"Amandla!" "Awathu!"

Our group was in South Africa on International Mandela Day on July 18th. In 2009, the United Nations declared Mandela Day as a time to make a difference in local communities. On Mandela Day, you are encouraged to do 67 minutes of service. It is 67 mins because that's the number of years Mandala provided service, as a human rights lawyer, political prisoner, or president of the new South African democracy. We were able to see samples of service performed by Stellenbosch students. For example, at the Student Service Center, they made sandwiches for the poor. This is appropriate because this year’s theme was "Action Against Poverty." TAMUK students who visited the Stellenbosch University horse stables saw young girls spending over an hour cleaning up around the stables as their 67 minutes of service. Next year, July 18th, 2018, would have Mandela’s 100th birthday. That year there will be community service events every week in South Africa. That's how important Mandela is to South Africans.

Today we visited a monument to Mandela in front of the last prison he was released from. He was released from the Victor Verster Prison on February 11th, 1990. We saw the road that he walked down to leave the prison. He yelled out, "Amandla!" with his right fist held up high, and the people answered back, "Awathu!" Both of these words are Xhosa and Zulu words which mean "Power," and "To Us." The monument we saw is called the Madiba Legacy. Mandela is called Madiba in South Africa because it is his clan name and clan names are more important than family names. It is also a sign of respect and affection. It has been a unique privilege to have sensed Madiba’s spirit in the very land that is his.