Apartheid

“What was it like?” I asked him. “Apartheid.”

Joseph. Our driver.

He was a large, jolly man in his mid-fifties. He had dark chocolate skin with curly, salt and pepper hair. He looked at me and the smile lines around his eyes wrinkled.

Then, he laughed.

Not just a chuckle. Joseph burst into a full belly laugh. He had lived through it. He was 33 when Apartheid ended.

“You would not believe me if I told you,” Joseph said, as his laughter faded. “My children do not believe me when I tell them.”

At first, I didn’t understand why he was laughing. I didn’t understand how he could laugh. I pressed him.

“Tell me.”

He tried.

“It was horrible. We had no freedom. We had no jobs. We had no hope.”

He drove us to a township just outside of Johannesburg.

“Three-thousand people live here,” he said. “They have no running water. They have no electricity. They share 3 water taps. They share 20 portable toilets.”

He introduced me to the people. They were quick to smile, but their eyes were guarded, skeptical. I did not understand their words.

Joseph translated.

Who is this white face with a camera? Why does he take our picture?

Joseph told them I was there to tell their story. They were glad. They were friendly. They wanted me to understand. They wanted others to know of their struggle. For them, Apartheid was very real.

I was stunned. They had so little. Yet, they seemed happy.

“Why?”

Joseph told me it was time to go. It was not safe.

I got in the car.

This time, Joseph did not laugh.

“Apartheid ended in 1994. Those were difficult times. I lost my best friend to a gunshot. I cannot describe…I will not describe the trials of those days. We did not know if we would live or die. We had no hope.”

“But, Apartheid has been over for 17 years.”

“These people believe the government will take care of them. They believe the government will educate them.”

“Will they?”

Joseph laughed. We can only hope.