Honest Chocolate

What do a juicer, a vacuum cleaner, rotisserie oven, a pressure cooker and a hairdryer have in common? They're all used to make Honest Chocolate at the Woodstock Exchange! I spent a delightful morning in a "bon-bon making" workshop yesterday learning to not be afraid of the dark - dark chocolate, that is. It was more about the journey of chocolate rather than actually making the chocolate but what fun!

Anthony and Michael started their chocolate-making journey at the same time, but in different countries and then joined forces. Michael sounds like a bit of a MacGyver, hence all the unorthodox gadgets to produce the chocolate. Beans are dried in the adapted rotisserie oven:

Then crushed in the juicer to remove the husks, which are sucked up by the vacuum cleaner:

Other tools of the trade:

                            

The warm chocolate is hand-tempered in a hypnotic display of handwork:

The chocolate is made from cacao paste, cacao butter and sweetened with agave; it is free from preservatives and artificial flavourings. The finished products are finally packaged in eco-friendly paper decorated with designs from local artists. I loved that the chocolate is made by hand and sourced straight from the farms in Ecuador and soon from Tanzania.  

As a little extra, we got to dip dried naartjie slices in the chocolate and garnish with a sprinkling of buchu leaves...which reminded me of my grandmother's koeksusters made with dried citrus peel and the buchu she boiled up for us to drink whenever we had a sniffle. Standing in the tiny kitchen, with the electricity tripping every now and again, watching Anele the chocolate-maker flick his wrists back and forth rhythmically, it all felt, well, honest.

Go check it out here: Honest Chocolate 

Looking for a Magazine that Grace and Frankie will enjoy

My brain has been rather over-taxed by academic reading and I long for something that I can get lost in, switch off and float along on the words and maybe doze off ... without constantly reading between the lines for hidden references to my subject matter. See previous blog on reading for pleasure...

I decided yesterday that a magazine might do the trick when I popped into the supermarket for an overdue replenishment of stocks. Rows of magazines were on display - home and garden, parenting, fashion and travel...I scrolled through the selection but nothing popped out at me. I didn't want a whole magazine on any of those topics but a maybe little bit of everything. My children have finished school, my home is pretty comfortable (besides I am subscribing to an old piece of advice from my new mother days - let your home be dirty enough to be happy and clean enough to be healthy), and I have been fortunate to travel a good part of the world.

There were magazines for "iconic black women", business entrepreneurs, and health nuts all half my age. I picked up a magazine that had a blurb about menopause and found the article - I swear that the woman used to illustrate that article isn't going to experience a hot flush for another 10 years at least.

Where are the people who look like me? Who aren't baring their all figuratively or literally, who aren't looking like slightly weathered versions of their teenage daughters? Where are the ones who are exploring new freedoms from their empty nests, going back to study, getting involved in their communities, reinventing themselves? The ones having real hot flushes or forgetting whether they actually did take the omegas which are supposed to improve memory? 

Does anyone do yoga in comfortable tops and pants, rather than sweating it out in figure-hugging designer gear, in rooms heated to above normal body temperature? I want to see women who like to look smart but are not looking for labels, who aren't afraid to try something new even if they fail and look silly. Where is the magazine that someone who rolls about laughing at the adventures of proper Grace and eccentric Frankie  will enjoy? Please feel free to recommend any!

Offerings at the local supermarket

Women Surviving Lavender Hill

Kimdendhri Pillay-Constant (facilitator) with
authors Veronica Kroukamp and Naema Moses

Aunty Veronica is one of the many women living behind the headlines of:

LAVENDER HILL COMMUNITY 'LIVING IN FEAR' AMID GANG VIOLENCE

LAVENDER HILL TEACHERS CRY FOR HELP

WHERE DO THE CHILDREN PLAY? LAVENDER HILL’S DERELICT FACILITIES

LAVENDER HILL SCHOOLS REOPEN AFTER GANG GUN BATTLE CLAMPDOWN

Aunty Veronica remembers crying when she moved into Constitution Court No. 48 in 1981, because she had “always heard and seen what happens in this place”. Her children were afraid to play outside, they witnessed a gang killing, when she came home from work at night, neighbours would have eaten the food she had left out for her children. Through it all she was determined to make sure that her children would not be brought up “like the neighbours”. She speaks proudly about her children overcoming challenges to find a way to earn a living. 

In spite of this, her story is punctuated with headings like, Facing Danger and Change in the Community, The Life and Death of My Son, Tough Times with My Daughter Sonia, and My Daughter Roundel Who We Almost Lost a Few Times. The story is a rollercoaster of suicide attempts, battles with drugs, abuse and violence but a determination to overcome shines through and she ends her story with the words:

I will come out on top. I will achieve the things I want in life even if I must do the subjects over, I will do it because I still believe that I will get my grade 12 certificate before I am going to be 60 years old.

Aunty Veronica was one of the speakers at a meeting of the Non-Violence Vocal I attended recently.  She is one of the authors of a book, Women Surviving Lavender Hill, which emerged from a two-year writing project facilitated by New World Foundation. The project was started a healing process for women to address the trauma and abuse they have endured through living in a community such as Lavender Hill, a community of gang violence, drug and alcohol addiction and domestic violence. 

Places like Lavender Hill are the scars we bear from the apartheid legacy of forced removals when culturally diverse communities from District Six in the city centre to Claremont, Harfield and Bishopscourt, in the southern suburbs, to Simon’s town along the False Bay coast, were disrupted and the lives of ordinary people destroyed in the classificatory madness of the National Party. 

These depressing headlines immediately pop up on a cursory search on the internet, but I feel that I owe it to Aunty Veronica to share some of the good news stories that defy any ideas that we may have of the real people who live in communities like Lavender Hill. Like the Waves for Change surfing project, the Lavender in Lavender Hill job creation project, and the story of  Lavender Hill resident, Riaan Cedras ,who went from cutting grass to graduating with a PhD in Marine Science this year. 

The book is self-published and reflects the stories of the women in their authentic voices, is available from New World Foundation: admin@newworldfoundation.org.za.

Down South in the USA

I have visited the USA often over the last 20+ years, but this last trip was the first one that I spent any significant time in the south. An opportunity to present at a conference was the main reason for the visit which of course got extended because “if I was going all the way I should make it worthwhile”. Visiting the south was a very different experience, especially with my daughter beside me, whispering that she felt like she was on the set of the movie, Get Out. Suffice it to say that we had arrived from Mexico where we had blended in with the locals a lot more easily. 

The conference took place in Charleston, South Carolina (there are two Charlestons in the USA). Charleston, SC, was the American capital of the transatlantic slave trade, with 40 percent of enslaved Africans passing through it. The opening shots of the Civil War were fired in April 1861 at Fort Sumter in Charleston harbour. 

Inside Mother Emmanuel Church

The conference, “Transforming Public History from Charleston to the Atlantic World,” was organized by the College of Charleston’s Race and Social Justice Initiative and the Avery Research Centre.  The opening address was given by Dr Lonny Bunch, founding director of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture, at the Mother Emmanuel church, where nine worshippers were shot and killed in a racially motivated attack. The church was built in 1816 and has survived natural disasters and burning for its association with slaves; civil rights activists gathered there, Martin Luther King Jr spoke from its pulpit. The church has survived the shootings and has become a site of pilgrimage and a symbol of forgiveness.

That weekend happened to be the second anniversary of the racist shooting at the church in which 9 people were killed. In my experience, places of worship, no matter what faith they celebrate, are imbued with a sense of peace and spirituality. It’s difficult to imagine anyone violating that space. Sitting in the pews with sunlight streaming through stained glass window, reminded me of a visit we had made to Regina Mundi in Soweto, the site of police shootings in 1976. 

People around us were whispering about a noose that had been left at the museum recently and were wondering whether Dr Bunch would mention it in his speech. He didn’t, but spoke instead about the importance of public history, about remembering the history that is omitted from the official narrative and how slavery and race and ethnicity have shaped America. He concluded that it was important for everyone to be exposed to this history since it had shaped everyone. His speech, the venue, the anniversary of the shooting … all added emotional layers to the conference. With topics like, “My Skin – the Costume I’m in”, “Black Lives Matter in the Age of Trump” and “They wore white and prayed to the east”, the conference helped me to place my study in an international context. 

Charleston SC waterfront. Fort Sumter to the right in the distance

Given this history, it was a shock to walk along the waterfront on our last afternoon there and see statues and monuments to the confederacy. Even more so, since the Mother Emmanuel shooter had posted images of himself flying the confederate flag. 

On our last morning we visited the Mcleod Plantation, all “Gone with the Wind” – a long driveway lined with tall trees dripping with Spanish moss, leading to the mansion. A guide who had been on a panel the previous day gave us a more inclusive tour, taking us around the back to tell us stories of the people who had lived in the row of one-roomed wooden houses. It was chilling to think that, Dylan Roof, the Mother Emmanuel shooter had been on this same visit and taken photographs in the same places we did.  

On my entry to the USA, immigration officer, on hearing the purpose of my visit, remarked, I don’t think we’ll ever learn, do you? I’d like to think that everyone at the conference left with a renewed conviction to share the stories, to tell history with a multiplicity of voices.

Mind Your Language

It is doubtful whether there are many people out there who will take advice from gangsters or drunks, even less so if the person advocating caution was a drunk gangster. So I am not sure what the Western Cape Transport and Public Works department was thinking with this advert for their #BoozeFreeRoads campaign. See article by Robin-Lee Francke here:

http://www.dailyvoice.co.za/news/watch-anti-booze-is-an-insult-to-coloureds/

It seems that they don't see anything wrong with their "100% authentic" portrayal of drunk gangsters selected off the streets of Hanover Park on the Cape Flats. 

The stereotypes of drunkenness and violence associated with 'coloured' people is ingrained in the narratives which go way back to the 17th century, when those who were referred to as 'Hottentots' were described thus:  

... they are lazy, they love to drink, they swear and fight at the slightest provocation and are generally immoral... 

In his examination of the portrayal of ‘Hottentot’ characters in early 19th century theatre, Vernon February finds the same basic elements: their love of liquor, their irascibility, their moral looseness, and linguistic incomprehension. He remarks that by the early 20^th century, ‘coloureds’ were limited to certain roles in Afrikaner mythology – the labour syndrome, comic syndrome, Bacchus syndrome, incarceration syndrome, loud-mouthed syndrome, and bellicose syndrome.  The theme of alcohol is a recurring one throughout Afrikaans literature, enshrining the tot system and justifying alcohol as the ‘coloured’s’ greatest cultural heritage, he concludes. 

Questions of race continue to surface in South Africa more than twenty years after democracy, Albie Sachs, anti-apartheid activist and constitutional court judge, comments in his autobiography that we have to acknowledge the catastrophic effects of apartheid in human terms in order to move on. Not only do we need to acknowledge apartheid and repression, but we need to realize the social and emotional impact that it had. 

Unless we destroy the stereotypes which were used to oppress us and define us racially, we cannot move towards a post-apartheid society where 'black' and 'white' believe they are equal to each other. We need to create the optimum conditions on the ground in order for people to feel neither superior nor inferior to each other, but to view each other as human. 

Further reading:

February, V. 2014. Mind Your Colour: The 'Coloured' Stereotype in South African Literature

Reading for Pleasure or Not the Life of a Student

I have been so wrapped up in academia that it seems a lifetime ago that I actually read a book for pure pleasure. Every time I pick up a book a little voice appears urging me to read between the lines to look for hidden themes, symbols and contexts.  

In fact, I was forced to trawl the thousands of photographs on my phone (which I really need to make time to clean up) to find proof that I have done so! Sadly, this is from a holiday two and a half years ago. Pure bliss...

These days, my reading pile looks more like this:

I am having an amazing journey, by times stimulated, fascinated, overwhelmed, depressed, a whole gamut of emotions. And one book leads to another and another, and I fear that I may disappear behind a pile of paper and eventually someone may have to dig me out and I will emerge, clutching the thesis like the holy grail in one hand, the other hand hanging limply by my side with mouse-induced stiffness. 

I do miss immersing myself in a good book, curling up in bed and reading into the night. I also miss writing, keeping up with my blog, writing about issues that have nothing to do with slavery, colonialism or racism. Sitting at the computer feels like work all the time. I sneak onto Facebook and press a few likes, and disappear before I get sucked in. But would I do the studying all over again? Yes, without hesitation. It's given a different meaning to my life. 

So I am going on a trip this week and am most excited about choosing a book to read on the plane! Believe me, I have choices on my bookshelf from months ago when I ventured into bookshops in Australia and America. I even have Harper Lee's Go Set a Watchman from almost two years ago, when I very excitedly grabbed it off the shelf in Pawling, happy to read it before it had been released back home. (Well, I haven't yet!). What I have chosen, and it may have something to do with the title more than anything else, is:

The Bad-Ass Librarians of Timbuktu

and their race to save the 

world's most precious manuscripts

This is a story of a historian who organised a dangerous operation to save 350 000 volumes of ancient Islamic and secular texts out of Timbuktu to the safety of southern Mali. One of the reviews promises that the author, Joshua Hammer, "has pulled off the truly remarkable - a book that is both important and a delight to read. Another, that this book is a must-read if you are feeling despair about the fate of the world (which I am). I'm hoping that is enough to shut up the nagging little voice and that I will be able to simply enjoy the fantastic story! I will keep you posted. 

On race and culture

I am still processing the information that, somewhere out there are 2000 people who bought a book with the good intentions of navigating the diverse cultures of the people of South Africa.  Instead, I shudder to think, they were offered stereotypes of so-called ‘coloured culture. That someone could be bold enough to write a chapter on the subject is wrong on so many levels. Where shall I start?

Firstly, the very notion of a grouping of coloured people is an artificial construct of an apartheid government hell-bent on denying the rights and freedoms to 80% of the population of our country, for more than 40 years. 

Secondly, culture, “the arts, customs, and institutions of a nation, people or group”, by its nature refers to a fairly homogenous group of people to begin with. There is no white culture or black culture or coloured culture.

Gabeba Baderoon in her book, Regarding Muslims, notes that,

… in the racial hierarchy of apartheid, ‘colouredness’ formed the interstitial zone between ‘native’ and ‘white’… defined solely through negatives, imbued with ambiguity … ‘colouredness’ was the fluid middle of the hierarchy in South Africa …

Even the architects of apartheid had trouble deciding who fitted into this group of “leftovers” (as Marike de Klerk so famously referred to coloureds). The fluidity that Baderoon refers to was evident in the seven subgroups of coloured made provision for in the Population Registration Act of 1950:

Cape Coloured/Malay/Griqua/Chinese/Indian/Other Asian/Other Coloured

And as Mrs de Klerk observed, the people who were” left after the nations were sorted out, the negative group, the non-people” were classified coloured.  Conveniently forgotten was the rich diversity of people descended from Indonesian slaves, Europeans, Khoikhoi and San, with diverse art, music, customs, speaking Afrikaans and/or English.  Also ignored by Mrs de Klerk and others like her, were studies that showed that on average 7% of all Afrikaner forefathers were of “coloured” origin. 

The Act required every citizen to be registered according to his/her race group, with race determined by a classification board acting on information from family and friends; a person’s hair, eyeballs and cuticles could be examined for pigmentation if there was any doubt. This fluidity meant, for example, that my grandfather could change his classification from ‘white’ to marry my ‘coloured’ grandmother, even though she was fairer-skinned than he. My aunt, who married a "real" European (as in he really was born there and not as a synonym for "white South African") was not able to live in South Africa with her husband. When she visited with her children, she was not allowed to stay in her mother’s “coloured” home with her “white” children.

My aunt Hilda on her wedding day

Lastly, tough as it may be to comprehend, there is only one human race. We are 99% genetically identical. There is no coloured race, or white or black race for that matter. So let’s refrain from deepening divisions by assigning sweeping characteristics to artificial groups of people.