This is amazing. Simply amazing. thanks for sharing your adventure with us. WOW!!! It thought my trip back to Finland was exciting. Never had anything like this… I read most of your journal entries here but it will take me days to look at all 4000 pictures.

You are amazing….

Cordell

I mean, most modern tours of South Africa is focused on illustrating the wrongdoings of the white man, and focuses on how black people live and make the white guy non-existent, except for their wrongdoings. Sure that is a very integral part of our country, but what many people do not get to see is the modern, first world aspects of South Africa.

In all large corporate companies these days, when you walk in to the reception area, you will find coffee table books on the great South Africa. All of them – without exception, consists only of rural South Africa, villages and black people. But there is another part to SA… Feels like reversed racism. I just so wish we could find a balance were both are equal, not like now where the cards seem to have been reversed.

I too love South Africa and think it is one of the greatest countries in the world, and wished we are like 50 years in the future when hopefully a generation has passed and the hatred both ways subsided. But it has not, and because of that I just wish that foreign visitors would be exposed to the parts of South Africa that drove the country to be what it is today, and get a more balanced view. But that does not seem to be you, so this comment is then for your visitors to your site

I met people ranging from horribly racist (one man didn’t even consider women to be human telling me ‘read the bible, it says God made the human and then made a helper for the human’) to others who cared deeply for all South Africans regardless of color or gender.

I found South Africa to be a beautiful country not only because of the land…but also the wonderful people I met. It is also why the Sweni trail was the highlight of my trip…the people I met made it an adventure I will never forget.

Even in the 80′s I defended South Africa, saying the problems are more complex than the most of the world understands. Most people seemed to over-simplify the problems. But at the same time, it does not excuse nor diminish the atrocities that happened. We have a similar dark history here in the US with slavery and the American Indians and our battle against racism is ongoing. A few years ago I was thrown out of an African shop in Seattle because I was white ‘get out, the white man’s store is down the street.’ There still is a lot of anger and bitterness…but we are slowly making progress.

So although I appreciate your comment, I think my point of view is more educated and ground in experience than you may have realized. Sure, this trip was a vacation for my son and we did a lot of the tourist type activities…which I highly recommend to any visitor. We visited a squatter camp in Soweto (something very few South Africans have even done). And I’ll defend the apartheid museum 100%: although dark and disturbing, is part of the history…like it or not. Yes, things happened for a reason (same could be argued for the early American history) but that doesn’t make it right and it doesn’t excuse the poor choices made by our ancestors.

I love South Africa. It is filled with beauty and good people. But like America, it has some stains in the history books that can’t be ignored nor brushed aside. But that is part of the beauty: a country that has embraced change and is fighting for a better way. People who have been able to forgive and move on, others who have had to give up wealth to more fairly distribute resources. Over the past 20 years I’ve made 3 trips to South Africa and have seen many changes. But the one thing that hasn’t changed is that overall, most of the people I have met are kind, genuine, and want a country that treats all human beings in a fair and equal manner.

In my opinion this is extremely biased, and one cannot form an opinion on a country just by talking to the one side. Apartheid seemed evil (and yes in most cases it was), but there is much more to tell about the story. And that you will not get from the tour you were on. You need to understand both sides of the story to gain a better understanding behind why things happened, and why things are the way they are now.