Most people who live or have spent time in Umphumulo would agree that it is, in addition to many other things, a very quiet place. Personally, this bit of information was made crystal clear to me during my first few weekends in the area. Beginning around 1 pm every Friday, the majority of activity in and around the church center grinds to a stop. Projects are put on hold, tasks are set aside for the next week, blinds are drawn, doors are locked, and the power in the office is shut off. Even the hospital is operates on a bare-bones staff for the weekend.
All this I expected. I didn’t expect that about a half an hour after finishing work for the week, many of the workers in the area pack up a bag and head home for the weekend. First, I was surprised that Umphumulo wasn’t home for the people who worked here, particularly after witnessing how so many people associated with the ELCSA in Pietermaritzburg hold Umphumulo in such high regard. Second, I was surprised that so many people in this community had another home to go to on weekends. I was even more surprised to learn that many of people who work here live apart from their children and families. I guess I had expected that members of a culture that valued family so highly would have been more likely to live with their children and loved ones.
Over the next few weeks, these questions set off a series of inquiries in my head. Why did families live apart? How hard is it to leave children in the care of relatives or grandparents? How does the structure of households in rural KwaZulu-Natal differ from those in the Midwestern United States? How does the prospect of a steady job affect family life and togetherness? Wouldn’t it be more efficient (and make for better family dynamics) for everyone to live together, close to where jobs are? And last but not least, why are people’s homes where they are?
I won’t pretend to have answers to most of these questions, but a recent conversation I had with my site supervisor shed some light on the subject. I learned from Rev. Khathi that one of the most significant factors that contribute to the separation between families and breadwinners that I’ve experienced in Umphumulo is a direct legacy of apartheid South Africa. During apartheid, the white minority government went to great lengths to reduce the morale, strength, unity, and supposed danger of the native African population. One of the measures they took involved restricting where Africans (and other ethnic groups, for that matter) could live. Blacks were assigned homelands based on their tribal and clan affiliations. Supposedly the homelands would strengthen the tribal communities among African societies, but in fact these homelands were often little more than arbitrarily selected, had few natural resources, and were far from sources of employment. In addition, many African families were forced to relocate from the land that their families had originally lived and farmed because of these laws.
After the apartheid regime was voted out of power in 1994, these laws were quickly repealed. However, the intentions of the original lawmakers had already done a tremendous amount of damage. Many families could not afford to move again despite the shortage of job opportunities near the areas they were forced to relocate to under apartheid. When coupled with high unemployment, often the most viable option was for one member of the family to live as cheaply as possible near his or her job and send money back to support the rest of the family. Even 18 years after the end of apartheid, this trend has not been completely broken.
Terribly, this separation between workers and their families has had other consequences. Many people credit this separation as one of the reasons HIV has spread so quickly in South Africa. Workers, who are often male and live alone, bring the virus back to their families. As a result, the virus can cross distances of hundreds of kilometers and enter communities that had been previously untouched. This also may be one reason that women continue to outlive men in SA.
The picture I’m trying to paint is far from the big picture of life and the legacy of apartheid in South Africa. I’m still learning new details and gaining new insights on a daily basis, and hope to be able to answer and ask many more questions as continue to I walk with my friends in the months to come. In addition, my mathematically inclined friends will be the first to point out the statistical insignificance of the sample size I draw on as I write… Regardless, I look forward to new questions and more unforeseen conclusions, and appreciate your thoughts and prayers on this journey.
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