January 11, 2007

Thursday, January 11, 2007

By Angela Ludema

Today was yet another wonderful day. We started out with our re-scheduled appointment to Parliament only to find that we again were not in the books. So things often go around here. So we made due and received a shortened version of the tour. Construction going on in the building, which also prevented us from seeing some of the common sites in the Parliament building. But while we were there, we were able to sit in the Old Assembly chamber where all the Apartheid laws were pasted under the Nationalist party regime. I don’t know if playing with the microphones was allowed but a few decided to try it out. ?

Following our tour of Parliament we headed over to the Institute for Justice and Reconciliation (IJR) arriving promptly on “African time” (30 minutes late). Here we sat in a conference room where we received a quick introduction by Charles Villevalencia, Executive Director of IJR and former Chief Researcher for the TRC (important guy we found out later). Following his intro, our guides Fannie Du Toit and Marian spoke to us about the IJR and the continued struggle for reconciliation we all face. The country of South Africa chose a revolutionary way to move forward from the hurtful past of the Apartheid through the Truth and Reconciliation Commission and now through the continued work of the IJR.

Afterwards, we all stopped for lunch at the amazing elementary school where Mark will probably be attending when the Kuperus-Heun family moves to Cape Town in the next couple years.

Finally, we made it Boulders beach, which has just recently been added as a part of the Table Mountain National Park. Here we encountered tons of penguins, which have made this beach their home. We were supposed to remain 2 meters away from them but that didn’t stop Jeremy when he touched one while it was cleaning its feathers. One life goal to check off the list. ? We spent the rest of the afternoon at the beach sun bathing in the 30°C (86°F) weather and swimming in the 22°C (72°F) water. A couple of us joined some kids in jumping off a 20 foot rock into the water. We left the beach around 5:30 to return to the seminary for dinner and presentations.

We love and miss you all.

~Angela

 

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