Yesterday, I heard the news of Nelson Mandela's passing away. I was shocked at first, and as soon as I got the chance, I read some news articles about his passing. Although I have grown up knowing about him, it was not until I began to read more on the man that I realized what we had truly lost. I felt a deep, terrible kind of grief as I continued to read about him. I stayed up until 2 a.m. yesterday with the pretext of working, but in reality, my sadness was what was keeping me awake. And as I read more and more about him, I began to gain an understanding of what his friends, followers, and indeed the rest of the world had lost.
Even in elementary school I knew of his colorful life, from his being labeled a terrorist, to his prison years, to his becoming the president and father of his country. But throughout the years, I thought of him as a distant, larger-than-life figure with whom ordinary people such as me had nothing in common. But whatever I was able to read yesterday brought the man and his immense struggle across those distances to the hard ground of reality before me.
His prison years spoke volumes about who he was as a person. Over the 27 years he spent in prison, tragedies continued to ensue within his family. His mother and firstborn son both died while he was under imprisonment; he was forbidden from attending their funerals. His wife was also imprisoned and had to tolerate perhaps even harsher conditions than he - and he would have to tolerate long, agonizing waits to get news of her.
I wanted to mention these things because what inspired me was that in spite of these ordeals, plus the harsh conditions he was subjected to, the solitary confinement he was placed in, and the racist treatment of the guards, he did not break. He was fundamentally changed by his experiences in prison to learn the value of many core qualities that he had not necessarily applied before in his political involvement before prison, but that would become invaluable later when he got out of prison and helped lead South Africa out of apartheid. Sufferings that would break most men stripped him of many of his former beliefs and left him an unshakable belief in humanism and moral goodness.
I think that one of the things that I find so wonderful about Mandela is this humanism. He understood the effect of apartheid not only upon the subjected race, but also its effect upon the dominating race. In his own words, "As I walked out the door toward the gate that would lead to my freedom, I knew if I didn't leave my bitterness and hatred behind, I'd still be in prison." He readily made peace with those who played a role in his imprisonment and in the imprisonment of South Africa, traveling hundreds of miles to meet the widow of the last president of apartheid-era South Africa and inviting his former jailer over to the VIP box to watch his presidential inauguration. Simply for playing such an instrumental role in keeping the nation united and protecting it from the threat of a divide between the whites and the blacks, I feel like he should be celebrated.
But I feel like he should be celebrated for even more, because men like these belong not only to South Africa, but to all of us. I feel that his actions exemplified how, with a deep moral authority and with unshakable faith in yourself, immense good can be done in the world. Realizing the extent of what he did and all he stood for made me come close to tears last night, but I do not think that the coming days should be days of mourning. I think they should be days of celebration, because we are blessed that men like him live among us.
Even in elementary school I knew of his colorful life, from his being labeled a terrorist, to his prison years, to his becoming the president and father of his country. But throughout the years, I thought of him as a distant, larger-than-life figure with whom ordinary people such as me had nothing in common. But whatever I was able to read yesterday brought the man and his immense struggle across those distances to the hard ground of reality before me.
His prison years spoke volumes about who he was as a person. Over the 27 years he spent in prison, tragedies continued to ensue within his family. His mother and firstborn son both died while he was under imprisonment; he was forbidden from attending their funerals. His wife was also imprisoned and had to tolerate perhaps even harsher conditions than he - and he would have to tolerate long, agonizing waits to get news of her.
I wanted to mention these things because what inspired me was that in spite of these ordeals, plus the harsh conditions he was subjected to, the solitary confinement he was placed in, and the racist treatment of the guards, he did not break. He was fundamentally changed by his experiences in prison to learn the value of many core qualities that he had not necessarily applied before in his political involvement before prison, but that would become invaluable later when he got out of prison and helped lead South Africa out of apartheid. Sufferings that would break most men stripped him of many of his former beliefs and left him an unshakable belief in humanism and moral goodness.
I think that one of the things that I find so wonderful about Mandela is this humanism. He understood the effect of apartheid not only upon the subjected race, but also its effect upon the dominating race. In his own words, "As I walked out the door toward the gate that would lead to my freedom, I knew if I didn't leave my bitterness and hatred behind, I'd still be in prison." He readily made peace with those who played a role in his imprisonment and in the imprisonment of South Africa, traveling hundreds of miles to meet the widow of the last president of apartheid-era South Africa and inviting his former jailer over to the VIP box to watch his presidential inauguration. Simply for playing such an instrumental role in keeping the nation united and protecting it from the threat of a divide between the whites and the blacks, I feel like he should be celebrated.
But I feel like he should be celebrated for even more, because men like these belong not only to South Africa, but to all of us. I feel that his actions exemplified how, with a deep moral authority and with unshakable faith in yourself, immense good can be done in the world. Realizing the extent of what he did and all he stood for made me come close to tears last night, but I do not think that the coming days should be days of mourning. I think they should be days of celebration, because we are blessed that men like him live among us.
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