Look! Look!

When I had first visited Bona-Bona I had had to laugh. I wondered how it was that a place called “look look”(…or see-see, which are both “bona” in Setswana) could have so little to actually look at in it! As I stood outside my small brick house on that morning of mid-July, however, I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. It had only returned from vacationing during June break a few days earlier. I spent those few days lying low…to recoup from all the hard-core socializing id been doing for one, and to stay out of the path of what looked to the onset of another community demonstration. I wasn’t surprised. At the beginning of every term since I first arrived in the village there had been demonstrations. “Demonstration,” however, is a term that can only be used loosely here in South Africa. In reality, it is often the equivalent of a riot. Typical activities include the disruption and closing of schools, the burning of tires, automobiles, trash bins, and public buildings, and most importantly, the heartfelt stomping dances and singing of chants (that has earned the activity the affectionate nickname of “leg up” in certain regions of the country.) The people of my village were angry. Many had said they felt betrayed by the government, which at the time of transition to democracy had promised to deliver services and life altering improvements in infrastructure. Now, eighteen years later, they still had to travel 25 km to reach the nearest paved road (when would it finally be paved?), and struggled with constant water shortage--which, when it was available, was bad quality. Rumors had spread that the good water was being delivered to the outlying farms of the Afrikaners while the village was being bypassed. These were the initial complaints that had been voiced. As discontent grew however, new demands were added. They demanded that the local clinic be staffed so to be opened 24 hours a day. (After all, at the time of the first strike, three stabbings occurred and the victims had gone 24 hours without treatment.) Also, the fact that our secondary school only went to 10^th grade meant that most students became forced drop outs. Few could afford to rent property in the next village over in order to complete grades 11 and 12.

With each successive school term their anger had grown and the protests had become more agressive. Municipal leaders would come, make more promises and give more deadlines by which certain developments would be made. But these were never met.  I knew things were taking a turn for the worse. During the first strike, they had locked down the high school and refused to allow classes to be held for over a week. They began burning tires in the street.  By the second they had locked both schools down for two weeks as well as the clinic and threatened to burn things. By the third strike they actually burned a section of the Tribal Hall as well as the community center. In that last week of school vacation before term 3 they had begun protesting yet again. As I had entered the village on my way back from Limpopo I had seen the tell-tale black stains on the white gravel and knew they had been at it again.

I had sat at my desk preparing lessons for the up-coming school week and listening to the ruckus outside. All day long I could see the black plumes from burning tired stretching their dark fingers out over the crossing not far from my house and in the distance near the tribal hall. On that Wednesday morning, however, there was a strange sort of feeling in the air. I was sitting at my desk working when suddenly the strange scents of burning wood, paper and gasoline filled my room. At first I thought my host mother was burning the trash, but then I began to hear raised voices. I recognized the voice of neighbor across the way, shouting something in Setswana I couldn’t make out. I perked up and listened. Only a few seconds later there was a loud knock at my door. “Rethabile! Tla kwano! Bona!” (Rethabile come here!! Look!) It was my host mom yelling. I rushed outside. “Eng?!” (What is it?!) As soon as I stepped outside, I stopped dead in my tracks. A huge cloud of smoke and flame was billowing up from the horizon. It looked intimidating...and almost close enough to touch.  “Ke Tlotlang-Thuto!” my host mom exclaimed, gesturing wildly in the direction of the cloud. My heart nearly skipped a beat. Tlotlang- Thuto, the high school, was engulfed in flames. I stood and watched the blackness spread out over the village. I couldn’t help but think I’ve just watched the already uncertain future of several hundred village kids go up in smoke. Not only their futures but also everything I had spent the past year working towards. I stood watching for a good long while, taken aback. What would happen now? How would they be able to finish the year? Would I be able to keep living and working here? It had been the last straw. I heard via the village gossip network that they were calling this war against the government…for all their empty promises, all the corruption and wastage of money that went on while the people suffered…it made me want to cry. I couldn’t explain to them that they had achieved nothing other than to deprive their already underserved community and their own children of a few much needed resources. They didn’t seem to understand the gravity of what they’d done and the magnitude of the consequences they would reap. I called my Peace Corps supervisor to report the incident. Deep down I knew what this would mean. It was going to mean id be evacuated from Bona-Bona. I hoped beyond hope that is somehow would work out.