Apartheid Museum

This week nothing much has changed, the strike is still on, more informational sessions, and of course more language lessons. On Saturday, we were taken to Johannesburg to visit the Apartheid Museum.



This was a very moving and intense experience, similar to my experience in Amsterdam at the Anne Frank House. Apartheid ended in 1994, by 2001 the museum was up and running, this really threw me of.
When you enter the museum you are handed a card; the card reads either WHITES or NON-WHITES. When I was handed my card chills ran up and down my spine. The WHITES enter through a separate entrance than the NON-WHITES. Posted on the wall was an explanation of the racial classification system. This system was used as a basis for enforcing Apartheid.









I viewed numerous pictures videos and testimonies of victims, a lot of these videos were in color. Growing up I’ve watched many documentaries on the civil rights movement, as we all know those were in black & white. Now for those baby boomers reading this I’m sure you remember the civil rights movement. For me seeing people being discriminated against in color, in the 1990’s was just mind blowing. I do understand that things like this are currently going on in other countries, but im here, I’m in South Africa where 90% of the population is, for lack of a better word NON-WHITE.
My only questions is where was our all powerful military, I guess by that time all the gold was mined out of Johannesburg. AT the end of the day it was a great museum and an eye opening experience.
When I returned to Siyabuswa, I spoke with other South Africans and the overwhelming majority have never visited this museum. When I asked my friends host father why he replied, “Apartheid just ended in 1994, 16 years ago, I still have nightmares. I can still remember being beaten, turned away from shops and denied many things.” I felt so bad. Standing there breathless I began to weep.....