That translates to "Hello everybody, how are you?" in isiXhosa, which is one of South Africa's ELEVEN official languages. isiXhosa is a tribal language dependent on the clicking sound of your tongue. There are three different click sounds in the language. Whenever you see an 'x' it translates to side click of your tongue, a 'g' is a palette click of your tongue, and the 'q' is a frontal click with your lips. I took a lot of notes.
It's been a very cultural day for us here in Port Elizabeth. After our fascinating lecture on the basics of the isiXhosa language, we took a cultural tour of our little town, led by a very retired teacher names Mike who told us all about the history of the area. Mike led us around to beaches, sculptures, and a beautiful park over looking Nelson Mandela Bay filled with different public art work.
Two of the most powerful things that we saw on the tour were the public art pieces that spoke about Apartheid. The first one we saw was along a main stairway in Port Elizabeth, blanketing the entire wall. At the bottom of the staircase was a metal sculpture of a book with blowing pages. The idea of the sculpture was that the pages were blowing out of the book and along the wall showing the injustices and destruction caused by Apartheid. Each page showed a different scene whether it was a protest, a police vehicle, or a quote from Nelson Mandela. One in particular scene showed "necklacing" something that often happened in the townships when informers were caught. It's involved putting a tire around someone's neck and lighting it on fire. It was extremely powerful to see such a thing immortalized in sculpture.
One of the most uplifting though was a sculpture dedicated to the first democratic elections held after Apartheid. At the center of the park we visited there is a long wire sculpture encircling the base of a South African flag. The wire sculpture shows people of all cultures standing in line, isiXhosa, Muslim, old, young, all creating an enormous line leading up to a triumphant metal sculpture of Nelson Mandela with his hand in the air and the words "Nelson Mandela Changed the World" emblazoned into the metal. Mike told us that they had to keep polls open for two days just to handle the enormous influx of people who turned out to vote on that historic day.
Something that I personally love about Port Elizabeth is their devotion to the memory of Nelson Mandela. I've never seen a town so dedicated to one man. It's beautiful. We ended the day with a visit to Aya's Ceramic Studio in one of the townships in PE. A woman there makes pottery and sells it out of her house. Each piece is completely unique. She prides herself in that.
But now we have to head home and pack for the weekend! We'll be on the road tomorrow! Updates to come!
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