Strangers & Humanity: Lessons from the Street

“None of the work in rigidly fixed modern settings, no matter how noble, matches a discovery of the long-lost stranger one finds on the street. True devotes of the street find themselves searching for the stranger, longing to overcome the barrier that separates us from the countless nameless lives that inundate and encroach upon us physically in the subways and malls, or on the highway.”

~Marc Gopin, Holy War, Holy Peace

A week ago, I was in South Africa with a friend. We needed to get back to Lesotho from a town about an hour and a half across the border, but with no public transport, hitchhiking was the obvious and frankly only choice.  So my friend and I walk from the beautiful town of Clarens to the road and stop to wait. Stylish, empty cars drive by ignoring our waves of desperation. It quickly becomes apparent that, despite our proximity to the Lesotho border, the culture of trust that permeates the Mountain Kingdom is absent here.

Allow me a brief digression to explain what I mean.  Over the past year, one of the biggest lessons I’ve learnt in Lesotho is how to trust complete strangers. In Thaba Tseka, one of the schools I was in charge of monitoring was beyond cell phone reception, making it impossible to call for any kind of transport when my day was done. When public transport is difficult to come by hitching rides becomes a way of life. I was surprised that the first time I hitched even cars that were too full to take me would stop, ask where I was going, and apologize for not having space. If a car had space, it was expected that they would stop and take anyone who needed a ride. In these situations one quickly learns to trust strangers; the gap between the “self” and the “other” is much closer than the cult of individualism would have us believe.

Returning to my day in South Africa, as nearly empty cars continue to drive by, my friend and I decide to walk towards a nearby township. As we come closer a young man who looks about twenty approaches us. “I’m not a criminal,” is the first thing he tells us, clearly used to mistrust.  “My name is Joseph. I just wanted to find out if there was anything I could do to help.” We explain we want to get to Fouriesburg so that we can take a Kombi (15 seat mini van used for public transport) to the Lesotho border. “I can help you with that,” he smiles.

So we follow Joseph to the top of the road as he tells us bits and pieces of his story; he talks about his life in Johannesburg, returning home when his grandfather passed away, and how he now cares for his grandmother. We wait a while, chatting as cars continue to drive by.

Finally, Joseph is able to flag down a car for us. It’s an old beat up pickup truck with chipped red paint, a cracked windshield, and duct tape on the steering wheel. “You don’t want to get in that do you?” he says, looking skeptically at us and then back at the truck. “Yes we do!” my friend and I say in unison. We hurriedly hand Joseph a few rand for his help (I love it when people see a need and make up their own jobs).  The men sitting in the front of the truck offer us their seats and move to the back. We jump in and introduce ourselves to the driver.

Our driver is Steve.

 “Do you smoke?” Steve asks.  

“No,” we say.

“You mind if I light up?”

“Not a problem.”

Steve rolls down the window and lights his cigarette. “I keep meaning to quit,” he tells us. “But I think you have to really want to quit to quit, you know what I mean?”

As we drive Steve tells us snippets of his life. He sells firewood for a living. He has an eight-year-old daughter. He speaks five languages: Sesotho, Xhosa, Zulu, Afrikaans and English. We, in turn, tell him about our work in Lesotho and life in Canada.

When we get to Fouriesburg, Steve makes sure we get in the right Kombi. Just before the Kombi leaves, he gives us a big wave.

“All the best on your journey home,” he says.

“You too,” we smile.

***

I have been reflecting all week on this simple exchange; how we stood by the side of the road and none of the fancy cars stopped—too busy to care, too afraid to trust, or perhaps a bit of both.

It was a poor man from a township who stopped to help us find a ride. It was a man selling firewood who offered us a space in his car.

 Why is it that those who have the least are the most willing to share? Why is it that the marginalized are so often willing to greet others with great openness?

That day in South Africa there were ultimately two different attitudes towards the “other” at play:

To the fancy cars we were merely strangers but to Joseph and Steve we were fellow human beings.