Saying Goodbye

Today the Baha’i community of Port Elizabeth had a farewell lunch for me and it is at events like these that reality starts to hit you. I am leaving South Africa. There is a chance that I may not see many of these people again or at least not for a very long time and it actually hurts.

Today a remarkable thing happened, I was giving a small goodbye speech and I almost cried, I know big bad Martha shedding tears? Well no tears were shed but my voice did that wavering high pitched thing and I had to stop for a second but tears or not is besides the point, the point is that I’m leaving and I’m saying goodbye. I’m saying goodbye to people who have been my only family for the last 11 months, who have been my only friends, who have been my whole life. I have a wonderful family and friends at home who have made sure I know that I am missed in Australia and the Port Elizabeth community have been filling the space where they would normally be. It’s not easy to say goodbye to them.

There has been a question which people have been asking me again and again throughout my time here and which I have been giving pretty much the same answer to; Are you enjoying your time in South Africa? Every time I answer with the same thing but with a different intention. Sometimes my answer is because it is truly how I feel and other times my answer is because I don’t want to go on about my time in SA or because I don’t want to tell a South African how much I dislike their country. The answer is always that while I am still in the middle of my time here it’s hard to know what I feel but when I leave and when I’m outside looking back I’ll be able to see and be able to reflect on my experience here.

I have an answer for that question now. I know how I feel about South Africa and it’s not a feeling of hate or resentment or disappointment, although I still see all of these emotions within myself, but now when I think of my time here I think of joy, of growth and learning and I remember all the great people that came into my life.

I was always worried coming into this journey about how difficult it would be when I would have to leave. I know the pain of saying goodbye especially once you’ve fallen in love. I feel in love in 2008 with a place that has impacted my life so much I would not be even half the person that I am if it wasn’t for that place. I fell in love with Vanuatu, I fell in love with its people, with its purity, with its simplicity and with its love. The light in my soul which for so long had been flickering was set to glow in Vanuatu and it will forever be a part of me. I was in Vanuatu for just under a month doing service at the Rawhani Baha’i school. In that time I made friendships that will last for eternity, I found a piece of myself that I thought was gone and when it came time to leave it tore me apart. I was an absolute wreck and it took months to not feel the pain of separation. I knew that if I could hurt that much after only a month how much more could I hurt after a year? This thought has been plaguing me since before I even arrived in South Africa and I think it is as a result of that fear that I have not allowed myself to love as freely and as openly as I did in Vanuatu. I honestly didn’t think I could handle the part where I would have to say goodbye.

Now I am saying goodbye and I am seeing that just like in Vanuatu, although I fought it, South Africa too has taken a piece of me.

My heart and soul are in pieces scattered in the different places that made me whole. In Vanuatu where I found my light, in Sydney where I house my soul, in Haifa where I go for refuge and now in South Africa the place that taught me to grow. I wonder how much more I can tear apart my heart, how many more places will claim a piece?

I feel as though I am not done with South Africa, I feel as though there is more that I have to do here but it is not for now but for another stage of my life. My soul tells me that this is not the end of my African journey. Still soon I will have to say goodbye for the last time, I will have to tear off that piece of my heart as I leave this place. I will try to hold back my throbbing pain as I hold the ones I’m leaving behind and pretend I’m not breaking apart as I turn around and walk away.

1 Month To Go

The 18^th of April marks my last day in Port Elizabeth and my last day of service. In one month from today I will end what has been a whirlwind of events, a vortex of emotions, a dialectic of crisis and victory, an amazing time of growth, self understanding, wonderful new friendships and above all a time of service.

As this day was approaching I looked back on photos of myself from this time last year and reflected on what I was doing then and what I’m doing now. The funny thing is at both times I was travelling, I guess that side of me will never change. This time last year I had just come home from visiting Vanuatu, the first place I ever went for service in January 2008. I had made some of the most wonderful friendships of my life there and so I went back to visit the friends I had made and to be back in the place that my soul calls home.

Looking back on other photos there were times I could hardly recognise myself, not only because my hair colour has changed or because the clothes I was wearing are still in Sydney but because I remembered the way the world looked to me back then, I remembered what was the most important to me then, I remembered what kind of person I was. None of these things were bad but the growth that I have experienced recently is so great that I feel like that girl that said goodbye to her family in Sydney all those months ago is not going to be coming home.

Normally when I notice that I have developed as a person it’s based on a year by year scale but this time I can look back on myself a few months ago and see that I’ve changed. I looked at photos from Johannesburg when I first arrived here and I was having the same feelings about myself as I did with the photos from when I was still in Sydney. Amazing what service can do. It reminds me of this quote from Shoghi Effendi...

"The more we search for ourselves, the less likely we are to find ourselves; and the more we search for God, and to serve our fellow-men, the more profoundly will we become acquainted with ourselves, and the more inwardly assured. This is one of the great spiritual laws of life."

                (Compilations, Lights of Guidance, p. 114)

I didn’t come to South Africa to find myself, when I left Sydney I thought the person I was was pretty great. I didn’t think I needed much self tuning or any major personality repairs but the more I was tested during this service, the more hardships I faced, the more things went wrong or people treated me badly, the more I realised that there were things about myself that I wasn’t happy with and it wasn’t even a process of change requiring tonnes of effort that made me develop from these weak points that I saw but a natural reaction of me realigning myself to counter the things that were going wrong around me. I can’t pinpoint a specific time or place that this change began or be able to note when the greatest change occurred, it just happened and one day I looked at myself and saw that I was different.

It really is true that you see the best and the worst of yourself when you are serving. I’ve seen things within myself that I am just shocked at, how easily I lost control of myself and fell into black pits of despair and I’ve also been so amazingly proud of myself for how I’ve managed to survive through everything and continue to go on with almost no support from anyone. I’ve seen myself reach my heaviest weight while in South Africa, tipping the scales for the first time in my life over 50kgs when this time last year I was in the best shape of my life. I won’t detail everything that I’ve noticed because it is personal reflection but I will say that for those who I will see again in Sydney you’re going to notice that this Martha is not the same as the one you said goodbye to. I am the upgraded version of myself, fully installed with new life handling powers and an ability to kinda cook (mum will be happy about that one).

So now maybe just an outline of what will happen after this month is over. From South Africa I am flying to Madrid, Spain to visit my uncle and his family who I haven’t seen in a couple years. I’ll be spending a month in Spain and potentially going to Haifa, Israel in that time also for a few days to visit my big sister Melody and spend time in the Shrines. The arrival home will be towards the end of May and I have already started my application to do my Masters in Building and Sustainable Design for second semester of this year at the University of Sydney. That gives me 2 solid months to work and pay off all the debt that I have accumulated over this year, which means I also need to find a job and I’m open for suggestions on what I should do.

Honestly, I know it’s cliché, but I cannot believe that it has almost been a year already and at the same time I can’t believe that it’s only been almost a year, it really feels like forever.

Truth be told I can’t wait to get to Spain and see something new, although I’m sure it’s going to be difficult to leave. As much as I’ve stated my dislike for South Africa I actually think I’ll miss it.

Hey White Gal

As previously mentioned I live in the township. For the most part this has been fairly normal, there hasn't been anything in terms of how I live that is different to living anywhere else but there have been some very noticeable elements about township living that have stuck out for me. As well as living in Motherwell I also spend at least 3 days a week in Kuyga township and what I am about to explain applies in both places.

Looking at me and most certainly while living in Australia I am not a white girl but in South Africa what colour you are branded as isn’t so much about the actual colour of your skin but more what class you fall into or group you belong to. Being ‘coloured’ is more of a culture than the fact that you are mixed race. For example your father could be an Anglo-Saxon Australian and your mother a Xhosa South African but that doesn’t automatically deem you as coloured, people in this circumstance usually refer to themselves as mixed  race. It’s hard to explain because every case is different but pretty much what I’m trying to say is that just because my skin isn’t white doesn’t mean I’m not classed as white, especially in the township.

So I’ve been living in Motherwell for over a month now and as I had originally stated there aren’t that many non-black people here, or any at all for that matter. So yes I do get a lot of attention, people stare when I walk down the street or look at me funny and this naturally I expected. I expected people to be curious as to what I’m doing here which is normal as it is completely uncommon for ‘white’ people to be in the township let alone live there. What has been happening in both Kuyga and Motherwell, however, has been completely foreign to what I expected, it has been strange to say the least.

It actually started in Kuyga, the attention I had been getting in Motherwell was very similar to what I’ve been getting in Kuyga since the first time I stepped foot in that area, boys calling out to me and kids getting excited when they see me “Hey, come see the white girl”. In Motherwell I have boys often calling out “white gal, white gal! Come here!”, “Hello white gal, what’s your name?” which I got a lot of in Kuyga also but then recently something changed about the attention I was getting. It became personalised.

So one day I was in Kuyga going to a devotional gathering that was being held by some of the Ruhi book 1 participants and as I was walking to their house some kids walked past me “hello”, “hi”, “hello Martha”. First reaction is this must be one of our Jy kids but I’m looking at this child’s face and I have never seen any of these boys before. Then it happens again, after devotional I’m walking back to the taxi stop and “Hello Martha” who are these people? Now it keeps happening, I’ll be walking in Kuyga either on my own or with Bayan and people are calling my name, most of the time I have never seen these people before. I have been visiting this area for 6-7 months now so it is more than likely that people have been talking and asking ‘who is this girl who always comes here?’ and then they here from this person that I do something at the school and my name is Martha and so it spreads. Township life is very closed especially in Kuyga which is so isolated from other suburbs. People know everyone that lives around them, they know each other’s business, they observe everything that is happening  and they talk, talk, talk. I just hope that in their whisperings about me they are passing on the right message.

What has been happening in Motherwell has been slightly different. I guess because I don’t see myself as any different to anyone else I don’t notice how much I stand out. It all started when I was in Korsten which is an area about 20min from Motherwell and I was getting a taxi to Lorraine which is another 10min from there. A girl got into the same taxi as me and said “Do you live in Motherwell?” I said yes, “I know you”. I was like ohh ok cool, I thought that was an exciting story so I made it my Facebook status. Then it kept happening, again and again and again.

I would get into taxi in Motherwell, someone would ask me “Where’s your friend?” meaning Bayan. I would be in taxi going back to Motherwell, people call out the name of my stop for me, they know where I get off. I got into taxi leaving Motherwell, “so you living in Motherwell? I always see you everyday”. I can’t walk to the local shops without having someone follow me home or take a taxi ride without someone asking me who I am living with or why, I have men young and old calling out to me or asking me my name. I can’t be discreet, I don’t blend, everything I do is being noticed by someone because to them I’m different. I became a little concerned about this especially because a lot of people were asking me if I was living with my boyfriend. I guess this is the most rational explanation for them as to why I live in the township, so I have to keep verifying to people that I am living with a wonderful family as I am doing service for the Baha’i Faith and I hope people spread that around.

I love the look of shock on people’s faces when I speak Xhosa, it makes me want to learn more, I love when people ask me where I live and then they get excited because they live near me and they say they’ll see me around. What I think is the most wonderful thing about me living and spending so much time in the townships is that it’s hopefully bridging a gap. There is a stigma about the township from ‘white people’ and there is a stigma within the townships about ‘white people’. I hope the impact that I am having is positive, that is shows that there are people in this world who don’t notice the colour of your skin first and the person you are second, there are people who defy stereotypes and who don’t see everyone else in terms of their stereotype either.

Again recently in Korsten Bayan and I were walking to get the taxi to Kuyga and a guy said “There are the Baha’i ladies”, we had never seen this guy before. I had a girl get off the Motherwell taxi at the same stop as me in town and she asked me to say hi to Bayan for her. There are honestly so many examples that I could list of random people knowing who I am in both Kuyga and Motherwell. The last little remark I’ll share with you was when a guy we were walking past said “Hello Jessica” to me. I think he was just trying to guess what my name was.

Sometimes I find it annoying especially when I’m in a taxi going to Motherwell and people ask me where I live and I say in Motherwell and then they tell me I’m lying, like really? What else would I go to Motherwell for? Sightseeing? But I guess it is quite different. Strange thing is as shocked as everyone else is I don’t find it strange or shocking at all that I live in the township because like I said before I don’t see myself as different to anyone else. I actually like being in the townships.

I had a remarkable moment in the taxi the other day as I was driving out of Kuyga, as we drove through and I looked out the window, taking in this place that has become one of the areas I am most comfortable in, I started to think that I would actually really miss Kuyga when I’m gone and then I put this question to myself.. What would I stay in South Africa for? I smiled as the taxi pulled out of Kuyga township, it’s my favourite place in P.E.