Migrant Workers

I have just finished reading a series of articles sent to me by my mother on the subject of migrant workers sending money home from the richer countries in which they have found work to their poverty stricken relatives in third world countries. Clipped from the LA Times, the articles describe the billions of dollars from workers abroad that now make up a significant part of the economy in these struggling countries.

I can not help but compare it to the situation here in South Africa. Only here, uniquely, workers migrate to the “first-world” cities and send money back to the “third-world” villages. Time and time again, when I make the trek to the post office in Kgapane, I watch older women waiting in long lines with their money orders which relatives in Pretoria and Johannesburg send home. All too often these “grannies” are carrying infants and toddlers on their backs, the children of their children who work hours away in order to provide their families with a means of sustenance as well as a hope for a better future.

It is very easy, in village life, to spot those people with family members working in more lucrative jobs away from home. They are the families with brick houses, tiled roofs, running water, cars, American clothes, and technological appliances such as televisions, DVD players, and stereos. They are the ones of enviable lives whose children often go to better schools and are afforded more opportunities.

Yet, somewhere along the line, there is a trade off for this lifestyle: lost children. All too often, the older women of the village are over burdened with raising their multiple grandchildren while their children live far away. Many things happen as a result: often the grandmother doesn’t have enough education to assist children in school work and is too intimidated by the schools themselves thus they play an absent role in the education of their children’s children. In addition, due to the culture in which they were raised, things such as sex are not discussed in the household. Thus, all too often girls and boys end up victims of teen pregnancy or HIV, perpetuating the cycle of absentee parents. In the end, more and more houses are run by older women, alone, while the parents work away or die from the diseases they’ve contracted.

Yet, there is no hope of advancement in the village itself. The only successful shops tend to be those with liquor. So parents have to make a decision: move to the cities in hope of work to send money home and hope their children are raised adequately by grandmothers or stay in the village with no hopes of providing advancement for their children due to lack of resources.

In America, due to more availability of care and jobs, children are often raised in cities by single parents who rely on daycare and other means rarely available in South Africa. I never expected to be asked the question “How many children do you have?” I always expected the answer to be obvious: I have none with me so how could I have any children? But here the assumption is the opposite. If you are my age you have children regardless of where they stay. I am a freak of nature in these regards.

Many people do not understand the story of Africa because they do not understand the depths of the situation and history of all that we perceive as problems of the continent. There is no easy solution and we need to stop assuming that if we give countries money or food or new schools that Africa will rise. It is vital to realize that complicated problems rely on complicated solutions.