Townships: The Past is Not Past

               On our last day in Cape Town, we traveled to the memorial of Amy Biehl, the young white Fulbright student who in 1993 was killed by an angry mob as she was dropping off friends in Gugulethu the day before she was headed back to California. The violence occurred in the turbulent moment when apartheid was just ending.
              As we were gathered and reviewing what we knew from our research and the book we read, Mother to Mother by Sindiwe Magona, two men were watching us from an idling car. I went over to talk to them. Would it be okay if we took a picture with your group, they asked when I approached. I said, Probably—but first you have to tell why you want this, and I want you to be honest about it.
              In the four years since they had moved from the Eastern Cape, in all that time, they had never seen white people in Gugulethu before. They wanted a picture to mark the occasion, but perhaps the picture was a pretext to talk with us and find out what we were up to.
              We took the picture and launched an exchange of welcome and gratitude and questions.
              Amy Biehl was killed more than three decades ago. Apartheid ended more than three decades ago. But these men taught us so clearly the past is not past.

               The night before, the mamas held a braai for their guests and the Isilimela and Roosevelt teachers. Our students gathered all the adults in the yard and sang for us—“Lean on Me,” “Stimela,” and “Yahkalipi koko”; they were leaping and jumping in excitement while the Isilimela teachers were shouting at each other in surprise and joy, look at what the Americans are doing, our music, in IsiXhosa, singing with the students, all of us joined together.