I have been waiting for things to happen / Adventure Withdrawal

(A blog reflecting on Botswana and the obligation to be involved with bizzare things that was left behind in my computer when I traveled to meet up with my folks)

Gaborone was surprising in a bland sort of fashion. Our outdated guide books lead us to expect a sprawling, overpopulated, dirty, underdeveloped and poorly planned urban mess. Gaborone was none of these things. However, Gaborone was neither invigorating nor vibrant nor exotic. It gave me nothing to say. Repeatedly, I recognized Middle America and the monotone of commercial culture. Gabs felt more African than Windhoek because it was filled with black people. I like to see local permanent residents benefiting from the natural wealth of their country. Several people said, "There is no poor part of town;" No township. No place where conspicuously or traditionally African life exists or makes noise.

I feel obligated, in this blog, to present experiences that are largely unavailable to a western audience, experiences that demonstrate how risky or comical or mind boggling this trip can be. But for about one week in Gaborone I simply enjoyed the company of our amicable host and his friendly neighbors. I was frustrated in my attempts to interview several different people and I spent evenings at franchised establishments as flavorless as TGI Fridays or as fake and full of posers as a shopping center's upmarket bar. That was fine and well because the company and conversation were sufficiently vibrant and engaging; but sometimes, it doesn't feel right to poach from my conversations with friends or my knowledge of their own strongest stories for the enrichment of these more public writings.

The main reason we loitered in Gabs for nearly a week was the Ditshwanelo Human Rights Film Festival. Ditshwanelo is the Botswana Centre for Human Rights and this is the sixth year they have held their festival. Unfortunately, it does not seem to have been gathering momentum. Nowhere in any of the city's major malls, on its university campus or in its bars did I once see a poster, a pamphlet or other promotional material. This might account for the dismally small audience. On each of the first three nights, fewer than thirty people sparsely populated the comfortable screening room of a very fancy hotel and casino. The audience was almost entirely white-embassy types-and most of them were well over forty. It is safe to say that citizens of Botswana were poorly represented and that its young people were nearly invisible. This kept things on the comatose side of festive.

Over the course of eight nights, the festival screened sixteen movies touching on divergent themes such as genocide, gender, music of resistance, indigenous peoples and wartime. Most of the films deserved a significantly larger audience; all of them were thought provoking; the strongest were crushing in their revelations.

The festival opened with a speech from a government minister who urged the Batswana to produce films, to seek out Botswana’s oral historians and to capture their knowledge before it fades. He jested, "I hope that it is a lack of human rights abuse in Botwswana that has kept Botswana films out of this festival." He then urged people to consult him for some of the valuable and undisclosed oral history before saying his thank yous and taking his seat. The event coordinator thanked the minister, listed a raft of sponsors including famed human rights defenders Shell Oil and the U.S. government, and then encouraged everyone to sign a petition to close the illegal prison facilities at Guantanamo Bay. The first movie began and the minister slipped out the door.

For a review of five different human rights films from around Southern Africa, follow the link to our HIV/AIDS page and check the Botswana section. The article is with our web master and ready for posting.
* posted by Nathaniel at 12:53 PM