week one

I've now been in South Africa for almost exactly seven days and I have to say, it feels like much much more time has passed. My friend Katie who I've known since high school in New York and also happens to be on the trip caught me using the phrase "the other day" to describe something that had happened about 6 hours earlier on our first day in Cape Town. I would say such linguistic slips give a fairly accurate representation of my understanding of time since my arrival. 

Beyond the simple disorientation that comes from distance and time zone changes, Cape Town has completely altered my perception of Africa, disorienting me in a way I had not remotely expected. Africa, I think to most people, implies images of a savannah flecked with villages, poor but happy, and above all happy for you, happy for the Westerner's help and presence, happy and welcoming despite their hardship. Above all, this Platonic ideal of "Africa" is remote and rugged, a tabula rasa complete with big game. This view, I now realize is not only absurd  -- there is no "Africa" in a continent that could encompass Argentina, the US, Europe and then some -- but indeed very insulting. Underdevelopment is not charming or a way for privileged Americans or Europeans to "rough it" or "find themselves." We only think that because we stay for a week or a year and then go home, with no conception of the true problems facing a given society. I can only hope to understand these issues as a South African would, rather than a simple tourist.