Old Takkies Indaba

Epistemology.com:
petty
1393, “small,” from O.Fr. petit “small” (see petit). In Eng., not originally disparaging (cf. petty cash, 1834, petty officer, 1577). Meaning “of small importance” is recorded from 1523; that of “small-minded” is from 1581.

Wikipedia:
Hence, the idea behind apartheid was more one of political separation, later known as “grand apartheid,” than segregation, later known as “petty apartheid.”

I admit, I didn’t know. I don’t have any massive, open, mind expanding moment to look back on, when I first realised that the world was not fair, and that whether people were equal or not didn’t matter to those with the stick.

Clearly, I went through childhood and youth with either a wee pair of blinkers, or a broken memory writer. Or perhaps, when you’re young and innocent and privileged, you simply don’t notice what other people can and can’t do.

When I look around now though, there are all those innocuous little signs still hanging about; signs that provide us with hints, memories, scents, of… something. I’m not talking about the inequalities that still haven’t worked themselves out. But rather, physical things that remind us of times and injustices that I don’t remember, things that don’t quite seem comprehensible now.

The old Kensington Post Office, where Roberts Avenue is introduced to Lancaster Drive by Milner Cresent, used to have two doors. I always wondered about that.

I did some work at a company in the Joburg CBD, about three years back. The building had two sets of loos, right next to each other, on the ground floor. It’s just strange, you know.

About 10 years ago, I was in Orkney on a rowing camp, and a mate and I went into town to buy some things. There was a show in the parking lot of the SPAR. There was a mobile stage, and red bunting forming a large square in front of it. Inside the square, white. Outside, not white. In everybody’s defence, I didn’t see anybody enforcing this separation. Maybe that made it worse.

It’s a little bizarre to write this now, and think about how much it was a different world. And not simply different, but so different that it’s something that I can’t even fully understand.

And yet, it’s a situation that exists all over the world, even now. Be it as simple a thing as dress codes at a bar, or something as complex as where borders lie between countries, apartheid exists. And it’s petty. It uses different names, but the goal is the same – this is our spot, it’s only for people like us, and the rest of you can sod off.

The question is, can South Africa provide a model for the world on how to get past this? Can we, as the first country to go through and come out of state level segregation without major bloodshed, become a shining light, a beacon to those people in the world who are just people, who just want to live day to day, without harm or hatred, and don’t mind that others do the same?

I think we can. I think we have to.