AMANDLA!!! Pump your fists in the air and stamp your feet, we’re striking! I think that striking is part of the South African culture. However, when I picture freedom fighters, I picture them serious, well informed and intelligently sensible protestors, calling for our freedom from oppression…AMANDLA! Today, I looked at the strikers and saw rather unfit college students, dragging their feet in a somewhat pathetic rendition (not all of them, some of them were very energetic and in sync) of a rhythmic beat, dancing and waving yellow banners about, calling for Lord knows only what.
Every year, without fail, the Durban Universities can anticipate a strike of some sort, for this or the other. Honestly, they should now print it on the campus calendars, “Week 5: strike,” it’s becoming so regular.
Laurenzo (yup, like from the Merchant of Venice), was telling us how the strikers told him, “join the strike or die.” To which Laurenzo rejoined, “No, we’re going home.” And the strikers blankly concluded, “Oh okay. That too.”
My question is, do half of these people even know what it is that they’re striking about? And secondly, why can’t it be negotiated in a civil manner? What, could you please inform me, is the need to whack a girl with a pot-plant (A POTPLANT!) – while you’re in stitches of laughter, give some thought to the poor things face – I know I certainly wouldn’t want to be taken by surprise like that (especially not with a potplant!)
So in conclusion, while the German students may find watching tyres burning in the quad an experience of great thrill and excitement, many of us are quite simply annoyed with this whole striking business.
Boy are they lucky they didn’t try the whole, “strike or die,” line on me. I would have gone all psycho smurf on them for sure and bombed their ingratiating asses all the way to the fifteenth planet.
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