Visages

I walk by these faces every day and never quite get used to their expressions. I don't think it's the sculptor's fault, just the wild stuff I see along this path. The overpass for the highway exit goes over the train station before plunging into Obz, and as a commuter - for a minute or two twice a day - you share this narrow, shadowy area with the many street people who live underneath it. I've had a mumbling woman try to sell me a handful of bent coat hangers, watched some young kids play that game where you bounce coins off a wall to see who can get closest - except with rocks and over a drugged-out old man - and it's not uncommon to have to step over moguls of blanketed bodies when I go to work in the morning. And then there are these cement faces, all by themselves on the side of a huge overpass. This little trip from the station is a cake walk compared to the scenery in the townships... it's not really dangerous and I don't have any real statements to make about it... but there's definitely a feeling here.

Also, some corrections to previous entries:

1. I had the poster I saw on the train translated, and it means "alcohol can lead to fighting, drink responsibly." This is not that funny to me, but at the time I thought it was saying that you can fall and get hurt if you're drunk on a train, and I was laughing at a government-mandated stick-figure drawing of drunk people. Thankfully, the direct translation from Afrikaans to English is still a little funny: "Alcohol lets the fists often slap. Drink responsibly."

2. I misspoke about the Grade 12 learners at the township high schools, who did not take their Matric exams yet (which they take in a few months), but their Midterm Exams. The results of those tests are what set the events I named into motion