walking

I walked to work on Friday with a strange feeling. well, I do walk to work every day, but that day, THAT day was different. just hearing about the passing of Nelson Mandela I was compellingly aware of the act of walking, and its cultural meanings and connotations in South Africa. of course, I could not not think of Mandela’s biography ‘Long Walk to Freedom’ (1994). And the movie ‘Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom’ directed by Justin Chadwick that premiered on September 7 at the 2013 Toronto International Film Festival, and was released on November 29, just a few days before his passing. the movie became an instant success in South Africa, and now… well, I guess it will gain even more popularity. which, again I guess, is a good thing, because the message of the life of this man is one worth spreading.

walking on street in South Africa, especially in Pretoria where I happened to live, is a status symbol. or rather a lack of it. people with money (usually) don’t walk, they go by car. white people usually don’t walk. they have cars. walking on street in South Africa, especially at certain areas, is considered dangerous, some places even life hazard. that has however only a little to do with the colour of your skin; it is more a question of hopelessness of the people living (can you actually call that living?) in those areas. as a white woman walking on street you are definitely in a more vulnerable position than your fellow-walkers. because you’re visible, and because you’re considered to carry objects of value with you. even though I avoid walking on street after dark, I take it as a statement to walk every day to the office and back. around 6 a.m. I am usually the only white person on the street. while passing by people smile at and greet each other. I do smile and greet them too. I wouldn’t deny that I get strange looks every now and then, but maybe it’s just because i DO get strange looks all the time, more or less everywhere I go. maybe it’s because people aren’t used to white people walking on street, especially not at areas where well off people live. of course, there are poor neigbourhoods where whites walk, beg, live from scratch and sleep on street. for me, as a clearly privileged person, it is also (maybe in my mind only) a political statement. a walking reminder that in nowaday’s Africa, at least on paper, alle people are equal.

as I am writing this, thousands of people of all colours are walking towards the FNB Stadium in Johannesburg – Africa’s largest stadium that can accommodate 94,736 people – where the memorial ceremony for Nelson Mandela will take place. they walk together, next to each other, side by side, to honour the legacy of the first South African democratic president. today, after a period of warm days with occassional storms in the evening, the weather is cold and it has been raining since early in the morning. in this cold rainy weather people are standing at the FNB stadium, some of them wrapped in South African flags or ANC flags, stamp their feet, dance and sing. “Nelson Mandela ga go ya tshwanang le ena (Nelson Mandela there is no one like him),” they sing. “Nelson Mandela my president”, they sing. the formal ceremony will start at 11 o’clock local time, but people were gathering there since 5, 6 in the morning. to be able to be there. to mourn, to show respects, to celebrate, to share. even it might (well, I know it DOES) sound like a terrible cliché, it really feels as if the whole country was mourning. Mandela is not the only one who has made the change possible, we should never forget the thousands of ANC members, anti-Apartheid fighters of all colours who devoted (and sacrificed) their lives to the struggle. but it is Mandela who embodied this fight for humanity. “Comrades and fellow South Africans, I greet you all in the name of peace, democracy and freedom,” said Mandela on 11 February 1990 when he has been released from prison after 27 years. “I stand here before you not as a prophet, but as a humble servant of you the people.”

“We have waited too long for our freedom,” he said that day in his first public speech. South Africans have indeed figuratively and literally walked a long way to freedom. hopefully it wasn’t too long, because there is still a long way to go. but every single step counts when it is taken in the right direction. Mahatma Gandhi said: “If we could change ourselves, the tendencies in the world would also change. As a man changes his own nature, so does the attitude of the world change towards him. … We need not wait to see what others do.” a way to often mistakenly shortened in the bumper-sticker-ish “Be the change you wish to see in the world.” but that is basically what Mandela’s legacy is about. every change begins at personal level. if we all walk together towards peace, and make the every step count, it CAN be reached.

props

For a long time I thought that you are supposed to practice a yoga posture untill you get there. With my quite stiff body and bulging muscles that stood in the way I was quite struggling, rolling to the side, falling out of postures, … I thought that using towels or other props to help you in the posture was for sissies, like real yogis don’t do props. Then, during the yoga teacher training, I discovered the charm of blocks. Not that I haven’t seen or used them before, but it was only then when I realized the importance of props in yoga, and in real life. Because sometimes, sometimes we simply need something to help us to get where we need to be. Only then we are in a correct allignment and can work the posture, or life for that matter, further. Otherwise you will stay cramped where you are, unable to move forward.

In a yoga class, we sometimes reach for a block, bolster or strap when we feel we need extra support, and sometimes and the teacher has to come to us, lay a hand on our shoulder cramped with stubborn concentration and hand us a prop. Or they lay a hand on our shoulder and tell us: “And now try it without the prop.” LIfe works exactly the same way. When we get stuck, usually life offers us a prop to move forward. And we can be stubborn and refuse it, or thankfully accept it. Using a prop or not, it is always us who have to make the choice. Two weeks ago I was visiting my dear friend in Johannesburg. When I was leaving back to Pretoria on Monday morning, she placed a book in front of me. “I want to give you something to read,” she said. “It is my mother’s book and you have to take good care of it and give it back after you’re finished. But I want you to read that, and work with it.!” I thanked her, promised I will as I was told and took a look at the cover. It was ‘One Day My Soul Just Opened Up: 40 Days and 40 Nights Toward Spiritual Strength and Personal Growth’ by Iyanla Vanzant. I read the foreword quickly and realized that this is my next prop. “Thank you,” I said once again and this time it came from deep in my heart, “this is exactly what I need right now.”

Props aren’t there to be used forever, they are like crutches we need to walk with untill our broken leg, or sprained ankle in my case, heals. They get us where we need to be, and then we have to walk on our own again. I read religiously in this book every morning and every evening, I write down important things I need to remember. Every day I write an affirmation from the book on my forearm, so that I would be reminded of it in case my monkey mind slips. Sometimes I need a few days to digest one “book-day”, I read it over and over untill I get it, and then the next morning I move on to another day. When I’m finished with the book, I’ll give it back to my friend as I promised. I wil thank her for being my yoga teacher, and her mother for being her yoga teacher. I might return to it in times of need (if my soul gets stiff for a while), but I sincerely hope that it will help me to get where I need to be.