South African natives share memories

It has been 10 years since the fall of the apartheid regime in
South Africa, but crime is still rampant, unemployment rates are
still high, and racism still exists.

But Lungi Sosibo, André Nel, Michael Hall and Nick
Desmond-Smith cannot stop saying how wonderful South Africa is.

They came to UCLA, ranging from nine months to 40 years ago, to
teach and to study. But the four UCLA faculty members have more
than just their origins in common; they all love their home
country.

“It’s the best place in the world if you look at it
from the perspective of beauty, people’s interactions … and
pace of life,” said Nel, a professor of medicine at UCLA who
joined the faculty in 1988. “In going to a place like South
Africa, I think you first find people who still live and enjoy
their lives as they are intended to be lived.”

Nel came to live in the United States on two separate occasions,
the first of which was between 1983 and 1985 to do his
post-doctorate work at the Medical University of South
Carolina.

“I was initially surprised by how provincial and closed
that society was compared to South Africa,” Nel said.
“South Africa, where I lived in 1983, was a very fast-moving
society that was facing many different issues.”

In 1983 South Africa was still in the midst of the turmoil and
strife caused by apartheid and its policies of separate
development.

Blacks and whites were not allowed to live in the same
communities, and blacks were restricted to the areas they could
work and be in.

Though a white member of the African society, Nel said his ideas
had been those of the minority because he opposed the precepts of
apartheid.

He grew up speaking out against apartheid and, in his job
practicing medicine at a hospital, he worked to increase access for
blacks to facilities designated for white people.

The hospital was divided between the east wing, for white
patients, and the west, for blacks only.

The number of black patients always seemed to outnumber the
whites, so the west wing was typically overflowing with patients,
while the east would often have extra room.

“That’s one of the areas where there would be heated
debates between myself and the hospital administration,” Nel
said. “When there were not enough beds, there were always
beds in the white wards and that made my blood boil.”

Professor Hall, who works for the Department of Ophthalmology,
grew up with a much different background than Nel, and he said he
didn’t realize much of the troubles going on around him in
South Africa.

Hall originally came to the United States between 1958 and 1961,
and then again in 1963 to join the UCLA faculty.

He said he grew up in a sheltered community and didn’t
realize until later the wrongs caused by apartheid.

“We didn’t know any different; we never lived in any
system other than apartheid,” Hall said. “When I left
and came to America, I began to see what democracy was. People
could live together without racial problems and that the
suppression was not necessary or desirable or needed.”

Hall said when he first arrived he faced a lot of hate from
Americans. As a white South African, people automatically assumed
he was part of the regime actively oppressing blacks.

“When I came here, every so often African American
students and white students would attack me verbally,” Hall
said. “Sometimes it was so bad, so pointed, that we would say
we were from England so we wouldn’t have to go through the
attacks.”

In the 1980s Hall participated as a passive protester in some of
the UCLA demonstrations for divestment of University of California
funds from South Africa because he said his views had changed such
that he wanted to join the movement to end apartheid.

Now, Hall travels back to South Africa as often as he is able,
though he says it is still dangerous.

“It’s definitely getting better, but it’s
still very bad,” he said. “It’s a fairly small
country, so it can’t provide jobs for 43 million people, so
what can they do? They turn to crime.”

Desmond-Smith, a staff research associate in the Department of
Ophthalmology, came to the United States nine months ago. He said
even with the crime, he feels safe in South Africa, perhaps even
more so since the fall of apartheid.

“I take steps to secure my property, but I am not
restricted in my movements because of safety,” Desmond-Smith
said.

In fact, he misses the excitement and the lifestyle he had in
South Africa. He said Los Angeles does not have the social life he
enjoyed.

“It was such a big city, and it was great being in such a
big city,” Desmond-Smith said. “I miss the country a
lot. … I’ll probably go back after two or three
years.”

Sosibo, a lecturer at UCLA in Zulu and South African cinema and
literature, grew up very much aware of the atrocities caused by
apartheid, but she, too, cannot wait to go back.

She came to the United States in 1994, after the first free
elections in which Nelson Mandela, the leader of the African
National Congress, was elected president.

But Sosibo did not manage to leave the country unscathed. On
March 21 of that year, members of the Inkatha Freedom Party, a
pro-apartheid group, burned her house to the ground.

“They burned it down; everything, the house and its
contents,” Sosibo said. “We had to run for our
lives.”

She said it was not likely that she was targeted specifically,
though she was a teacher and was politically active. The police
never came to the scene to investigate and the perpetrators were
never brought to justice.

When she was younger, Sosibo said she faced obstacles both
because she was black and female.

“In terms of accessibility and choices, my choices were
limited,” Sosibo said. “There was an assumption that we
were not going to succeed. … Our teacher always made it clear to
us that we were not going to make it, so when we didn’t
succeed it was a self-fulfilling prophecy.”

Sosibo came to United States on a Fulbright Scholarship in 1994
to study at the University of Illinois. She said it wasn’t
until she came to the United States that she began to realize her
potential for success.

Sosibo has plans to return to South Africa this summer as an
assistant professor at the University of the Western Cape. Someday,
she would like to work in the Ministry of Education to improve its
education system with her knowledge and experiences in the United
States.

But the reason Sosibo is most excited is because she gets to
return home.

“Not even a single day have I said that America is home to
me,” she said. “I have always felt that South Africa is
my only home.”

Sosibo considers South Africa her home because much of her
family lives there and it is the place where she grew up. But even
more so because it is the place that she loves.

“I miss the people,” Sosibo said. “I miss the
genuineness of the people. I miss the smile of the black person. I
miss everything.”

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