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Alan from South Africa wrote the most meaningful email I have ever received. Each word makes so much sense, I hope everyone out there understands why I have added it here...and more importantly, realizes the significance of its message

Hi,

It is perhaps self serving to talk about it now, but although many white South Africans systematically voted for the National Party - the crowd that introduced and maintained apartheid, it is amazing how those same people are now embracing the new dispensation in South Africa. 

It is now generally accepted that people permitted it to go on for as long as they did because they feared the unknown. It wouldn't be the first time in history that this has happened, and I, being the eternal optimist, constantly find evidence of the basic goodwill between 99% of all races. 

And at the schools it is particularly gratifying; I coach a bit of rugby at a school that was formerly a bastion of Afrikaans domination. There are now a good number of colored kids there and most of the pupils are young enough to not know what Apartheid was all about. There is this one youngster - a little colored kid who is very talented - that I have been spending a bit of time with. This kid calls me "oom" (uncle in Afrikaans), which was previously the respectful manner in which white children spoke to an adult whose name they did not know (whether or not he was actually an uncle). The first time he did it I actually had a tear in my eye because I realized that what we were doing in the country was going to work, irrespective of how many setbacks there might be along the way.

It's true that what we have created since the end of apartheid is not perfect; in some parts of the country the level of crime is totally out of hand and innocent people of all colors are the victims. But with a bit of luck we'll continue to have one of the most envious standards of living in the world. The only question is whether those who have will help up those who don't, or whether the poor will drag down those that are not poor. 

Time will tell.....
Very best wishes,
Alan