The Redistribution of Wealth

Hattie: There is a well known phenomenon in Cape Town called the redistribution of wealth. I unfortunately fell fowl of this yesterday while writing my previous blog entry about Sparky. Oh what irony. As I was sitting here bemoaning my little VW Chico someone was helping themselves to it right under my very nose. I returned to my space to find another car in its place and no Sparky. The saddest fact of all is that Mr Penguin my mascot made by my diligent niece has been kidnapped. The scoundrels have also driven away with my newly installed and paid for radio, my jacket and the newly purchased winter clothes I bought to survive in freezing Cape Town.

A nice passer by lent me her jacket and drove me to the police station where I made my statement. The policemen then drove me home- my first ever ride in a police car. Half an hour after arriving home there was a knock at my door and it was one of the police officers I had seen at the station. He asked if he could come in and asked me for the same details I had given at the station. I was a bit suspicious and then he cheekily continued to change the subject….it became blatantly apparent he was not interested in the car! You can imagine the hilarity as he asked me if I was married, then if I had a boyfriend (I am afraid I lied- his name is ‘Jack’, he lives in Zimbabwe and he would be terribly disappointed if I broke it off)!

I am wondering whether I should have done a deal with Police constable Sharif. Something like ‘if you find my car, with my belongings inside, we can go for a coffee’.

Joking aside I am not surprised crime is high here although it is not nearly as high as it is in Joburg. Richard and Sophie wrote in a previous blog entry about the inequality here, the continued divisions in society where people are still segregated in their racially defined areas. People try to insulate themselves against poverty and crime behind their big alarmed fences so distanced from the reality they live in. I have come back to where I am staying most days to find local women and children rummaging through our wheelie bin to find food or anything they can reuse. Our global economic system is failing the poor- the homeless and slum dwellers left to rummage through our waste. These women are blatant about their activities- they don’t stop when I arrive, some don’t even look at me, they just continue in their desperate attempts to find food. I feel, deep down, that there must be a better way. Surely there is enough to go around? Can we not share a bit more and be less greedy? I am not a communist but I know we were not designed to live in this self-imposed isolation from each other.