Week 6: A Week of Unexpected Growth

By Carly Dillis

This week, all of us are fresh off of our homestay experiences and back into the grind of classes and internships. However, that does not mean that this week was quiet or uneventful.



One of the Cheetahs from N/a'ankuse. There were two cheetahs in the
reserve who will be there for the rest of their lives.

On Monday, our environmental class visited N/a’an ku sê  nature reserve. The reserve takes in injured or orphaned African animals and raises them, often keeping them in captivity for life. We were able to see baboons, lions, caracal, leopards, cheetahs, and wild African dogs. Aside from baboons, these animals are some of the most endangered in the country and very few people get to see them. The readings for class this week had focused around human wildlife conflict. Thus, the reserve gave us the opportunity to see examples of the victims of this conflict. The animals housed in the reserve mostly ended up there because they had made their way into farms or private land and were either hurt, orphaned, or brought into the reserve by the farmers who refuse to have them on their land. The experience greatly helped to ground the readings of the week and it was easy to understand why the country of Namibia has difficulty in navigating human wildlife conflict.

The rest of the week went as scheduled. In history, we discussed anti-racism and how the movement has developed in Namibia. We had a guest speaker who was originally from the United States come in and explain the comparisons between the two societies. After he left, the students engaged in a spontaneous conversation at lunch about the speaker and his lecture. We were critical of his experiences and his opinions on women’s rights, environmental law, and LGBTQIA+ rights. In our politics class, we talked about democratization. Using Zimbabwe as an example, we discussed leadership, corruption, state sponsored violence, voting, etc. It is interesting to look at case studies from countries in the region and have them be so drastically different than they are when I read about neighbouring countries back home in the United States. It is a powerful reminder of where I am, how grateful I am to be here, and the depth of life and history in this place.

Some of the dunes at the inner most part of Sossuvlei  The trees and clay flats
can be seen in the distance.

Despite the incredible experiences of the week, the most powerful activity I participated in was a weekend camping excursion to Sossuvlei. Sossuvlei is a park where many of the most famous dunes in Namibia can be seen. It is about a 6-hour drive South from Windhoek. Five of the students rented a four-wheel drive truck with rooftop tents and booked a campsite to. We drove through the most rural and the most beautiful roads I have ever seen. The topography in Namibia changes about every 100 km, so we would go from driving in mountains to driving through the flat drylands. When we arrived at Sossuvlei, we entered the park and made our way to the dunes. They stretch higher than I ever thought possible. We stopped at one with a beautiful ridge and tried to hike it, before realizing that what we thought to be the top, was only about the halfway point. We also drove into the main part of the park where the biggest dunes are and there is a clay flat petrified forest. In the United States, I grew up in a state park in the forested hills of Massachusetts. We would regularly spend entire days outside, hiking, biking, collecting leaves, etc. I consider myself to be fairly well versed in the ways of nature. However, my experience at Sossuvlei was truly humbling in this way. Certainly, I never believed myself to know everything or be ready for everything this trip will show me. However, I sincerely do not think I could have prepared myself for the experiences I had in Sossuvlei.

I entered this week with the expectation that it would serve me as a week to reflect, which it certainly has. Additionally however, it has also empowered me to keep exploring Namibia on my own, to seek the things not sought. I am so grateful for my experiences this week as they have once again made me understand myself and the world more fully.

Week 5: Urban Homestay/Classes

By Michele Poindexter
 

We officially reached the one month of our stay in Southern Africa this week, and the learning hasn’t stopped! The first full week of classes was completed, internships continued, and we were all welcomed into the homes of ten wonderful families during our weeklong Urban Homestay. There is certainly never a dull moment here at CGEE Namibia.

 

My favourite of all puppies!

In Environmental Connections (taught by the first woman in Namibia to manage a national park - how awesome is that?!), we began with an overview of the environmental issues in Southern Africa. These include deforestation, an increase in the urban population, land degradation, wildlife poaching, limited natural freshwater resources, desertification, loss of wildlife habitats, drought, poverty, and pollution. I had two main takeaways from this first class. First, there is a large need for regionally specific public awareness and education about environmental issues. Each region is geographically, climatically, and socially distinct, so a blanket solution would not be successful everywhere. However, the underlying issue of poverty must be addressed before environmental conservation and sustainability can be achieved. If people are struggling to meet their basic needs, considering the environment in their decisions for survival is not going to be a top priority. Second, our world is not isolated. The pollution in the United States, or anywhere in the world, affects Africa, and vice versa. This means that the choices we make every day (that might just be contributing to climate change) do not only affect us - they affect everyone, even on the other side of the world. To solve environmental degradation, all people must make an effort, for we all share one home, one Earth.

 

In Religion class, we learned a bit about the history of Black Liberation Theology, and its role in the United States and Southern Africa. Our conversation also expanded to include other oppressed groups such as the LGBT+ community. During our travels through Southern Africa, many of us have had conversations with folks about their views on the LGBT+ community in relation to their religion, so it was a good opportunity for us to discuss and reflect on what we had encountered compared to our own views.

My wonderful homestay family!!

The greatest part of my week was getting to live with a wonderful father, mother, and brother during the urban homestay. There is no better way to learn about the history and culture of a country than to completely immerse yourself in the lives of the people. I lived in a neighborhood called Khomasdal. During Apartheid, this neighborhood was built to house coloured people, a racial category created by the Apartheid regime. This categorization was meant to enforce the separation and supposed hierarchy of races. Today, Khomasdal is a diverse community, full of neighborly love and adorable dogs. My family and I talked about everything from immigration to the effect the Chinese are having on the country to drugs. I learned some Afrikaan words, learned how to bake some traditional dishes, and played with the cutest puppies on this planet. I am now more confident in fitting into the culture here and gained a wonderful new family - I’d say that was a pretty successful week.

 

I jumped in on the yoga class this week,
and we did some acroyoga!!

Now onto the next adventures!

Week 3: Two Countries, One Continent

By Mickey Liebrecht



Mural at District 6 museum

In the past week we’ve transitioned from exploring Cape Town in South Africa to exploring Windhoek and our semester schedule in Namibia. I’ll start off with telling my experience with learning more about what Apartheid did to many communities of color from the District Six museum. Then I’ll move to talking a bit about Namibia and the budding possibilities that I’ve been able to see coming in my future.

While still in South Africa, we went to a museum called the District 6 Museum, and though its building is small, the gravity of its contents is not. The museum is a collection of donated items not just from the destroyed community of District 6, but the people who were forced to ‘relocate’ to another area so their community could be used for white homes – spoiler alert, they never did anything with the land after destroying the community that’d already been there. Our tour guide had his own stories from when he lived in District Six, and with them there was an air of pride about him that really stood out to me. He was proud because the district itself was filled with people of all kinds – race, religion, etc. – living together as harmonically as human beings can live with one another. This, in his opinion (and mine too), was what made the district a threat to the government, as they believed this could never happen in real life, or at least were selling that idea to their “fellow whites;” the most important ones at the time to sell this idea to, as they did have the easiest position within the structure of the country to do something about it.



Top view of District 6

His stories, along with the many others illustrated within the museum, were heart-breaking yes, but they didn’t break my heart in the same way other stories I’ve heard about Apartheid in the past few weeks have. Other stories have left me close to tears, or just flat out crying, as I hear them and/or read them, but I believe the stories of District Six had a different effect on me, because the storyteller was a man who experienced this atrocity and managed to leave me smiling after ending his story with a few jokes and some hope thrown in there for good measure; the government is currently working on a project that will rebuild District Six from the rubble that’s still there. The tour guide was a fun, happy, and naturally light-hearted spirit, a lot like who I used to be when I was younger. Also, the fact that he went through all this and still manages to make fun of it and be happy with himself and his life and the simple pleasures of it, gives me hope for myself. Hope that eventually, I’ll be able to do the same thing with some of the darker parts of my past, and move on to do something about them – within society – in the future. It’s one of the best experiences I’ve had so far, for that reason.

My future in Windhoek also seems brighter because of this, as I’m continuing to learn more about the area and the organizations that reside here, fighting the good fight for their groups of humanity who are being “screwed over” essentially by the government and society – my words. I look forward to learning more from the two organizations I’ve been focusing on as the semester goes on, and helping in any way I can – if they’ll have me. The first is an orphanage that goes by the name of Village Hope, and the other is an LGBTI advocacy group that goes by the name Outright Namibia.  


Visual lounge space in HIV exhibit at Slave Lodge

 

Week Twelve: Equal Rights in an Independent Namibia

by: Katie Bosse, Gabbi Mpagi, Lia Wellen

Siri and Gabi being politicians!

The common theme for this week’s classes centered on the question of equal rights in post-independent Namibia. The politics class visited Parliament and discussed gender equality in government, Mr. Ya Nangoloh spoke about segregation and race relations in terms of equality in our history class, and gay rights activist Wendelinus Hamutenya talked about LGBTQI rights in Namibia.

Students enrolled in the politics course had the honor of listening to the brave and beautiful social activist Wendelinus Ndiwakalunga Hamutenya, otherwise known as Mr. Gay Namibia. Mr. Hamutenya shared his struggles and triumphs about finding his identity, promoting equality, and upholding the civil liberties of individuals who identify as LGBTQI in Namibia. Becoming Mr. Gay Namibia opened many doors for Mr. Hamutenya, including an opportunity to participate in San Francisco’s Gay Pride Parade, but unfortunately he experienced backlash from Namibians who weren’t tolerant of his sexuality. Namibia has been recognized as one of the more lenient countries within Africa when it comes to the topic of LGBTQI rights, yet the truth of the matter is that LGBTQI persons are still being denied basic equal rights based on their sexual orientations and or preferences. LGBTQI persons are being ostracized in rural communities, forced into marriages for the sake of reproduction, and are experiencing dangerous acts of violence based in hate by their fellow Namibians as well as government officials. Mr. Hamutenya’s dedication to defying the status quo has had dangerous consequences such as being denied access to public transportation and enduring unlawful arrests by Namibian police officers, but his perseverance has remained resilient. He continues to work towards equality for all Namibians. 

Lia pretending to make a
speech in the speaker’s seat.

This week the Politics & Social Change in Southern Africa class began our day by getting a tour of the Namibian Parliament. We spent some time in the National Assembly. We had fun sitting in the speaker’s seat, and looking at the elegant building. The gardens around and in the center of the Parliament building were also very nice. When speaking about civil rights, or equality amongst the Namibian people, we spoke about gender equality in Parliament and we were able to draw some lines between parliament and inequality in Namibia. In terms of gender equality, the government is attempting to equalize the number of seats that women take to that of men. SWAPO (South West African Political Organization) is the ruling party and takes up the majority of seats in Parliament. They have a system where a woman takes every other seat. There is still a majority of males in government, but the number has improved drastically since independence in 1990. In terms of post-apartheid segregation and inequality, in class our instructor, and a few speakers, has talked about how the SWAPO party, the party who liberated Namibia, is now becoming a sort of oppressor due to the fact that they are the overwhelming majority in Parliament. Mr. Ya Nangoloh, director of NamRights, stated that only the color of the people in charge of Namibia has changed, but many apartheid-like policies are still in place. The fact that opposition parties have very little say in government exacerbates the power that the SWAPO party has and the lack of power that opposition parties have. So, in general, Namibian Parliament is becoming more equal in terms of gender, but is arguably unequal in terms of fairly representing the Namibian people because of the overwhelming SWAPO majority party.

This is an example of the beautiful decorations and architecture
in Parliament. These are the lights in the National Assembly building.

In our history class on tuesday we had Mr. Phil ya Nangoloh visit our class for the second time this semester to speak about the similarities between liberation struggles in Southern Africa compared to the Civil Rights Movement in the United States. As the founder of Namibia’s National Society for Human Rights (NSHR), also known as NamRights, Mr. Nangoloh is an expert in human rights politics and history on the liberation struggle for Namibia’s independence from South Africa. He finds that the situation of apartheid and racial inequalities under the South African government is not a unique case and one can draw several parallels between the regime’s policy of “separate and unequal” in South Africa and the United States Jim Crowism and subsequent New Jim Crowism. Nevertheless Mr. Nangoloh did locate where the two movements differed in nature and strategy, despite having the same overarching goal of separation. Mr. Nangoloh believed there are fundamental differences that distinguish the two movements beginning with the fact that the liberation struggle in Southern Africa was a “violent civil disobedience” against a white minority while the United States’ civil rights movement tended to more of a peaceful civil disobedience against a white majority. Moreover, Mr. Nangoloh made the tactical distinction that during the civil rights movement it was focused on gaining rights for all, while he believed the liberation was more of a fight against colonialism. Finally, he wanted to leave with the class that there is a difference between freedom and independence. For example, Namibia might be liberated from colonial forces legally, but in actuality as Mr. Nangoloh explained, Namibia is still dependent on outside markets that control their major industries such as the fishing and diamond industry. 

The courtyard near the National Assembly.

Mr. Nangoloh’s visit to the class was important for us to hear the gaps in history we missed in our education in the United States. It was beneficial for the class to ponder the dichotomy of freedom and liberation in the context of a globalization and neocolonialism reign. This week helped set the framework for examining how these racial processes occur in our own home and aid in setting the tone for intentional action when we return to the United States.

Week Ten: On Remembering the Dead

By: J. D. Mechelke

Out-Right Namibia's Trans Day of Remembrance 2015

I’m glad I had Annie and Amanda with me. Do you know that feeling right before walking into a room of people who, because you are so different, could judge you so easily? Well, think of that coupled with a little bloating and you’ll know how I felt before we walked up to the gate of Out-Right Namibia during a Saturday night where we were going to memorialize the trans individuals that had died that year in Namibia.

Between the three of us, no one had planned, when we woke up today, to taxi to Windhoek North to be part of this event. At least Amanda and I had planned on going to see the new Hunger Games movie with the rest of the gang. But, as my mother would say, “You got a hair up your butt son! You’re just like your father.” My dad and I have a reputation for getting these big ideas that we follow at all costs. Although an idea to attend a Trans Day of Remembrance event shouldn’t seem like a “big idea,” I’d been struggling a lot recently with my mental health. Lately taking a shower seemed like a “big idea.” Maybe that was also a part of why I felt so intimidated by the group that evening (though I don’t think that can help explain the bloated part). Somehow, even in the heat of this country, my spirits had gone cold. My depression was keeping me in bed during the day while my anxiety was keeping me up at night.

As I stood intimidated before pushing the gate aside, I grabbed Annie and Amanda’s hands. Their palms warmed my cold fingers. We signed a check-in sheet. In addition to our name was our gender/sex and sexual orientation: mine as gay intersex male. We were the only white people in the complex. A situation that was surprisingly uncommon even in a capital city in an African state. I had introduced my two friends to some of the people in this community that had made me feel loved. Some of the bravest people I have ever met were all in eyeshot.

We stood, we sat. We sang, we cried. We ate, we drank. We talked, we observed in silence. We named the dead, and we dared to tell why the dead are dead. The time we spent together prompted my memories of a particular service in the liturgical calendar: All Saints Day. All Saints is a service, speaking from a Lutheran perspective, where we honor those who have died during the past year, and those in the more distant past who we had loved, naming them all as saints. In the services liturgy we hear, “Loved ones now resting in you, who guided us, nurtured and cared for us; ancestors who worked and traveled, lived and died that we might be who we are, where we are—your precious children in this community of believers.”¹ How wonderful and how scandalous to remember trans people of color in Namibia who have died not just by name but by the title of saint.

Later that night I was crying on the porch of the CGEE house. I was overwhelmed by a lot of things, but mostly by the courage of the saints that we had named a few hours ago. Too often when we talk about social change and promoting social justice we’re really concerned about immediate action. Even if it’s social analysis, we feel we got to get to work now. While there are probably good reasons for this feeling, I think we sometimes miss something in pure secular work for social change that the religious world can help us with. That is, remembering the dead, and remembering why the dead are dead.

This statement of remembering “why the dead are dead,” is something that has still been ruminating in my mind since I heard it from Pastor Alan Storey a few months back in Cape Town. Storey talked about how we are so many times “addicted to hope!” We forget how important it is to mourn and memorialize. I agree with the Pastor’s thoughts. However, I’m not sure that much can happen when we are devoid of all hope.

Harvey Milk, a gay rights activist in the U.S. that was eventually assassinated, once said, “I know that you cannot live on hope alone, but without it, life is not worth living.” Yes, mourning the dead and allowing ourselves to feel complete despair against the answers to why they are dead is required. But if we stay eloping in that state of mourning forever, life will no longer be worth living. We have to let ourselves stand and sit, sing and cry, eat and drink, speak and be silent. Though we can’t live on hope, we have to keep its flames alive if we are ever going to avenge the injustices that killed our friends. Never forget the dead. But even more important, never forget why you are living.

¹ http://www.crivoice.org/allsaints.html