Barry Levy's Blog, page 2
March 18, 2012
A Song for South Africans
A modern Australian song is used so much in jingles here, that no matter how irritating and annoying it has become, Australians easily sing the song in their heads - and sing it no matter where they are in the world. The song which almost everyone will know, goes... 'I've been to cities that never close down/ From New York to Rio and old London town/ But no matter how far or how wide I roam/ I still call Australia home...'
The reality is that the writer of that song, Peter Allen lived all his professional career - more than two decades of his mere 48-year life - outside Australia. My point: Substituting the word South Africa for Australia is the way I feel about my home country, South Africa.
After 27 years abroad I still call South Africa home... yes, still feel it pump and bloat, bubble and swagger in my heart; I have even recently published a book about it: Shades of Exodus (Interactive Publications): http://ipoz.biz/Titles/SOE.htm
For many South Africans, the feelings are totally the opposite of Peter Allen's song. They spend the rest of their lives trying to get the South African rhythm and tune out of their heads because they hate what their country has done to them, and they do not believe or want to believe in its future - no matter the promise of its new democracy, in fact many of them because of it and what it has brought in terms of black affirmative action and bias.
What many of these South African migrant folk have to realise and remove from their old 'Cold War -Apartheid' mentality is that because they don't like Zuma or his predecessor Mbeki or the policies of Black Economic Empowerment or whatever, is that this doesn't mean they have to hate their country. The government of the day, yes, maybe. Definitely. Hate them. But not the country!
That is our soul. A part of our flesh and blood, a part of the oxygen we breathed when we first burst into this world... And what a wonderful part of the world it is - so wonderful that our country, my country, once a pariah nation of the world, eventually conquered the biggest scourge of the planet, Apartheid.
Not only that, South Africa is known today as one of the most democratic countries in the world. People in the country, and some abroad these days even, freak out when they see the government tampering with that freedom through threats to manipulate the constitution. They also throw a cadenza when they hear of policy threats to freedom of speech in the country's unbelievably vibrant and overwhelmingly antagonistic media - and I am very proud of that.
To this Nobel Peace Prize winning accomplishment of ridding the world of apartheid and giving the planet a notable new democracy, I say cheers, many cheers, as in well bladdy done! This is the way to remember the old country - not ever to say goodbye to it!
In the end, what I miss above all else about South Africa, above everything physical and sense-related and artistically creative, is the greatest thing anyone can have from a country: the emotional anchor of home.
Shades Of Exodus
The reality is that the writer of that song, Peter Allen lived all his professional career - more than two decades of his mere 48-year life - outside Australia. My point: Substituting the word South Africa for Australia is the way I feel about my home country, South Africa.
After 27 years abroad I still call South Africa home... yes, still feel it pump and bloat, bubble and swagger in my heart; I have even recently published a book about it: Shades of Exodus (Interactive Publications): http://ipoz.biz/Titles/SOE.htm
For many South Africans, the feelings are totally the opposite of Peter Allen's song. They spend the rest of their lives trying to get the South African rhythm and tune out of their heads because they hate what their country has done to them, and they do not believe or want to believe in its future - no matter the promise of its new democracy, in fact many of them because of it and what it has brought in terms of black affirmative action and bias.
What many of these South African migrant folk have to realise and remove from their old 'Cold War -Apartheid' mentality is that because they don't like Zuma or his predecessor Mbeki or the policies of Black Economic Empowerment or whatever, is that this doesn't mean they have to hate their country. The government of the day, yes, maybe. Definitely. Hate them. But not the country!
That is our soul. A part of our flesh and blood, a part of the oxygen we breathed when we first burst into this world... And what a wonderful part of the world it is - so wonderful that our country, my country, once a pariah nation of the world, eventually conquered the biggest scourge of the planet, Apartheid.
Not only that, South Africa is known today as one of the most democratic countries in the world. People in the country, and some abroad these days even, freak out when they see the government tampering with that freedom through threats to manipulate the constitution. They also throw a cadenza when they hear of policy threats to freedom of speech in the country's unbelievably vibrant and overwhelmingly antagonistic media - and I am very proud of that.
To this Nobel Peace Prize winning accomplishment of ridding the world of apartheid and giving the planet a notable new democracy, I say cheers, many cheers, as in well bladdy done! This is the way to remember the old country - not ever to say goodbye to it!
In the end, what I miss above all else about South Africa, above everything physical and sense-related and artistically creative, is the greatest thing anyone can have from a country: the emotional anchor of home.
Shades Of Exodus
