A Black and White Relationship.

Some writer advised me to write everyday about things that I can write about every day. So I’m going to write a post about what happened yesterday. Of course I’m going to use similes and metaphors, with that said I hope you enjoy.

I woke up in the morning. I took a shower. I went to work. I did a bit of work. I had some breakfast. I carried on working while I was listening to music. Because of my contract I can’t tell you what I did exactly, but it was work.

My girlfriend wanted me to join he for drinks at some restaurant in observatory, but alas I couldn’t make, I was working until 7:15pm. When I eventually went home, we started talking about race, I don’t really remember how we got there but we were in it like a toothbrush in a dirty mouth. The conversation got heated but she tapped out because her English is limited.

I flipped open the laptop and we started watching the big debate, and boy let me tell you it was a BIG debate in the staunchest sense of the word.

But lets backtrack a little bit; we need some information concerning the reason why I flipped open the laptop. This is the reason; I said to my German girlfriend: ‘white people in this country will be killed because they choose to ignore our (black people) suffering and only care about themselves. Yes this country has a lot of problems but there is this undying tension in the air between the race groups of this country, and if we don’t resolve this, there will be war.’

At first she thought I was being racist but then we flipped open the laptop and she saw for herself how some white people in this country really don’t care about reconciliation and moving forward as a true rainbow nation. 

On the show there was a clip of Desmond tutu saying, that white people are lucky they were not killed for their past transgressions, black people still wake up today from a shack and they go and work for white people in the city, and they are still treated like secondary citizens. One of the members (white) said why doesn’t anybody acknowledge that those comments said by Tutu were racists. The crowd’s response was unanimous like the votes for Sony Bill Williams fight against the White Buffalo, the crowd said, “Because it’s true!” 

One thing that is also true. For once in our lives we were all honest, people were angry and the truth was revealed (or a part of it). If we continue to talk like this and resolve the problems at hand we will reconcile and truly live in a rainbow nation. Until then, in the words of Lebo Mashile, “When the lights are off everybody is …cked”.

At the end of the debate my girlfriend was silent.

The purpose of this was not meant to make her feel bad, or for me to feel as though I have some power. I wanted her to see what it’s like to be a black South African living in a country were your ancestor suffered for over three hundred years and the people that benefited from that suffering showed not that they care or at least they want to make emends, they still benefit while the rest still suffers.