Reflections on South Africa; from 2016

It was snowing when I left Durham in January of 2016.

After stopping in London, I had another layover in Frankfurt. On this flight to Johannesburg, I couldn't help but notice that there were 3? Maybe 4 black people and 1 or 2 asians, besides myself, getting on this plane to a black majority country. Well well well, I thought, either a lot of Germans go to South Africa, black South Africans don't like Germany, or economic apartheid was still in full effect.

On the plane, I started to hear a language that was completely unfamiliar. It sounded... almost eastern European but it wasn't.... definitely not Russian. It wasn't Polish... or Romanian... what the fuck are they speaking? I really didn't know much about South Africa. Being the foreigner that I was, I didn't know Afrikaans was a western European derivation; a kind of patois. For some reason, I thought it was a black African language. Yes, I was ignorant about the country and implicitly biased in this way. In fact, I knew very little other than the glorified Nelson Mandela and that there was a history apartheid. People either told me that I would love it in South Africa or that I should be careful because it was very dangerous and violent (the primary stereotype I encountered by people outside of Africa). My friend Brenda, who knew Pretoria quite well, told me about her experiences with the Theology department and sent me a list of things to do and try (still can't find that 'leopard beer'). Another meaningful conversation was with my good friend Marika. She mentioned Mandela's contested legacy and some of the historical struggles in the country. When I confessed my ignorance, she recommended I read Incognegro, a book by Frank B. Wilderson III; Professor of African American Studies and Drama at UC Irvine. We had similar views on a lot of things so I knew I could trust her advice (and yes, it's a good book - I recommend the read). 

Without much thought, I drifted into the southern hemisphere where a South African summer would hit me like wave of hot bricks. 

I had arranged for a shuttle to drive me to Pretoria. I thought about trying to use the public transportation system, the "Gautrain," but the instructions on the website weren't very clear. I figured I should probably get to the University first before I try to navigate the system. It was a long-ass 30 hour flight and I knew I wouldn't have any patience if I got lost somewhere, which I usually don't mind (it's part of the fun when travelling and wandering about).

I tried to make conversation with the driver. It was just me in the car and the drive was a lot longer than I thought. Hell, Jo'burg didn't look too far on the map from Pretoria. I just didn't recognize how big the country actually was.

The driver was middle-aged. Probably late 40s early 50s, maybe mid to late 50s. Knowing that apartheid "ended" in the mid-90s I wanted to ask him how life had changed for him. He told me that the economy was bad. Things were still hard for him and his family but that overall things have gotten better. I took it with a grain of salt, accepted what he had to say, and nodded my head wondering about what life would be like in this country. It was my first time in Africa. The closest I ever got to the southern hemisphere was Jamaica, during college, and later Mexico on a trip with some old college buddies. 

When we finally arrived in Hatfield, I thought it looked quite nice. But I was suspicious: this has to be some kind of insulated suburban bubble (I wasn't too far off). The driver and I got to talking again. He mentioned the variation from area to area. Housing prices and so on. I was getting hungry so I asked him what I should eat. I didn't want some hamburger or pizza - you can get that shit anywhere. What's local; something I can't get anywhere else? He told me chesanyama, biltong, bunny chow, and a few other things I can't remember. Bunny chow stuck with me. I remembered seeing it on some list of things to eat in South Africa. Ok, that's what I'm going to eat. My brother sent me a picture of 'smiley' and he told that I had to try it. The picture was gnarley; it was, quite literally, the head of a lamb on a plate. I told myself that I'ld try it if I could.
   
The driver took me to one of the admistrator buildings where the housing people were supposed to sort me out.

The University was closed but the housing administrators were still working. After two-days of straight travelling, my aim was solely focused on getting into the arranged accomodation, taking a shower and a nap. I didn't think much about the University being closed and only found out from one of the administrators that the institution was shut down due to student protests. How interesting, I thought. I remember reading something about student protests in South Africa but they were mostly in Johannesburg and Cape Town. So I thought nothing of it because I was in Pretoria. And, I, like many foreigners, had no real sense of the geography. Didn't have much idea about the political climate either.

At any rate, they put me in the building reserved for post-doctorates and visiting professors. It felt very much like a self-catering hotel with pots, pans, utensils, etc. The rent, relative to what I would be paid, seemed expensive. They even had cleaning ladies! Changing the linens and towels, cleaning the room, even washing my dishes! Like, what the fuck? It made me uncomfortable. It was weird. I can't live like this. The building was awkwardly gated. Maybe 10 feet from the building to the gate. A square inside a bigger square and a security guard walking around like a human guard dog - a white dude at that. The guards in all the other buildings were black. This, I figured, was a political statement. I just wasn't sure on who's behalf. Security guards were everywhere. Everything was gated. Some kind of fetish with fences and barbed wire.      

I took a shower but I couldn't sleep. The peculiarity of everything had my mind going; the residual effects of apartheid was the theme that occupied my thoughts. I had to eat something and stock up on some food. The admin lady told me there was a mall down the road: Hatfield Plaza. So I went there. I didn't have much money and had to live off the few pounds I saved from England. Turns out the British Pound goes a long way to the South African Rand. To be safe, I had to be frugal. But I wanted to try the food. So the first thing I got was the Bunny Chow at the one of the fast food joints in the mall. It was alright; I didn't expect much from the place and remembered that I had to go to Durban to get it proper. The supermarket, Pick 'N Pay, was... very... "western." That is, it struck me like any other supermarket in Europe or the US. The supermarkets in Korea and Japan had a very distinct flavor and style to them: local food, local snacks, local ways of advertising and branding. I assumed that an African country would have its own style as well. But... it didn't... there was maize meal and prickly pears - two things you don't see in Europe, the US, or Korea and Japan. The familiarity of all the products struck me as odd. My first impression was that apartheid had taken away South Africa's swag, it's style, it's creativity, it's aesthetics. This, I thought, this was violence; a cultural violence of identity. I wondered, where can I find the local street markets? The music, the dance, the art, the food. The pulse. It had to be somewhere.       

After purchasing a few groceries and putting them away at my place, I wanted to walk around a bit more. Just wander and see. As I got nearer towards the campus, I noticed that all the university signs had three languages on them: Afrikaans, English, and Northern Sotho (I think). This was also weird. At one of the gates, there was a stencil tag: "WE ARE ANARCHY." It made me smile. 

When the semester started. All the buildings had the name of their departments on the walls in Afrikaans and English. When the Vice Chancellor or some administrator sent out a mass email to staff. It was in Afrikaans. And then another one in English followed - sometimes not at all. I later found out that there was an option in some courses to take the class in Afrikaans. For me, this would be the equivalent of being at a Korean University but everything catered in Japanese!

I later found out that the students were protesting this language policy. They would end up victorious on this front. The University had decided to change its policy and phase out Afrikaans as a language of instruction. But there were some other provisions, I think. Study groups in Afrikaans or something. I don't remember if there would also be study groups in Xhosa, Zulu, Pedi, or Sotho. This catering to Afrikaans was a pretty clear example of white privilege, colonial legacy type privilege. 

As the year went on, I was surprised by how many people thought Koreans spoke Mandarin. I don't think most people even knew where Korea was, despite LG and Samsung products being everywhere. Chinese wasn't an ethnicity but a race - it didn't matter what country you came from, if you're East Asian then your Chinese. Although not quite the same, this was a similar logic to somebody saying, "Well, we're all African because humanity came out of Africa." The homeless, or "street children," would often come up to me and say "Master" and show me their kung fu imitations with these Bruce Lee noises. There were people randomly yelling "China!" This, pretty much happens everywhere. The difference between South Africa and England was the frequency: almost once a week in SA and about once a month in England. What's interesting in Pretoria is that once in a while I'll get somebody come up to me and say things like, "you don't know kung fu." LOL. And he'd be right. I don't know Kung Fu. But I do know TaeKwonDo. But the Mandarin thing - it was the first time I encountered this impression (turns out it's pretty common) and I wondered how many people around the world thought this. Man... people don't know shit about Korea. But then again, why would they? A lot of the students didn't know that colonial imperialism also happened in East and South East Asia.

I think the most offensive and ignorant thing somebody said to me, ever, was that I was "basically white." This threw me off (like, wtf?!). There's a commentary here on what it means to be "white-washed" and the cultural politics of being "Asian" - terms like "twinkie", "black banana", or "coconut" - but I won't go into that. It seems that speaking US English without some fobby twang has rendered me "white" and negated my immigrant history; I don't fit the description, the mental stereotype, or something. I guess they also haven't encoutered an Asian with a hybrid of Korean and American mannerisms either. What was also weird is that if I say that I'm Korean-American. A lot of people, usually "white" people (I assume Afrikaaner), infer that to mean that I'm mixed. Fuckin, Rob Schneider is mixed. Chrissey Teigen is mixed. Tiger Woods is mixed. Bruno Mars, Chloe Bennet, Maggie Q. All beautiful people. But I look nothing close to them. Once, a black person at the grocery store counter wanted to ask me a "personal" question, she said: "Do the Chinese sleep with their cousins? Cause, you know, you all look alike." What?! Hahah - sometimes you just have to laugh at the absurdity.    

Anyway, the protest against Afrikaans was coupled with the issue of outsourcing (hiring private companies to work as cleaners and security) and the #FeesMustFall movement, which also wanted  a 'decolonised curriculum' (something that many students of color have wondered for some time but found expression at the University of Amsterdam a couple years ago). Apparently, last year, the education minister decided to raise tuition fees and this agitated the students. My question was, where were the parents? Why weren't they angry and protesting with the students? Academics reflected and some spoke out for and others against #FeesMustFall. 

This year, some of the protests became destructive in that buildings, cars, and tires were burned. They disrupted classes and exams. I was told last year the protests were peaceful. I also saw the reluctance of University representatives to engage in dialogue. They brought in additional security. Locked down campuses. Introduced more security measures. The institutions became paranoid. In a mass meeting with staff, the Univ. of Pretoria Vice Chancellor stressed the importance of finishing out the academic year. Put material online while the campus was closed down to students. Eventually they forced the year to an end and allowed students on campus for exams only. For the most part, the student protests weren't really violent other than a few isolated incidents. But the police imprisoned quite a few student activists for public disorder, destruction of property, and inciting violence. There were police patrolling the streets in their vans and armed with assault rifles and bullet proof vests. A bit much, really. None of these students have guns. Sticks and stones to war-time artillery? How dramatic.    

The students, knowing that the issue of tuition fees also had to do with government, took the protest there. But there was really no response. The government was dealing with its own issues. President Zuma was deep in corruption, scandal, and a crashing economy that barely avoided junk status. The ANC was divided. The EFF continued to be boisterous and the DA was quietly increasing their voter base.

South Africa was among the many countries around the world with corrupt governance, economic instability, and class tension. We'll see what the students will do in the upcoming year. Some Universities have already decided to go ahead with the fee increase. A decolonised education is definitely warranted. My task, in part, is to contribute in this endeavor to the Study of Religion. After an unsuccessful proposal to do fieldwork in Korea, I'll have to execute a different proposal set in South Africa: "African Traditional Religion" in a township and White Buddhism in an affluent area through the broader theme of religion and money. I'll also think more carefully about what it means to do Korean Anthropology, which means engaging more with Korean philosophy and re-thinking certain conceptual frameworks and analytical categories. I've been reading vigorously on Yi Yulgok (a Korean Neo-Confucian philosopher from the 16th century), the ensuing pragmatist movement (silhak), as well as people who have written on "African Traditional Religion" and "Buddhism in Africa." Although slightly disappointed that the Korea proposal didn't work out (shit happens), I am pretty excited about the current project which I'll start in the coming year. 

Personally, 2016 has been a year of transition and adaptation. Academically, I've been pretty productive - was able to get several articles published - and I'm in a position to work with some brilliant minds and learn from them. I've met some great people and made a handful of good friends. I've had the good fortune of spending time in Lesotho, the "Bush", Newcastle, several of the townships, got to listen to some local reggae, jazz, and house music, and was able to taste the diversity in Sunnyside (the Ethiopian and Congolese food was great). I've been to several Braais (South African Barbeque) and got to hang out with some good people from around the world. I'm sure, after I save up a bit more, I'll get around to doing more in Jo'burg, Cape Town, and Durban in 2017 as well as visit some other African countries. I'm already set for Nigeria in February.