Carl Kurz, BNB's International Director and founder, has just visited the Diepsloot Youth Cycles Project, both a youth training center and a full service bicycle shop. Bikes Not Bombs sent bikes, tools, and trainers Alex Twombly and Omar Bhimji to establish this project in 2005. Here, Carl writes reflections from his visit, which included his attendance at a ceremony for 30 young people graduating from the Earn-A-Bike class, where the youth receive ownership of the bikes they have rebuilt with their own hands through the training course. (Look for more news soon as Carl moves on to Tanzania to visit another of BNB's partners!)

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September 20, 2008

I'm back at the hotel 11:30pm after an incredible day of activities and issues. The big day for the Diepsloot Youth Cycles project was a success, many important persons from the Diepsloot community attended the Earn-A-Bike graduation party. We got there at 10am and by 11am the program started in earnest. The 30 youth graduates, mostly under 13 years old, sat to listen to speeches for nearly 4 hours, I was awed at how patient they were. There was a tin plate before each person as we all sat under tents or tarps that made shade with the promise of bikes for the kids and a meal for everyone. It was a challenge to speak to such a crowd because of the great disparities of age and understanding. A theatre group presented a few hilarious skits and two groups of youth were pitted in a competition as to who could first overhaul a headset fastest. Rap artists rapped and danced, DJ's pumped pop US music and the speeches continued. At the end the graduation ceremony gave away a bike and a helmet to each of the youth and they paraded by with their bikes, an ocean of black beaming faces with BNB blue t-shirts and the food was completely awesome.

Of great importance and hanging like a huge griffin over the blue skys above Diepsloot and all of South Africa is today's resignation of President Mbeke. The speaker of their parliament is a woman, the next in line of power, the first woman ever appointed as head of this immensely powerful country. His recall was not exactly welcomed by all, even though a majority of people wish for a change to Zuma as the new leader of the ANC and in due time to take over the presidency, most were in shock that their president was actually recalled and was no longer the leader of their country in such an abrupt move. If I can understand correctly what I'm hearing, many people feel that Zuma is not a leader who is genuinely in control with an agenda that people understand. He has had ties to Coalition of South African Trade Unions (COSATU ) and the South African Communist Party which is actually one political group inside the African Natioanl Congress (ANC) the ruling SA political party. But it is very hard to say how people think his eventual coming to power will really change things...

It is obvious that the community is involved to a big degree at the bike project. Youth are taking classes and bikes were flowing, however there was a lack of bikes available for sale to adults. The BNB container of bike aid we sent in July will hopefully come while I'm still here this week, it's been in the country a long time and the situation with customs is extremely problematic and some would say corrupt.

I'm just still only on African soil for 24 hours, overwhelmed by the comparison between the wealth that is ostentatiously deployed, in your face seething with capital and security amidst the dry grasses, stunted trees and blooming flowers of spring time, boulevards of swarming cars all driving on the left side of the road. Only a few miles away your jaw drops and the likes of poverty and dense slum conditions I've seen in Haiti and Nicaragua come to full light. The density of the throbbing current of human mass all walking and moving, laughing talking hurrying, standing in the dust laden edges of the sides of the streets of Diepsloot is truly intense. Every space along the edge of a street is a market stall but further inside is a labyrinth of wood and tin shacks housing 200,000 people in very difficult conditions, latrine outhouses are set up along the roadway and in strategic spots by the government and they aren't much smaller than some of the housing shacks themselves. With only one faucet of water for many families at a time, this Saturday is an eye opener for me. Out of the thousands and thousands of people mixed together in these conditions I only saw 4 other white people and none of them lived in Diepsloot, they were attending the bike graduation event. A bit different than the demographics on the airplane that I arrived in from Amsterdam; of the 400 people on board I couldn't even count 15 blacks. The disparity is intense and although South Africa's transition to Democratic Rule, meaning the ANC was allowed to win what was rightfully theirs at the voting booth, happened without the bloodshed that would have destroyed the entire country, it's not comforting to realize that, as more than a few have said, although De Klerk and the whites invented apartheid, the ANC has been left to implement it. I don't think it's as bad as that nor could I be that cynical but the black majority has definitely still not realized a significant rise in material upliftment, an issue that well might create revolt in the near future if Zuma's new presidency doesn't bring tangible change. This takes time to rebuild a country.


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September 22, 2008

Its one insane day in South Africa and the world.

Today I traveled to an expensive shopping mall and amidst a conglomeration of eateries I get to meet an amazing woman who is a board member of the Deipsloot Youth Bicycle Project. Her name is Nonhle Chamane. She has been on the board for little more than 6 months and had only recently really gleaned what the project's potential impact can be in Diepsloot and how its connections to international non-profits developed. She did not want to be pushy in joining and was basically waiting to be informed and handed more concrete tasks. It takes time to develop trust in these circumstances and Mzolisi, the project manager that raised the project from the dead, seems to be letting go more, and he approached her at the graduation to express his intention to including her more. Seeing the graduation of the Earn-A-Bike students and seeing that it was a viable path to youth empowerment and even economic development opportunities has rekindled her energy to stay involved and bring more resources to bear. She has many contacts in the business and media world, her background is in communications and marketing. At 36 years of age she has a 15 year old daughter and a sister who died from AIDs. She says we will have some outreach materials in less than a month and at the board meeting we will discuss the way forward for making sure the bike shop can succeed with more help from South African government and SA civil society.

Her understanding of South African culture(s), societal customs, current underpinnings of conflicts with immigrants, her knowledge of languages and history was fascinating. I would like to spend weeks asking her questions. I find myself exhilarated again by meeting yet another of the committed youth that are shaping world history. To think South Africa's democracy is only 18 years old and she like many of the other youth I am meeting, came of age during and since this world-shaking transformation. I am interested in her perspective as a South African woman, as a youth turned adult, (turning 36 means she is no longer considered a youth - which in South Africa officially includes people up to age of 35, to keep open opportunities for schooling and programs that young people lost because of apartheid and for many because of their fight against apartheid). She has a great ability to listen and also to organize. Her current concept is to hold conferences wherein community leaders and the general public would gather to learn to develop entrepreneurial skills and share available resources in current South African society. The backdrop to this is the coming World Cup championships in 2010 and the myriad of tasks and opportunities for employment that this major undertaking will mean for South Africans. “Our people, our culture is not known for being entrepreneurs...” she explains, excluding the white petite bourgousie and the millionaire capitalists in her sweeping statement. She is full of energy and obviously it is directed at uplifting and empowering blacks and she is very capable and willing to step out of her middle class background to address issues confronting the massive sector of society held back by poverty.

Tonight we went back to Diepsloot and met Chris Bondo, a youth activist for the ANC who has lived all his life in Diepsloot and now has 4 children and a small decent house make of bricks and a nice tile floor, running water and electricity. He also has two cars and a few electro domestics like a TV, washing machine and a modest stereo system. His home is part of a very new neighborhood - emotionally uplifting for me in that comparing it to the squatter shanty housing and government placed latrines (one per who knows how many families), living w/o running water over dirt floors w/o electricity just blocks away..., whew its a great sign of progress. Yes, even if the two cars thing rubs me the wrong way.

In a profound moment of national shock we watched president Mbeke make his resignation speech amidst political turmoil and in-fighting at the highest level of the ANC. Much discussion and visits from friends went on through the evening, his (I'm guessing) 3 year old son fell asleep on my lap and the children in the room were both amazingly courteous and respectful to adults with salutations and looking one in the eye and yet at the same time full of mischief and fun. TV Commentators went on and on about the implications ...

Chris has traveled to many parts of Africa as a leader of the ANC working with youth, and he is passionate about the role youth have to play in retaining and defending democracy. And he is a walking history of the working class struggle of South African youth against apartheid and the current transformation to democracy. He like many around him is a Zuma supporter, but also like many he is shocked and not supportive of the move to have Mbeki step down in this fashion.

Tonight in my hotel room the paper business section headlines reads, “The United Socialist States of America,” in mockery of course, and I sigh resignedly... if only it were true and we were going to get health care and sustainable energy development rather than a bail out of the richest cronies of interlocking corporate executives and their bankrupt empire of greed and corruption.


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Sept 22, 2008

Whew South Africa is intense. If I could stay 2 months it would be truly amazing. It's much like that moment in Nicaragua where the lingering status of revolutionary power and revolutionary social dynamics was the background to the installation of its democracy and the redistribution of power, wealth empowerment and the potential to contribute is awesome. Only South Africa has wealth Nicaragua could never even dream existed.

-Carl

This Sunday, June 15th from 10:30 to 4:00PM, Bikes Not Bombs volunteers will load a 40' shipping container full of bicycle aid for the Diepsloot, South Africa "Youth Cycles Project."

We start at 10:30 am and work until we finish, which we expect to be around 4:00pm. We'll take a break around 1pm for a pizza lunch (provided) and a short talk about the project. Volunteers can come for any part of this time that works for you. Experience not required.

The Diepsloot project was started in May of 2006 through a collaboration between Bikes Not Bombs and the Global Community Initiatives along with organized youth of Diepsloot. The project has two programmatic elements: 1) a small scale bicycle shop business and 2) an Earn-A-Bike youth program. Both of these programs are housed in Diepsloot, and run chiefly by youth who live in the South African settlement, a 200,000 person township that is considered to be a part of Johannesberg.

The Bike Shop and the Earn-A-Bike program, based on the Bikes Not Bombs model, are currently supporting the wages of 5 individuals by selling used and new bicycles, providing parts and repair services to the local community and running the not-for-profit Earn-A-Bike program for youth through foundation grants. More than 300 bicycles have been distributed via the Earn-A-Bike program in Diepsloot and 40 more individuals will be graduating in August of this year.

DIRECTIONS: This event does NOT happen at Bikes Not Bombs. We will be loading from a big parking lot at 179 Boylston St., Jamaica Plain, 2 blocks from the StonyBrook T stop on the Orange Line. Coming from the NEW BNB at 284 Amory Street, turn right on Amory (which puts you travelling away from the Green St T stop, towards the StoneyBrook T stop). Turn right on Boylston Street (where the StoneyBrook T stop is on your left) and then turn right into a large parking lot which is part of the Brewery Complex. You'll see our 40 ft. shipping container parked in this lot, just off the street.

We need volunteers to help us load up close to 500 donated bicycles with many spare parts, going to the City Cycle project in Diepsloot South Africa. Bikes Not Bombs was asked to set up this project in partnership with Global Community Initiatives South Africa, and we first hit the ground in January 2005 with a container of donated bikes and Alex Twombly as trainer. Omar Bhimji arrived months later to set up Earn-A-Bike youth programs modeled on BNB's classes in Boston. The City Cycle shop provides jobs, affordable transportation, and quality youth programs in Diepsloot, one of the poorest neighborhoods of South Africa, hit hard by the AIDS crisis.

In 2007, Mzosli Mbikwana (a Board member of the project since inception) has replaced Collins Sekele as the project manager. In anticipation of this shipment of bikes, Mzosli writes that they have worked through the previous two shipments of bikes from BNB, and have supplemented these by purchasing some new bikes from China and assembling them for sale. He says that the used bikes from the US sell much better than the new bike from China because people recognize that the used bikes are higher quality and stronger, and the new bikes are costly to the shop because they often have broken parts within the first month which is covered by the City Cycle warranty. Mzosli also writes that the Earn-A-Bike youth programs are on hold, and will resume immediately once they receive our shipment which will supply the bikes for youth to rebuild in the class.

Come for whatever part of this time works for you - RSVP helpful but not necessary. We'll take a break around 1pm for lunch (pizza provided) and a talk about the project.

DIRECTIONS
This event does NOT happen at Bikes Not Bombs. We will be loading from a big parking lot at 179 Boylston St., Jamaica Plain, 2 blocks from the StonyBrook T stop on the Orange Line. Coming from the NEW BNB at 284 Amory Street, turn right on Amory (which puts you travelling away from the Green St T stop, towards the StoneyBrook T stop). Turn right on Boylston Street (where the StoneyBrook T stop is on your left) and then turn right into a large parking lot which is part of the Brewery Complex. You'll see our 40 ft. shipping container parked in this lot, just off the street.