Cynthia's memorable experience

A memorable experience was the trip to Robben Island. During the tour of the island I learned that even in jail classified blacks were treated worse than classified colored people and Indians. The people classified African or black were treated differently and given foods of lesser quality compared to the people that were not classified African.  I also learned that the pencil test was used to classify non whites into different groups. Part of the tour was given by a person who actually served prison time at Robben Island. Having a person that went to jail on Robben Island gave me an experience that I think I would not have gotten if the whole tour was given by a tour guide that did not go through that experience. The tour guide told us that today the people that were oppressed live on the island with the people that oppressed them. I think those people are very courageous because I do not think if I was in that situation I would be able to live next door or with people that oppressed me and vice versa. I feel that this is important because it shows that some people have overcome what happened in the past and is taking steps to move forward.

During my first day at Tafelsig clinic I spoke with some of the people that work in the pharmacy. They asked me questions and I also asked them many questions. One question that I was asked that I thought was interesting is if “there is really freedom in America for everyone?” I thought it was interesting because while I just wanted to say yes right away I had to really think if I would be telling them the truth about America if I did. One of the workers told me that during slavery the minority group was the ones oppressing the majority groups. At first when I thought about it, I wondered how that could happen but he then explained that when the white people came they had better weapons and tools to fight the Africans. This resulted in them being able to control the majority population. The man I worked with also had strong view about the government and politics in South Africa today. He talked about how every time it is election time, the ANC party, which is the political party Nelson Mandela belonged to when he was president, always bring up what happened during the apartheid times in order to win votes. This makes me wonder if always bringing up the bad things that happened in the past is a good or bad idea because people are always bringing up the bad things that happened and I am starting to wonder whether or not that hinders the future.