Yunus Peer’s Story

Mahatma Gandhi was in South Africa between 1893-1914 – he lived in Durban. Both my grandfathers arrived on 5 year indentured contracts sometime around 1904 after the British won the war against the Dutch Boers.

In 2008 I discovered my paternal grandfather’s diary – written in 1908 – all in Gujerati. Both families lived in the Indian community in Durban when they arrived, and after a few years moved to rural areas where employment was more available. Mohammed Goolam Peer (my Grandfather) was a book-keeper on a white-owned sugar plantation in Batstone Drift outside Port Shepstone – and had to renew his contract every 5 years. Even my birth certificate has a column for FREE or INDENTURED. Of course mine says “FREE” …. I guess under Apartheid – ‘free’ was a relative term…it merely meant that I was not indentured to a White employer.

MG Peer died in 1933 a few days before he was to return to India with his 13 children – Papa was 8. The younger kids were all sent to foster homes. He started working in a rural store when he was 12 – slept on the store counter at night – and when he was 16 rented a home and brought his mum and my 5 unmarried aunts and uncles under one roof in Port Shepstone, an hour away from Durban. My paternal Granma (Dhadee) died on June 3rd, 1957, 20 days before I was born. Apparently, Gora, my older brother was her favorite – probably because Papa was the favorite of her 13 surviving children.

Political activism – thanks to Gandhi – started early in my family. Gandhi founded the Indian National Congress which was later absorbed into the African National Congress. Papa was a member of the INC and then the ANC when it was underground in the 60′s – and in 1991 when the ANC was unbanned, he became an executive member. It was then that Nelson Mandela came to visit Port Shepstone – of course I wasn’t there, but mum said he’s like an old uncle who sampled the cooking and made everyone around him feel comfortable.

I will be eternally indebted to my parents for investing in our education and our political consciousness. In 1971, I was admitted to Waterford Kamhlaba in neighboring Swaziland, a multi-racial school where many South African political exiles sent their kids. Among many others, my classmates included the Mandela, Tutu, and Sisulu children as well as the Kama’s from Botswana.

Yunus Peer in the Media

• University of Hawai’i Alumni Magazine Spring 2012 – (PDF copy)
• UWC article
• Attending Waterford Kamhlaba was a turning point in my life. The interview included below describes the impact of Waterford Kamlaba in my life. I am grateful for the opportunity Waterford Kamhlaba, and my parents, gave me.

I returned to Swaziland and my alma mater, Waterford Kamhlaba School in 1982, nine years after the South African government confiscated my passport, six years after they returned it, and five years after I arrived in Hawaii. Andy Foose was editor of the Waterford Phoenix and he wrote this article for the school’s 30 year anniversary.

Waterford Kamhlaba – Swaziland.
Phoenix – 1982
Looking Back 1963-1982 – Interview with Yunus

(Yunus Peer was a student at Waterford Kamhlaba from 1971 to 1973. During the Second Term he visited WK again, and Andy Foose interviewed him for PHOENIX.)

I saw him first at a soccer practice. He had arrived before I had, and stood chatting with Mr. Eyeington while we waited for the others to come. Occasionally he poked at a soccer ball with his toes or scanned the scenery. We watched him in glances as we warmed up. He was introduced as Yunus, an ex–student, and the game began.
Perhaps it was his soccer that recommended him to me. He had played in grey sweatsuit bottom and white high–top basketball shoes, and blended into our game so smoothly, playing with us. There was an easiness about him, as though he wasn’t a stranger. And so it was when I next saw him, when we met so that I could ‘interview’ him. We sat outside, on the edge of the field, under a tree. We sat, the sun keeping us warm, the autumn breeze keeping us comfortable, and we chatted, on and on and on, two Waterford students, acquaintances of just a few minutes, but with the ease, familiarity and warmth of years–old friends.

He did most of the talking, of course, while I sat, listening, listening, sometimes forgetting to take notes. And as he spoke of his past, his future, his teaching, his learning, as he told of his days here and his days abroad, and how closely all were linked, how each led from the one before and to the next, I began to realize how important this school, and the people in it, have been to his life, how things he discovered here have been carried with him ever since, reflected in all he does.
And so we sat, the dry grass hanging on our clothes and the noise of school life in the background, him telling his story, me listening with eyes and ears.

When he came to the school for the first time, he knew that he was entering a multi-racial school, he knew that he was supposed to be equal, but he never believed that it was true, he never expected that it would be so. He came accepting that school was school, life was life, and that people came in three models, within and without South Africa. Because he was an “Indian”, he was used to being a “second class citizen”, an “inferior”, and, perhaps, he believed that he was – certainly, that’s what he’d been all his life. Therefore, he came to a multi–racial school negatively, not believing that different races could mix, not believing that everyone could be equal. And when he arrived he saw black faces, brown faces, white faces. But, so? It was nothing new to him, he’d seen different faces before, even gathered in the same place. There seemed nothing to prove that here was different from anywhere else. In his first twenty–four hours he was hounded by those with power, being given three punishments. First, he had not laid the table, because he had not known it was his job, then he was caught reading in bed, but so were others, and, the next day, again because he didn’t know, he missed assembly. Three times in his first day he was punished for crimes he didn’t know he was committing. It hardly seemed different from the victimisation at home. He ran his punishments that afternoon assured that a multi–racial system didn’t really work, that it wasn’t any different, despite what everyone said.

But he couldn’t leave, he was forced to sweat it out. And as time passed, he found that it wasn’t all that hard to talk to – even to make friends with – whites, and others. Slowly he eased, allowing his instinctive tension to relax, and he grew in confidence, and in self–respect. He excelled in some areas, and found himself doing better than some of his white classmates. Perhaps ..? he thought. Gradually, as he-found respect for him in others, as his prejudices were eroded piece by piece, slowly, he began to feel … real, equal.

One day he was playing cricket, on the pitch next to which we were sitting as he told his tale, and he was at bat. The bowler had jogged, bouncing up to the wicket, and flung the ball down at him. It struck his pad. Mr Hatton, the umpire, raised a knobbly finger. He was out. But he wouldn’t accept it. “You’ve got to be joking!” he shouted, “that was never LBW !” Out was the call, and if he’d done ranting like a child, he could go and take a shower and report later. That was that. He shuffled off, angry. But his anger was nothing like as strong as the lecture he received later. His new­found confidence had carried him too high, perhaps. Mr. Hatton, in one flash speech, yanked him into reality. He spoke of self–control, of consideration for others, of manners, of courtesy. Responsibility. He taught Yunus, as Yunus put it to me, “the principles of social order”. Yunus added to his self–respect a new respect for others. That game, that speech, has stayed in Yunus’ mind since. He sees them as an important event is his life. Important not only for what was said, but also because it seemed to him to be the first time he’d been told to do something, and also why. That had never happened before. Orders were simply orders, unexplained, to be followed. He learnt, while here, one of the most important lessons of-all not only was he equal to everyone else, but everyone else equal to him. He learnt how to deal, comfortably and happily, with others.

Sports were very important to him during his stay here, and not just for the lessons that came out of them. Before coming to Waterford, he had never really had the chance to play sport, real sport, on real fields, with all the equipment. He was simply used to makeshift games of cricket in the street, or soccer games on a sand pitch with a plastic ball. Here, he excelled. He’d never played hockey before, but once harnessed by Mr Stern, he was top goal scorer. And so it was with other sports. He played almost all of them. His best, though, were soccer and tennis, the two areas where Mr Eyeington’s influence was felt. Yunus spoke fondly of Mr Eyeington, recalling his noisy enthusiasm, and his sadism as PE teacher – Mr Eyeington taught PE in those days. He remembered very clearly, and I wasn’t surprised, days when he used to arrive for PE and Mr Eyeington would give a huge silly grin and tell him to run up Tom, the huge mountain behind school, and wave from the top. “I want to see you waving, OK?” Yunus laughed. It wasn’t just in PE that the two were partners. Indeed, their greatest fame came in tennis, They played so well together they were doubles champions in the Swaziland Open. Yunus, he openly admitted, was the Singles champ.

Yunus told me all this, about Mr Hatton and the cricket, about Mr Eyeington, about all he did, with extreme enjoyment. He seemed so glad to be back, to see all those things which had been familiar, and taken for granted. He seemed so absorbed in his memories that it probably wasn’t necessary for me to be there at all. He would have simply sat and reminisced with the surroundings. Waterford had been so important to him. First, it had given him respect, respect for himself and for others, it had given him a chance to learn, to gain a real education, free from political holds, and it had given him sports and facilities, the chance to play and grow freely. It had given him what had previously been a fantasy world, a world he read about in magazines or saw in films, but which had always seemed no more than a fantasy.
And then it was gone. All of it.

In 1973, the South African Government withdrew his passport. Nothing was said. It was just taken. And with it, all that he had gained here. Gone the education, gone the respect, gone the equality gone the sports and facilities. He was suddenly back to where he had begun, but worse, since he had tasted — eaten the life which was possible outside of South Africa and discrimination.

For a while he did nothing, he wanted to do nothing. Then, in an attempt to salvage his education, at least, he applied to the Univ­ersity of Natal. But for him to get in, being “Indian”, not only would he have to be accepted by the University, but he also had to gain governmental permission. He achieved the first, the university was happy to have him study there. So he applied to the Ministry of the Interior to get a permit to study there. This meant flying to Pretoria, meeting the Minister or an official of his, being scrutinized. He did it. He flew to Pretoria. He was in the office three minutes, and was rejected. No explanations. Just a trip to Pretoria, and three minutes. The alternative was the University of Durban Westville, one specifically for “Indians”. He tried it. He hated it. He dropped out. At times classes were as large as a thousand and were held in an auditorium with microphones. It was too impersonal, too frustrat­ing. After Waterford Kamhlaba, it was impossible.

He did nothing again. His depression was overwhelming. Then, two years after it was removed, his passport was returned. Almost immediately he was ready to travel, determined to meet as many different people and as many different thoughts as possible. He was ready to rediscover all that he had found at Waterford. Yet, he could not return to Waterford itself: When he received his passport, he had to swear never to return to Swaziland to study again.

He travelled for two years. To Afghanistan, to Pakistan, to India and to New Jersey in the States. Once in New Jersey he began to play tennis again. Soon he was Middlesex county champion, and he competed in the national championships. He played tennis only. He did nothing else. And soon he was tired of it. In 1977 he went to Hawaii. There he played soccer semi—professionally. In 1979 he was named the League’s Most Valuable Player. But more importantly he went to university. In his two years of travel he hadn’t studied at all. It seemed to make the difference — he graduated from his four-year degree in two-and-a-half years. He did so well he was offered a teaching job, in Pyschology. From this he gained an interest in students, and studied for a teaching degree. In 1980 he had his degree and professional teaching certificate and was ready to teach.

It all went extremely quickly. One thing led to the next, so fast. He never did anything with less than “a hundred percent effort”. So everything raced on, successful. He became a teacher, teaching at Maryknoll High School in Honolulu. He teaches or has taught at some stage pyschology, sociology, introduction to Western civilization, Asian history, and, of course, PE. He’s also been the school’s tennis and soccer coach.

For him, though, his job is much more than teaching. Hawaii, to him, is very much like Swaziland, like Waterford. It’s beautiful, it’s peaceful, and there are people from all parts of the world. It’s where east and west meet, it’s where peoples and cultures mix. And where people and cultures intermingle, people share and people learn. And Yunus is there sharing what he discovered here. His teaching methods are hardly conventional. For example, he believes it’s time for the teacher not to know everything, it’s perhaps even desirable, since it shows the students that teachers are real people too. When they don’t know, they just find out. And it’s fine for the student not to know either, as long as they’re comfortable, feel easy and are willing to learn what they don’t know. In many lessons he and his class just talk, about anything, issues, gossip or work. But when they do, they all agree the next lesson will be one of hard, uninterrupted work. The essence of it all is found here, in this school, in his past: Respect. Respect for oneself, and respect for everyone else. Yunus is there sharing what he discovered here.

It is in this that I see him as the personification of this school’s ideals and purposes. Not only did the school reveal and give to him a whole new world, one free of racial discrimination, one with academic promise, one with facilities, one with friends and one with respect, but Yunus then took what he gained here, added himself to it, and then went out to share it with others. He did not simply use his education here to get a job, he took his experiences and shared it to benefit others.

ANDY FOOSE (IB2) – (Competition prize) – (PHOENIX prizewinner)
Waterford Kamhlaba Website

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Yunus C.Peer
Punahou School – Academy Social Studies
Teachers Across Borders South Africa
TAB-SA.org