Bernie finding connections between the past and present

Well today was the first day back to real life after going on our excursion to Johannesburg and Kruger National Park. The excursion was such an awesome experience in so many ways. What I loved about being in Johannesburg was going to the museums and memorials. I enjoyed going to those things because it made me think of some of the information we all learned in Vincent’s class and with having that knowledge and seeing the museum and memorials with pictures and videos really just allowed me to see how things were for people back then during apartheid and it allowed me to learn more and really understand the impact of apartheid. My favorite memorial was the Hector Pieterson Memorial. I enjoyed this museum because most of it contained first hand accounts as to what happened during the Soweto Uprising. While reading those first hand accounts I became very emotional because of the fact that these children were not armed and were not causing any harm, they just freaked out a couple of police officers who decided that it was okay to shoot them because of it. 

 

It just upsets me to see that that happened to people, and how people still until this day are affected by these events and all the events during apartheid. What also upsets me is that these kind of events happened in the past, happen in the present, and will probably happen in the future in the United States. I always find myself thinking about the article that we read once for Marita’s class about what American history tells us and what they don’t tell us. I think about that article because when I hear stories about what happened during apartheid in South Africa I become shocked that these horrible events and tragedies happened to the people. Then I think about why I am so shocked because these events happened in the US as well but I am shocked because I don’t know about those events, history never taught us about it.

On another note, there is only 18 days left here in South Africa and I’m freaking out because I feel like there is still so much that I want to do here! I’m not ready to leave this beautiful place yet so I have to make the most out of these next 18 days before flying home!