Children as Mirrors

When I first decided to go to South Africa, I was so excited to learn and see the differences between our cultures and see what I could do help with the kids as well. After a few weeks of teaching, we entered winter holidays and worked with the Western Cape Department of Education where I got to teach kids kayaking! I had one kid named Ishmael who took his shoes off and stuck them in the water off one side of the kayak causing us to drag. "What are you doing Ishmael?" I asked. He told me that he loved the water and that he used to live near our volunteer placement in Muizenberg, but his family had to move to Lavender Hill away from the fun of surfing and the ocean and towards higher crime rates and the influence of gangsterism. Immediately, I thought back to my childhood when my parents had considered moving, but I begged them not to take me away from my forest where I had built so many trails. Ishmael and I are growing up 8,000 miles apart, but in so many ways we are just the same. Although, it is theoretically true that we are all human, it is so good to be truly confronted by that fact especially through Ishmael's feet on a kayak in a South African estuary in the shadow of a mountain.