The sun rose higher. On they walked. The heat sank into them and they felt the sweat on their bodies. On they walked. Alone again… My first illustrated response to Journey to Jo’burg in 1985, thanks to a schoolboy Jeffrey Cooper Ocr tesseract 4.1.1 Ocr_detected_lang en Ocr_detected_lang_conf 1.0000 Ocr_detected_script Latin Ocr_detected_script_conf 1.0000 Ocr_module_version 0.0.11 Ocr_parameters -l eng Old_pallet IA-NS-2000229 Openlibrary_edition When I sent two copies of my first children’s book to nephews and nieces in South Africa in 1985, they never received the parcel. Instead, my sister-in-law received a letter telling her that the books had been seized and banned. Naledi is upset by everything she has heard and seen, but she is also grateful that she is learning so much about her mother and her world.

urn:lcp:journeytojoburg0000naid:epub:e62c6049-886d-406c-b0c1-e0ee7667cf32 Foldoutcount 0 Identifier journeytojoburg0000naid Identifier-ark ark:/13960/t9r312z0w Invoice 1652 Isbn 0582058295 But those children who marched in the streets don’t want to be like us...learning in school just how to be servants. They want to change what is wrong...even if they must die! I used this book within my Year 4 literacy lessons and I thought it was a great way to get the children aware of what was happening in South Africa in the time of the Apartheid. It opened up great discussions and the children were wanting to ask questions relating to it. We were able to complete a number of activities relating to the book such as, writing a diary entry as if they were Naledi, thinking of different items they could take on their journey and doing a conscience alley and role play by giving advice on whether Naledi and Tiro should go.All those lesson on writing letters…for jobs as servants…always writing how good they were at cooking, cleaning, washing, gardening…always ending with “Yours obediently.” so simple and straightforward that it makes accessible even to quite young children the difficult and the profound.

In memory of two small children who died far away from their mother … and to Kentse Mary Sebate, their Mma, who worked in Jo’burg. CONTENTS On the way into Johannesburg, Naledi and Tiro see a large mountain of sand. They know it is a dump from the mines that surround the city. Both children are very quiet, thinking of their father, who worked in the mines until he became ill with a cough and died.In reality, if you dig deeper, you will learn that this was a journey of self-discovery and awareness for them. They learned firsthand about apartheid because in Johannesburg they experienced it! They finally saw what their mother's job is like. They accidentally got on the white bus and were yelled at and were told they were stupid. They meet a girl who introduced them to the idea of freedom. They realized that there is a lot about South Africa that they don't know, which their schools are not teaching them. In a social studies or history class, Journey to Jo’Burg could be used to compare and contrast the history of South Africa with that of the U.S.A. Similar themes include class divisions by race, segregation and apartheid, police abuse and brutality, the fight for civil rights, protests, etc. It could specifically trigger a lesson on protests like the Soweto Uprising, in which students protested the structurally racist and oppressive education system and were killed. Jo-Wilfried Tsonga (French former tennis player) has no apparent relation to South Africa (I think I assumed he had).

PS I decided to write my review under this edition, although it is marked ”ebook”, because it matches the actual cover of the book I have. After going with a friend to a restaurant in Frankfurt, even though it was raining like crazy, it did not stop me from going to Oxfam, where I did behave: I only got this one book (1 euro). Beverley Naidoo (a white child) got a vaccine against diphteria, the children of the woman helping her family did not get this chance... The history of children’s books is full of wonderful and extraordinary stories, but it has to be said that a great majority of these are about one tiny, narrow band of the human race: middle-class western European and American people. Of course, our massively popular folk tales talk of peoples struggling to survive – think Hansel and Gretel, for example – but once novels for children started to be written, the authors tended to write about people like themselves. This is not a complaint – I do it myself! However, when a book comes in front of us that does that rare thing of talking of people with a way of life utterly distant from this western European type, it’s my view that we should celebrate it. Why shouldn’t we use the bus? When our buses are full, their buses are half empty. Don’t you be sorry!” (p. 26).to earn money to send them to school as well as to provide food and clothes. Once, some time ago, Naledi asked why she and Tiro could not live with Mama in Johannesburg. Mama said, “The white people who make the laws don’t allow it.” Don't underestimate this short and easy read.I actually almost have up on it because this first time I tried reading it I got confused by the characters and went to sleep! I tried again tonight and I read the whole thing in one sitting! Why did I choose this book? Well, I watched a reality show on Netflix called ”Jewish Matchmaking” (I'm not sure I recommend it :D) and two persons on the show where from Jo(')burg in South Africa. I stopped and went on Wikipedia (my go-to source on almost everything) to see what the deal with Jo'burg is (it is Johannesburg indeed!) and this is why this book appealed to me. If you have read The Help, this is an equivalent book for children. The period is South Africa's apartheid years, and while I'm rating four for writing, I'm rating another star for the depiction of tendencies towards popular activism and bringing about change. I also like that there is a simple map.