Drawn into the fray

Way down South, the Cape is where I'm from and being thousands of kilometers away does not leave me immune to the happenings there... Racism, a constant quest to defend where we come from... we are still battling to protect a birth-right of place. The upcoming local government elections, like in almost every election since the start of the end of Apartheid, becomes a platform for putting people in boxes. Men in suits discuss the place of people in a nation and in camps we divide. How about just being? South Africa and the world is still battling Apartheid. (There is currently a raging political fight about amendments to the Employment Equity Act and unconstitutional remarks in South Africa.)

Somehow we always knew it will take more than changing laws to change the way people think. Every battle won in breaking down barriers between people is another place for a skirmish to start... What about struggling students with no health insurance? What about aging grannies who have to raise grandchildren whose parents died because of the HIV/AIDS pandemic? What about millions of people who are stuck in the spiral of alcohol abuse and making addicted babies who will struggle to attain basic literacy levels? How about the world that is a global village outsourcing jobs to the next cheapest production spot, rising unemployment in the global south? Why not put our energies to dealing with the looming environmental crisis?

Are these the rants of an idealist?

WHO AM I?

Who am I ?
You wonder out loud
Am I sister coloured
To you brother black
Some Indian
But it is definitely not
Outright that
Why do you want me to be
In your categories caught
Reduced to a number
Historically naught

Who am I?
You wonder out loud
Argumentative
Sometimes
Plain quarrelsome
Definitely colourful
Not common and dour
An existence
In little boxes sour

Who I am?
I am sure
Black of mixed decent
No reason to pretend
My genes not paying any sinful rent
A life free
That I completely
Embrace with glee
What you prefer to in me see
Does not bother me

Who I am?
Not by ethnicity defined
Nor by the salty tears I cry
Every time a graze my knee
In life’s little skirmishes
We struggle to distinguish
Embracing my freedom to express
Despite momentary anguish
The way my eyes the world see
Regretfully still with prejudice of course
Idealistic creating less remorse
Living forward
With good cause

By Simone Naik, 27 November 2007

Written a while ago, it still holds true.