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Olivia Brian
Yesterday was an unofficial public holiday because the taxis were striking so no one could get to work or school. It was unsafe for us to travel into any township or valley areas where our schools are located because of the risk of people assuming we were picking up staff to take them to work - thereby boycotting the protest. Violence threatened if this situation was perceived to be the case, so all school sessions were cancelled by our partner organizations.
Instead, Dan and I went to a Zulu soccer match - the boys from the Zulu choir I sing in versus some other local boys. Dan played not one but two soccer games, and consequently today he can barely walk and is limping around the school during our school session. I played one 12 minute-game - us girls thrashing it around on the dusty dirt soccer field. I nearly died of shortness of breath and I am sore today - not used to the sprinting!
International Women's Day is this Saturday, 9th August. A local private girls school contacted me to ask if I'd like to invite some girls from the neighbouring valley ('black') schools to attend a Women's Day function. Through our partner organization and GOLD Implementing Organisation Sethani, we've arranged to send 15 lucky girls to the event this weekend. It was with Women's Day on my mind that I participated in the soccer match yesterday. It was interesting, encouraging and refreshing to note that here in a rural community in the Valley of a Thousand Hills, South Africa, the women were also on the schedule for the day's soccer tournaments. As the young girls and women strutted confidently to the field decked out in the boys' sweaty shorts, socks, shoes and soccer vests, dust rising in our wake, the boys on the sidelines shouted and jumped in support and encouragement. When my team scored the first goal the boys and men on the sidelines went CRAZY - jumping and screaming in joy, doing cartwheels, handstands and slapping high fives. I was chuffed just thinking about what the day represented - that here in rural Africa 2008, girls can wear grubby soccer shorts and run around a field, being cheered on by the communities boys and men. As the African sun began to set over the rolling valley of a thousand hills, I thought to myself that there is hope for the change as far as gender roles go in Africa - as no doubt twenty years ago this would never have occurred.
However, South Africa is a land of contrasts that forever keeps you on your toes and challenges what you thought you knew. After the game I was chatting with one of my girlfriends and she was pointing out her new soccer-playing boyfriend to me. "He's very strict," she said. "In what ways?" I asked. "Well, he's very traditional - he doesn't want me wearing pants or speaking to boys," she answered. I noticed for the first time the long skirt she was wearing - very different to the hip-hugging denim of her single days. Her boyfriend is 21 years old, a product of none other than the new, upcoming generation. He has the right, without her questioning, to dictate to his girlfriend what she should wear, how she should behave and whom she should and shouldn't spend time with. Perhaps my optimism about women's rights and gender equality was a little premature - we are talking about trying to change or evolve culturally imbedded ideas and expectations that have been around for thousands of years after-all. Change is slow, but it is happening bit-by-bit, day by day.
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