#CapetownIsRacist

I indulged a guilty pleasure last night, by lazily hopping onto the twitter trend #CapeTownIsRacist. It was two guilty pleasures actually - one is talking about race, and the other is getting into an online barney. Doing either of these is almost always a waste of time, doing both together is a always certainly a painful waste of time.

I don't know how it started (I don't know how to go to the beginning of a twitter-trend, can someone young and hip tell me? #25yearsOLDnow). Times Live claims it was Lindiwe Suttle who tweeted "No matter how famous/rich you are, you're still a 2nd class citizen if you're Black in Cape Town. @helenzille when's the change you spoke about happening". Ms. Zille, of course, dismissed this as a baseless assertion, as did her subjects. Enough people tweeted #CapeTownIsRacist, though, to make it the number-one trending hash-tag yesterday - either denying or affirming, or being very conspicuously disinterested in the whole thing.

My plan for this post was to carry out a sort of proof-by-humiliation, where I enumerate the countless small indignities I have encountered in Cape Town. Things like the bill folder going to the white side of the table, or the security guard who follows you if you are brown and in a retail store, or the time I was told that I am not gay enough to be admitted into a gay bar in Greenpoint. I was even going to recount the time I was accused of stealing bubble gum! (truthfully though, this last incident happened in another city). This is not a great strategy though, I risk being labelled a #ProfessionalBlack by my #ProfessionallyRaceBlindLiberal compatriots.

And too much is required of me: Not only do I have to endure indignity, I also have to chew it up into b(wh)ite-sized pieces for you to understand. I understand it just fine.

I remembered a very painful email exchange with a (then) close friend who proudly identifies as an "old-school liberal". It was about his hilarious (to him, and his other friends) impression of the Cape-Coloured. They way it goes, is to say "jou ma se poes" in the most nasal white-boy-sounding-coloured accent you can muster. I spent many precious words and minutes trying to explain the role of his white privilege in this ugly caricature of a diverse group of people, trying to explain that the fact that he's one-eighth coloured does not exonerate him when he is so very apparently white, trying to explain that his view of coloured people was frighteningly narrow. He was proudly non-racist, of course, so you can imagine how long it took for the explanation to take.


But Explaining over, and over, and over is its own kind of torture.

I don't think the #CapeTownIsRacist tag will achieve much. You cannot say anything in 120 characters - you can only shout a little. Clearly, the intended audience of these shouts cannot, or will not hear. (Now trending: #CapeTownIsAwesome).  At least, though, those of us for whom #CapeTownIsRacist resonates with a dull pain we have yet to articulate will know that we are not each imagining things.

Birthday ramble

I am a quarter of a century old. Yesterday I pulled out a lone nose hair poking out my left nostril. My newest preoccupation is my 8-month belly - an inheritance from my otherwise skinny dad, and beer I suppose. His hair only started running away in his 50s - no silver yet.  My mom still has a full head of jet-black hair, dread-locked into a crown. They are both hypertensive, but neither diabetic. My grandma would take insulin shots. Actually, I am not sure that they don't dye their hair. They are sneaky. Both of them wear glasses, and my younger sister does as well now. She is 21.

Are my nipples lower? What is this fold of skin when I bend to the side in the shower? I run now; twice a week. 3 miles, 30 minutes. I tried to cut carbs out last week - had salad for supper two nights in a row. Life seems too short to eat salad. I will switch from beer and to that turpentine-vodka they serve at No Parking. Right now I am having rice and beans because that is what is in my fridge.

My little sister is graduating from UCT today. I am extremely proud of her. I stayed at her apartment when I visited home. Judging by the contents of her fridge, she is more of a grown up than I will be for a while. Fridges dont lie.  She is also my friend. (When did that happen I wonder? Who knows.)

I guess it being christmas and all, I should reflect or whatever. I don't want to too much, I don't want to jinx things. I am on a winning streak that began on 1 Jan 2007 a little after midnight, after some heavy drinking, when I told my friend Iain that I am gay. He listened and bought me lots of chicken. Real friends buy you chicken (or Tofu or whatever) and they listen. And they hang around. Friends have helped me to gain sanity and to grow.

I am going to work tomorrow, in an organization that helps people all over the world to realize their human rights. Particularly, I'm working in the section that helps people who are gay or lesbian or transgendered.  People who may or may not be recognized as worthy of dignity by their own family members. Some who may not be deemed worthy of their own lives.

I have met some people, this year, who work "on the ground" in spaces like that. They do amazing things. Despite. Gay people always seem to do amazing things, Despite.

Anyways, I am excited to go to work tomorrow, and about the next quarter-century. Maybe over the next two months, I will do one thing that will make one person's life a little easier in a small way. Who knows? It is exciting.

Yours,
Tata Keletso

Things that I am thankful for

(in no particular order)

• living in a strange city with strange people
• no parking bar
• a scholarship
• ken "kennedy" nadolski's drunk voice message from last wednesday
• josephine karianjahi's jokes
• pedro "slut" carneiro's sassy sex column-like advice 
• daniel lyons's 'tude
• my family's ability to laugh at anything
• my research supervisor's openness
• facebook
• the ability to go to (almost) any country for $2.25
• the diaspora (you know who you are) for bringing home here
• people who hold the door open or say thanks when you do, help people with strollers, give up seats for elderly people, or in some other small way make this crazy city more livable for other people.
• the 24-hour $3.50 falafel guy on 168th and Fort Washington