Clinic Blog: 2012 South Africa Clinic Blog
February 19, 2012
Back home again
By ahoutman
Most of our team members are back home again (many with 30+ hours of travel behind them), and adjusting to “normal life”. I am left with two impressions that keep replaying in my mind. The first is the question I was constantly asked by our Zulu patients – “Where are you from”? I assumed, at first, that it was obvious I am American, and that they were inquiring as to which state of the union I am from - but it didn’t take me long to realize that, indeed, the question was as to the country. This reveals my nationalism –that I find it curious that it was not obvious I am an American. What varying answers our Zulu friends must have received from our global OneSight team! The second impression is that of the wide-eyed patients who were rendered utterly speechless, which our Peace Corps friends explained was because they were not accustomed to being around white people and were both scared and overwhelmed. As a team, we OneSighters amazed ourselves in our ability to cross language and geographical lines to become one – to become love in action. It is dawning on me how much more wondrous our cohesive global unit must have been to those Zulus whose lives have experienced apartheid – a word whose literal translation is “apartness” – which was everyone we saw over the age of 8. I am so thankful for the oneness I felt with our team and Zulu friends…the ability to laugh and serve together without thought to color, race, language or geography, and it is my wish that OneSight touched lives not only with vision care services, but a with a vision of hope, togetherness, joy and oneness.