, swimming and organising our plans for the rest of our travels. Here is a little bit of what we have experienced and what lies ahead.
FreeMe
We have spent more time volunteering at FreeMe, the wildlife rehabilitation centre, where things have been pretty eventful. There have been a string of new animals coming in, lots are making good progress and we have seen several animals grow stronger and be released. We were also there the day that the FreeMe vehicle was stolen from outside a shop in Howick, it’s unbelievable to think that someone would steal from a charity that needs the vehicle to rescue animals. Hopefully they will be able to raise enough money from their raffle over the next few months to replace it and get back on the road.
We must say a huge thank you to Tanisha, Roz, Isra, Carol, Brian, Sandile and all the animals for letting us help out and for being great company whilst we were there. We had a wonderful time and hopefully we made a contribution to the welfare of the animals. They certainly had an effect on us, we both got very attached to many of the creatures.
Seeing the sights
We took a nice walk around the Karkloof Falls one afternoon 🙂
as well as taking many walks around the Amber Valley area where we are staying!
We also had a day out at Wessa hunting for the resident giraffe! We found tracks so we know he was nearby, but unfortunately we didn’t manage to find the giraffe himself. It’s amazing that such a large animal can be so hard to find!
Apartheid
One thing that I have found particularly strange and disturbing during my time in South Africa is the issue of racial segregation. There was a great deal of racial segregation in the early history of South Africa, typically attempts to keep European colonies and indigenous African civilisations from clashing. Apartheid was a system of racial segregation officially used by the government in South Africa between 1948 and 1994 to separate people of different races. People were removed from their homes and non-white political representation was banned in 1970. Apartheid officially ended 21 years ago but the effects are still evident today.
Nelson Mandela fought hard to end the apartheid regime and simply wanted a society where everyone was viewed equally regardless of their race and background, an ideal that I believe in myself. Though apartheid has ended, there still seems to be a strong attitude here that people can be viewed differently because of their race, and people of all cultures have been guilty of this.
I have met many white people with a prejudice against Africans, blaming any poor working standards from Africans on the fact that they have darker skin, rather than facing the real issue which is that many Africans were deprived of a good education under the apartheid regime and many still live in poor conditions in townships as a result. Although we haven’t faced any direct discrimination ourselves we have been made aware of local Afrikaans people in some areas who have a hatred of the English, a lingering grudge held from the Anglo-Boer wars which were over 100 years ago. During our time here there has also been discrimination by the Zulu people of Durban and Pietermaritzburg who attacked foreign Africans, looted shops and rioted after their king commented that foreigners were taking their jobs and should go home. The attacks even resulted in some deaths.
With such a messy history of racial segregation I expected more lessons would have been learned in South Africa by now. With such a wide range of people living under one flag I hope that things will improve further and the people and cultures will be able to live together peacefully because the different cultures makes this country fascinating and unique. On a positive note, the xenophobic attacks in Durban and Pietermaritzburg caused an outcry and a lot of people stood together in solidarity against xenophobia and racism, which shows that it is just the acts of an ignorant minority and not the view of the nation as a whole.
To prove the point that all humans are equal, if you were to take a random social group of 55 chimpanzees and test the variations in their DNA, they would be more diverse than the variations found in the DNA of the entire human population. We are all brothers and sisters, regardless of our appearance, heritage, education or religion.
Next Steps
This Sunday, the 17th of May, will be our 90th day in South Africa. We have had a great time here but after 90 days we must pack our bags and move on to explore somewhere new! Our next stop is Botswana, where we will spend 8 weeks volunteering at a nature reserve and then a week travelling on a tour. Botswana has white and black bands on its national flag to represent racial harmony, and is highly renowned for its scenery and wildlife. We are particularly excited to see the Okavango Delta on the tour.
Further down the line we have a week in Namibia and 8 weeks of elephant research in Malawi before we come home! Stay tuned!