{"id":4416,"date":"2009-04-14T12:04:05","date_gmt":"2009-04-14T19:04:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.coldspaghetti.org\/blog\/?p=4416"},"modified":"2009-04-14T12:04:05","modified_gmt":"2009-04-14T19:04:05","slug":"march-just-posts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.coldspaghetti.org\/blog\/2009\/04\/14\/march-just-posts\/","title":{"rendered":"March Just Posts"},"content":{"rendered":"

A good friend of ours is a Peace Corps volunteer in South Africa.\u00c2\u00a0 She doesn’t have a blog (despite my ardent encouragement and hopes of it, the remoteness of her assignment make it easier to simply send an email when possible) but when she writes, she does so with beauty and thoughtfulness and reflection.<\/p>\n

Which is why I am posting a passage in one of her last email’s here.
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I know that the tone of my letters and email about my time in South
\nAfrica have been mostly up-beat and generally full of the anecdotes
\nand general hilarity that come with learning and blending with a new
\nculture as well as my usual crazy adventures. \u00c2\u00a0All of these are very
\naccurate and quite true, but I think it is important for me to convey
\nthat this is also only half the story. \u00c2\u00a0The cultures of South Africa
\ntend to downplay things undesirable or possibly unbecoming, and there
\nis a very vibrant tradition of singing-through-the-tears. \u00c2\u00a0It is easy
\ntherefore, coupled with my personal mental default-setting being humor
\nrather then melancholy, to simply write my letters to those far away
\nabout the superficial ups and downs of daily life without delving into
\nthe harder daily experiences which are a communal understanding yet an
\nelephant-in-the-corner with my fellow PCVs and community members.<\/p>\n

Therefore, in an effort to share some of the other realities of life
\nin South Africa, this is a little more about the situation and
\ncommunity of which I am now a part.<\/p>\n

I live in a village without a clinic. \u00c2\u00a0It has one tar road, one shop
\nto get bread and a few other sundries, one \u00e2\u20ac\u02dcbottle shop\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 for the
\nprocurement of alcohol, and one primary school. \u00c2\u00a0It has three
\nburial-grounds. \u00c2\u00a0In a country where one in five people are
\nHIV-positive and upward of 95% have latent tuberculosis, this ratio of
\ncemeteries to services is far from uncommon. \u00c2\u00a0About half of the
\npatients at my organization are wheelchair bound, yet we are located
\noff of a dirt road on uneven and rocky terrain \u00e2\u20ac\u201c just like their
\nhouses (if they one of the fortunate amongst our clients and have a
\nhouse). \u00c2\u00a0My community members have lived their whole lives in full
\nvisibility of the platinum mines and limestone quarries which produce
\na sizable wealth for the upper-echelons of the country, but they will
\nnever see even enough of that money to pay a visit to the private
\nhospital in Rustenburg (35 km away) to get the medications they need
\nwhen they are sick. \u00c2\u00a0My host brother came home mad as hell on Friday
\nnight \u00e2\u20ac\u201c Good Friday \u00e2\u20ac\u201c after witnessing a car accident in which six
\npeople were injured because someone in a sports car going to the
\nlargest casino on the continent (20 km away) wasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t paying attention
\nwhen making a turn. \u00c2\u00a0Two of those people will get the care they need,
\nand afterward make it to the near-by resort, the place where, if they
\nwere lucky (not to mention survive the accident), the other four could
\npotentially get a job, but never afford to visit. \u00c2\u00a0South Africa is a
\nplace where the \u00e2\u20ac\u0153first-world\u00e2\u20ac\u009d and \u00e2\u20ac\u0153third-world\u00e2\u20ac\u009d sit in uneasy
\njuxtaposition. \u00c2\u00a0Unlike where infrastructures are non-existent or there
\nis more homogeneity in the human condition, poor South Africans see
\nevery day the things they will never have (there is no judgment in
\nthat statement of who is worse off, it is just a thought on the range
\nof hardships being undertaken by different populations).<\/p>\n

If you have read this far, thank you for humoring me. \u00c2\u00a0Again, I am
\nalways more then happy to talk more deeply about any of these subjects
\nor to entertain questions. \u00c2\u00a0I also hope that it is understood that
\nthese truths aren\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t the only side of the story, either. \u00c2\u00a0I am always
\nand continually amazed at the resilience people have to all that is
\nthrown at them. \u00c2\u00a0South Africans sing, they sing a lot, but there are
\nalso many tears.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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\n<\/a>
\nI love the contrasts within her discussion and how they serve as a way to understand the human condition within — one school to three graveyards, affluence to poverty, accident to luck.\u00c2\u00a0 Reasons why, she argues, for there to be many tears — but also (and this is where I start to pull her words a little further) reasons why unrest, uprising, and violence may be not only common but justified in this type of environment.<\/p>\n

One of my passions in public health is ecological research — or, literally, studies that look to how a total environment (particularly social environment) impacts health.\u00c2\u00a0 This mode of research is still quite new, but exploratory studies suggest that when great divisions in wealth and poverty exist within a community, everyone within it experiences less optimal health.\u00c2\u00a0 In short, what we are starting to understand (at least, scientifically) is that common good benefits everyone.\u00c2\u00a0 It doesn’t take a lot of thought, then, to see why staying in Louisiana is important to me, at least, as a scientist.<\/p>\n

This month’s Just Posts give fuel to the common good fire — and, as always, do so in varied and inspirational ways.\u00c2\u00a0 Giving props to corporations moving to fair trade products, discussing the importance of math and realities of education in poor regions of the world, illustrating the connection between cheap and available produce to labor exploitation, celebrating notable “Days” in March with personal stories and insight.<\/p>\n

Thank you, readers and writers!\u00c2\u00a0 And please please — if you read something this month that inspires and informs and would be perfect for the next roundtable<\/a>, send it on!
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The March Just Posts<\/strong><\/p>\n