So my flight to Jo-berg proved to be the best so far. I met the most interesting person and probably learned more on that flight than I have ever learned from a class or the news.
I’ll begin, however, by describing the first two people I met before my neighbor. I met one girl, who I had to poke awake, who was going to Mozambique to visit her father. Another girl was moving to South Africa to live with her boyfriend. She got a 3 year visa, and had just come from Germany, where she went on a cruise with said boyfriend. She majored in psych at Colorado State.
Now for the interesting man. He was coming from Afghanistan, where he had just spent 20 weeks and was returning home to Jo-berg to visit his pregnant wife for 2 weeks. His job? He supplies fuel to American troops in Afghanistan at a place containing over 180 million liters of fuel. On average, 25 of his employees die from bombings every month. We continued to talk about his job, the uselessness of American occupancy in Afghanistan, and the US in general. It is almost embarrassing having to explain to people that you do not agree with many things your government is doing, and when people from other countries know more about your own than you do. Actually, it is very embarrassing.
We talked about how the healthiest countries are not necessarily the richest, and about how corporations and industries control our government. It was amazing how much he knew about everything. He has lived in over 18 African countries and showed me pictures of Ethiopia, which were devastating, South Africa, which is breathtaking, and Namibia. There was a picture of a young boy laying in the street in Ethiopia with elephant foot; his leg and foot were swollen to about three times their normal size. There was also a man with a giant tumor growing out of his head about the size of a pineapple. It is just so hard to grasp that things like this are so common there, and that not everyone has hospitals and doctors readily available.
Just seeing his pictures of South Africa and Cape Town assured me that I will return to Africa some day to spend time in the country, just traveling and sightseeing. It has so much coast line, with the tumultuous Atlantic on one side and the calm Indian Ocean on the other. There was a place called “God’s Window”, which you have to travel through a rainforest to get to. It is so high up that the clouds are below you and birds fly below you, and it is what you would imagine God sees when he looks out his window. If you are a golfer, South Africa would be your Holy Land for a lack of better terms. It is very popular to build golf course estates, which are unbelievably well-kept lands with mountain and ocean views.
I saw pictures of colonial buildings build by the Dutch. He also showed me pictures of his house, which is honestly the most beautiful house I have ever seen. It is on a 3 acre plot with a huge garden, a pond that he is currently building, and a view of the mountains; the house beats any house in Trillium Bay.
The most interesting part of our encounter, however, was the album he showed me of his work site after a suicide bombing. It was possibly the most sobering experience I’ve had, yet was also disgusting and horrific. Seeing pictures of incinerated cars, piles of bricks and woodwork, and dead bodies made the situation so much more real. A group of men drove into the compound, and despite having multiple people shooting at the car, the group was able to drive into the building and detonate. These incidents happen so frequently, yet we never see their true devastation in the news. I saw pictures of severed legs, fingers, feet, and a whole face (yes, a face that was just blown off of one of the bombers). There are signs all over Afghanistan saying “America go home” “I hate America” etc. etc…it just makes me wonder, what is actually happening?
I never take the time to catch up on current events or history, and seeing these things makes me regret it more than ever. We are so fortunate as Americans not to encounter these attacks or such political unrest, yet they are happening abroad and many of us are not well-educated on the issues. I don’t speak for everyone of course, I am sure there is a large fraction of people who are much more responsible than me and stay updated. But still, how much does the news tell us? How much do our professors teach us?
We talked about health care and public health, and one piece of advice this man gave me was to always question everything, and to always consider the alternatives. It may not always be best to question others, but always question yourself to determine the best decision. I have honestly never truly questioned what my professors have taught me, especially in science. I just assume that information in text books is definite, unbiased, and true. I focus on learning it, but not where it comes from or if it is the best solution. In labs, we learn a single way to do something and repeat it, but is that the best way? Although it may be the quickest solution, is it the safest, healthiest, cheapest, or most reliable?
I already feel that I have learned a great deal on this trip, and it has barely started. I’ve seen things many people have never had or will have the chance to.
My mind is open to experience whatever this time throws at me.
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