My Return

The last few weeks have been filled with me asking, what does it mean to return?

On the flight that never seemed to end from Washington to Johannesburg, I kept asking myself, “What am I doing?!  Why, if I really needed an international vacation, I couldn’t go to Paris?  Or, if I really needed an African vacation why I didn’t get off in Dakar, Senegal, the plane’s first stop.  What was I expecting to find?  Why did I need to do this?

I couldn’t really answer any of those questions, except it was just something I needed to do.  So I took a sleeping pill.  And I woke up moments before the plane descended into Johannesburg.

I was in South Africa, and I’d returned.

I saw quickly that returning to South Africa with eyes that have seen India, and more of life in general, was an exercise in growth, comfort, and change.

This time around, the plane landed in Cape Town at night...no African sunrise greeted me.  I couldn’t find Table Mountain, but I did find a different kind of beauty: I did not expect to walk off the plane to a place that felt like home.  Despite the new airport (A World Cup Upgrade, which will henceforth be referred to as a “WCU”), better roads (WCU), and faces and sounds like I hadn’t seen or heard in years, the feeling was of excitement, yes, but also of vast familiarity.  I felt I had come home. 

Like any place two years later, I found South Africa had evolved, but was still generally the same.  I found I had returned to a country whose reputation, until this summer’s World Cup, was one almost entirely of crime and racial strife and poverty (and safaris).  I found these things still exist, but now there are street lights and security guards in a part of town I would have never dreamed I could have walked in at night two years ago.  I found there is still much racial tension, but the World Cup has brought some understanding, pride, and a common interest to a country with many incredibly divided factions: restaurants I went to two years ago where I was the only white person were filled with white South Africans, and, as the wealthy white businessman on the airplane told me, the World Cup showed South Africans what their country was capable of, and got whites genuinely interested in a traditionally black pastime.  And I found there is still incredible poverty, one cannot ignore the sprawling shantytown upon leaving the Cape Town airport, but I found more innovation than ever before: I was exposed to a group of people of all ages, races, and nationalities in Durban who gather weekly to discuss issues facing South Africa as their form of social justice, a project they hope to spread to the townships; My friend Ronel is currently heading up multiple businesses such as social justice fashion and a public relations agency, while my friend Moses has put his masters on hold, as well as some other projects he was running, to begin an African-run study abroad program for Americans and Europeans.

The country is buzzing with life.

The biggest surprise to me was how easy it was to be in Cape Town.  And I don’t just mean that I remembered how to get from place to place almost as though no time had passed, I mean I could breathe.  Cape Town is no New Delhi.  And of course I knew this fact, and anyone reading this blog who has traveled anywhere in the developing world will read this and laugh, but let me tell you, fair readers, any challenge I had in Cape Town as a student seemed hilariously simple after spending months in India.  Even in Durban, a city a little more crowded and much more African than Cape Town, it was easy-breezy.  One South African WCU is increased infrastructure throughout the country, something that definitely contributed to this ease, but also, my changed perspective.  Even though it was a nice discovery, to feel so comfortable and safe, I struggled with this as well: is it bad to want to return to live someday, when it’s a not as challenging anymore?

Some highlights:

Seeing my former roommate’s daughter, Laiah, and feeling her look at me and knowing that we will share a bond that can never be broken.

Traveling with Jeremy, and laughing our way through a new country together

Getting to know my Ocean View family all over again.

Attending a soccer game in the World Cup stadium in Cape Town, which when I left South Africa in June 2008 was only a shell of a building to come.

Mzolis.  I cannot explain this experience.

Seeing friends and picking up where we left off.

All photos can be viewed here

As I hopped from friend’s house to friend’s house throughout Cape Town and its surrounding neighborhoods, I found the region alive with memories and friends who were not with me this time.  The neighborhood around the university is filled with a different generation of study abroad students whose faces look so young to me, despite only a three-year age difference, and my conversations with them put me on the other end of the spectrum.  I wandered the streets of Durban, soaking in a completely different South African city, one where the poor are also white, and there are no coloured people; it's a city with a lot less to offer on the surface than Cape Town, but if you search, it's also a city with a lot of life, and incredible Indian food. 

The entire experience felt like a dream.

This was what returning must feel like: a blur.

Throughout the trip I asked myself why I am more attached to South Africa than so many of the thousands of others who have been here on exchange.  Is it youthful innocence?  I didn’t return to try to relive my study abroad experience.  But being in South Africa changed me.  It made me confident. Strong.  Adventurous.  Patient.  Maybe I needed to come back to see if these things are still there.

In the last two years, so many have asked me, “What is it about South Africa?”  “Why not Israel?”  “Why not dedicate your passions to bettering the United States?”  So throughout my trip I tried to answer these questions.  And the truth might just be that it’s interesting to me, it’s a feeling that I cannot articulate.  I like that it’s a place that’s emerging into itself--a country with a fascinating history, written across the people’s faces.  It’s a country that is learning daily how to live together and be a democracy.  It’s like watching a child grow up.  I like that it’s a place where people from throughout Africa come, and with their unique cultures, settle: it’s the place to be here.  I like that everyday I meet people from a place I’ve never been, people who have crossed boundaries and borders, physical and cultural, to be where they are.  It’s an emerging society, like the wild west, and it’s exciting to watch and be a part of.

And I know that you may be thinking, “Yes, Laiah, but so many places are like this, and you were only there for study abroad.  Your life was laid out for you.”

This may be true, I would reply.  But there is no denying a feeling of comfort in a strange place.  One day, when that feeling disappears, if it does, I will move on.  But I’m in it now.  It’s a part of who I am, who I’ve been and who I’ll become.

**Note: if you've made it this far, it probably means we really like each other.  Therefore, please send me your phone number.  My phone was stolen and I've lost all my contacts. Thank you!**