Apartheid Museum

Went to the Apartheid Museum today with some friends from work... not the most uplifting start to a Saturday, but quite an experience. The closest thing I can relate to it is the Holocaust Museum in Washington, DC. Except... the pictures are in color. And the 'survivors', instead of being considerably aged and few in number, are everywhere. It's stunning how recently some of the horrors of Apartheid took place. Kurt Cobain died before Apartheid finally did.


For those who have never heard of it, Apartheid was the system of racial segregation set up by and enforced by the government. The foundation was laid at the beginning of the 20th century, although it could be argued that its roots stretch back to the colonization of South Africa hundreds of years earlier. Apartheid didn't really get going until until the mid-20th century though, and the violence didn't erupt until the 60's, and then got progessively worse in the 70's and 80's. To put it in more Western terms, it was the Jim Crow laws, Native American forced relocation, European ethnic cleansing / labor camps, early American sharecropping, and pretty much every other racial offense one can think of rolled into one. Pretty much everything except mass execution, unless you think about it more broadly and less literally.

These are the all of the Apartheid laws - there are a lot. One placard next to it said to think of it as a symbol of oppression, but also a symbol of people's ability to circumvent laws and force the creation of new ones. The glass window there in the middle leads to...

Nearly 200 nooses, one for each person that was executed or died in confinement while resisting Apartheid. The most recent was in 1989. The only name I recognized on the wall was Steve Biko, who I know mostly from the occasional mention in a rap lyric.

At least I'd heard of Nelson Mandela. As you might imagine, there is no shortage of mention of his name. Here they detail the meaning of his name - the name given to him at birth was Rolihlahla, meaning 'pulling the branch of a tree, or the one who disturbs the established order.' Well, they got that one right.

Just one of the many horrors under Apartheid was Bantu (native) education. There were no desks or chairs in classrooms, even for the teacher. There were upwards of 100 children in a class. Training was meant to keep people repressed and forced into menial labor positions. While this might look like scenes from the 1860's in the US, this was in the 1960's in South Africa.

What was striking was just how recent everything was. I was 10 years old when the first free elections were held in 1994. Also, it was not like there was no organized resistance to it all. Led mostly by the youth, there was internal resistance for 55 years before it all came to an end. The government simply detained people for life, if they didn't execute them outright, and continued on with business as usual.

I could go on for a while, but please, if you want to know more, go to the Apartheid museum website or the wikipedia page.

One final thought - this quote is on the wall outside of the museum, with letters protruding from the wall so that they cast a shadow directly below:

"To be free is not merely to cast off one's chains but to live in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others" -- Nelson Mandela

A comforting thought from a parking garage at the local mall

This is from the thing that spits out your parking ticket thing - click on this link to see a bigger version and read the sticker above the place where the ticket comes out

Home Sweet Home Pt III: The Office

The Monitor office is located in a fairly well-to-do suburb called Houghton, conveniently ~5 minutes away from my apartment. It's very open and airy with a lot of natural light, which is always a plus. Also, unlike the Chicago office, we have individual offices and unlike the Cambridge office, we get to have permanent ones.

Here's the view of the atrium in the middle of the office from the second floor - this is where we all eat lunch every day

Here's the second floor tables and chairs and balcony and coffee machine

View of those same tables from across the way

View of the front of the building from inside

The 'waterfall', which is basically a 2-story version of the ones you put on your desk / coffee table that gives you that running-water sound all day (for better or for worse)

New car!!

Actually, the exclamation points are misleading. It's actually not exciting. My new car is...


A Honda Jazz, or as they're called on the other side of the Atlantic, a Honda Fit. It's easier to get into parking places here, and I'm a less obvious target for grand theft auto. Yay.

One problem though - the turn signal is on the right-hand side, so when I go to turn sometimes, I accidentally hit the windshield wipers or hit the windshield spray thing. It's a little jarring / embarrassing, but not as bad as accidentally turning into the wrong side of the road, which I haven't done a while... (knock on wood)...

Sunset

Here's what the sunset looks like from my office right now...

Wasp, Africa-style

I engaged a mighty beast in battle today in my office. It was a wasp, at least as big as me, maybe bigger. Probably 6', 200 lbs. Welllll, maybe 2" long. At least 1 1/2". I spotted him on my window and then did the typical just-making-sure check that he was on the outside... but he wasn't. He was definitely 3 feet away from me on the inside of the window, ready to kill me at any second. I took off my shoe and swatted him, with easily enough force to kill a standard North American bug. He was unfazed. In fact, I think I heard him scoff at me. He crawled around on the window some more and then flew into the the flourescent lighting in the ceiling. Undeterred, I soon had both shoes off and was standing on top of my chair trying to flush him out of his hiding place, taunting him and trying to draw him out. Atfer 5 minutes of this, he eventually came out, and I was able to clap him between both shoes. I had won the battle.


Or so I thought. This was the picture I took immediately afterward, before heading to get a glass of water. When I came back, he had flipped over and was beginning to crawl / flap his wings again. He had come back to life. I quickly took my shoe off again and delivered another deathblow. Inferring that regular zombie rules would apply, I found a pen cap and used it to decapitate him. With the head removed and some appendages still twitching, I finally declared a lasting victory. The body and the head remain on my windowsill as a warning to all other wasps, should they dare to enter my office. I may have to have it mounted and stuffed - my first successful wild game hunt in Africa.

Super Bowl

I really wish the Super Bowl didn't come on at 3 AM here. If the Redskins were playing, I'd even watch the pre-game show starting at 1 AM and then stay up all night and take the next day off of work. That's if I didn't fly to Tampa for the weekend. But, Steelers / Cardinals... don't think that's worth starting my week with a lack of sleep. So, I set my alarm for 5 AM to catch the second half... and didn't wake up until 6 AM. I turned on the TV to see... the post-game wrap-up. Of course it was an incredible ending to a surprisingly high-scoring game. Great.