So the professors here are not afraid to put students on blast, especially with talking during a lecture. One of my professors today told someone that if they wanted to have side conversations they could leave. I also noticed that when it gets too loud in the library someone comes on the loud speaker calling for silence. As a overall loud culture, its surprising to see that they have strong restrictions on noise level.
I really like my organizational management class. The professor worked in HR for a long time and she also seems to have a lot of knowledge about people and behavior in workplaces. Today we were talking about competencies that managers have and what ways we as students could develop them. When we were on the global awareness competency she decides to put me on blast--like in elementary school when there was a new kid in class and they got a personal announcement. So I’m now the American girl who can pass for a Xhosa girl because I’m black lol. She was talking about how we should be open an sensitive to others from other cultures. To illustrate this she goes, “If I met Deana and heard her speak and thought ‘oh why does this black girl have an American accent? Does she think she’s a rockstar or something?” So I think I’ll take the title of a rockstar also :] I’ve enjoyed the class so far and I think I’ll get a lot out of it if I push myself to interact more with the south african students.
I was riding one of the cabbies today and the money collector and the driver are cracking jokes and talking real fast. I couldn’t catch half of what they were saying. All of a sudden the money collector goes, “We have to joke everyday because being HIV positive you never know when your going to die.” I can’t even explain how my face looked. I didn’t know what to do or what to say. I wanted to say ‘oh shame’ but chose ‘sorry’ instead. Then there was this awkward silence...then they started laughing. They said that they were joking and that they like to mess with people, that people are too serious these days. I definitely let out a sigh of relief because I really didn’t know how to handle what he had said. But it got me thinking later that many people do have it here and that I guess since I’ve never had to deal with any real conversations on it, that could be something I’m exposed to while I’m here, we’ll see. But the cabbie drive was really fun and I kept asking the driver about how they got their licensees and how how the cabbie system worked. He was telling me how the government was promising to buy all th cabbies so then the drivers would not only get paid better but have better conditions but he said that the government is always promising things and never doing it. I was able to ask a lot of questions about the city during the ride. I half-joked that it would be interesting to be the hype-man/money collector for one of the cabbies and yell out the window. The driver said that if I wanted he would let me do it for a couple hours one day. So I have a part time job if I want it lol. I don’t know if I’ll take him up on that but the option is good.
So general observations while i was in class today:
- Professor will put people on blast, directly, not subtlety
- There is a major distinctions between their classified groups (black, white, colored, etc)
- The woman professors are called ma’am
- You cannot just leave the class without letting the professor know--even for the bathroom
- Everyone in SA usually speaks 2 languages (English and home language)
- There are no clocks in the classrooms
- They still use overheads
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