Rotary and Experiencing Cape Town Life Outside of Being a Student

I am continually amazed to see the work of Rotary in South Africa and how fortunate I am to be an ‘ambassador’ of this phenomenal group of service-oriented individuals. In addition to giving Rotary talks over the past few months (including the District Conference), my host club (Newlands) and counselor (Grahamn Finlayson) have allowed me to witness some of their work in the community.

-         High: (1) Attending the opening of Emmanuel Daycare Center, a disabled child care center, in Atlantis. This neighborhood was an example of a predominantly coloured area established around a particular industry during Apartheid; however, when the factories were shut down almost the entire population became unemployed. (2) Attending the opening of Noluthando Autism Center in Khayelitsha. In addition to the joy of hearing the child sing at the center, I was intrigued by Newlands Rotary’s commitment to this school for the deaf. In addition to building the Autism Center they have participated in funding a soccer field and building other units of the education facilities.

Low: These were my first two trips inside the townships and acknowledging the dichotomy of life in Cape Town and in the townships is still unbelievable.  There are often times when I walk around town and forget that I am living in a ‘developing country’ with extreme levels of poverty, crime, and HIV/AIDS. To visit projects with Rotary reminds me of why I am here and why it is an honor to be a Rotary Ambassadorial Scholar. Although those in the townships and Cape Flats experience severe poverty, life goes on and many of the people are talented, hopefully, and remarkable individuals making a difference in their communities!

In June, I assisted with the interviews of the Rotary Peace Fellows! It was an interesting experience to be on the other side of the interview process and it was inspiring to meet South African applicants with a desire to pursue Peace and Conflict Studies abroad! Lastly, I had the opportunity to have lunch at Parliament and witness a committee hearing on a controversial bill concerning Protection of Information (often referred to as the Secrecy Bill). 

Emmanuel Centre was a Corporate Social Investment Project between Rotary and Peninsula Beverage of Coca-Cola

Fall- A Time for Education

View of the mountain from UCT while waiting for Bus

My first semester consisted of courses in both the politics and social development departments: Conflict in Africa, Peace and Conflict Resolution, and the Peace-Development Community Nexus. (My favorite part of the social development course was that 50% of the readings were from USIP!) The semester ended in early June and I received high marks so I am enjoying ‘vacation’ before classes resume on July 25^th.

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Two Highs: (1) Utilizing my Davidson degree and writing a paper on al-Shabaab in Somalia (half of my resources were from Ken Menkhaus!) (2) A Class stimulation to mediate the conflict with Gbagbo in Cote d'Ivoire 

 Low: Spending the final days of warm weather studying inside the library or computer labs!

At the moment, my winter ‘vacation’ is being spent researching thesis topics and finding a supervisor for my dissertation. I’m leaning towards looking at how the public and private sectors should engage the informal economy in post-conflict settings and whether or not its contributions to economy growth outweigh its inefficiency, distortion of competition, and limits on productivity.  (If anyone else has suggests or a better topic concerning transitioning/ post-conflict societies please feel free to send it my way!!!)

In addition to seeking learning opportunities inside the classroom, I have been able to attend some interesting Rotary lectures (including someone from the South African Defense Force) and documentaries in the past few weeks.

With Pierrinne at Encounters

-          (1) John Pilger’s The War You Don’t See about the role of media in depicting war. Let’s just say that as an American in the audience, in a foreign country, I felt a little attacked! A group of us went out to dinner afterwards to ‘process’ the portrayal of Obama and the US military. It was interesting feeling when I realized that I would be more open to the criticism if I had watched the film with an American audience.

-          (2) The Encounters International Documentary Film Festival showed Robert Mugabe: What Happened? about the Zimbabwean dictator. I found this film particularly interesting after a class discussion in which two Zimbabwean students had contrasting opinions —one held the view that Mugabe is a violent dictator who should be prosecuted for his crimes and the other was proud of him as the 'only' Africa leader willing to stand up to the West. The film portrayed him as a master of propaganda and a leader willing to change both his rhetoric and actions at any point in hopes of self-preservation.