Postcard #3 - Johannesburg and Cape Town, South Africa
Postcard #3 --South Africa
Janet and Stu at Cape of Good Hope “Don’t take any photos in this area and keep your cameras out of sight. The drug dealers
might mistake us for police.” Chilling words from Desmond, our guide, as we drove through the
city center. Formerly a vibrant area with five star hotels, shopping, corporate buildings housing
international businesses, and busy government buildings, the abandoned downtown is now home
to squatters--migrants from rural South Africa, illegal African immigrants, and criminals.
Welcome to Johannesburg.
After our once in a lifetime safari in Zambia and Botswana, we spent a week in South Africa traveling first to
Johannesburg, or “Joburg” as they say here, for two days and then Cape Town for another five.
Traveling independently, we arranged local tours and lodgings in both cities.
Our Joburg hotel lies in Sandton, in a newly developed area several miles north of the
city center. Many of the downtown businesses fled here as did shops, restaurants and hotels
which have now congregated in and around Nelson Mandela Square, a gigantic mall.
Desmond got us up to speed. The unemployment rate in Joburg is 35%. About 90% of
the city center squatters are not South African, but from other African nations. They, like rural
migrants, came here to find a better life in this new democracy.
Graffiti covers most first floor walls. A tiny storefront “Betela-Zanke-Muti” offers
witchcraft to cure medical problems, and here and there laundry hanging out windows reminded
us that real life is here too.
Women on the street in Soweto. Soweto shantytown.
Government is working on the problems, according to Desmond. In a nearby historic
area, restoration is beginning on the Supreme Court building and others. But even here, the
tallest building in Africa has a giant “To Let” sign on it and the IBM building remains
abandoned. Orange-suited private security guards patrol some downtown areas under contract
with the government to maintain order.
On our way to Soweto, we drove through one of the more expensive neighborhoods
where high walls surround estates, razor wire atop. Signs everywhere proclaim, “Armed
Response.” Desmond said that some homes abandoned by their owners and taken over by
squatters were demolished.
Signs like these were everywhere in South AfricaDuring Apartheid, the white government (9% of the population) forced Black people
(75% of the population) to live in segregated townships like Soweto (South Western Township).
One million people live here now. The original four-room houses with an outhouse in the back
are everywhere, but now the occupants own them. On the same blocks, some homes are larger
and remodeled. Shanty towns occupy undeveloped space although there is an organized effort to
develop permanent housing for the occupants.
In Soweto we visited the Regina Mundi Church, home to many anti-apartheid activities,
the Freedom Charter Memorial and street market, and the Hector Pieterson Museum. A 12-year
old child, Hector, was killed by police in 1976 during a children's march opposing the
requirement to use Afrikaans as the language of instruction in school. Many say this march and
children's deaths began the end of Apartheid.
Cape Town Waterfront and Table Mountain. Cape Town and Robben Island from Table Mountain.
After two nights here, we flew to Cape Town at the bottom of the African continent with
Table Mountain looming above it. Settled in 1652 by the Dutch East India Company as a post to
repair and supply ships, today 3.5 million residents call this delightful city home. For five nights
our home was Four Rosmead, a lovely Bed and Breakfast in the Oranjezicht suburb on Table
Mountain’s lower slopes. This 1903 contemporary-styled place was convenient and the
breakfasts superb with local fruits and breads, plus creative cooked breakfast.
In Cape Town too, we saw shanty towns along highways. Even Four Rosmead had razor
wire. But unlike Johannesburg, we felt safe walking everywhere. Our young B&B managers
insisted we take taxis in the evening and we followed their advice.
Since we first learned about the early explorers in school, we both knew we wanted to
visit the Cape of Good Hope. Our Cape Peninsula tour guide Randall drove south from Cape
Town along the coast and there it was, surprisingly close to civilization. Endangered Right
Whales frolicked in False Bay below us with their new babies – quite a bonus. And we also
visited Cape Point lighthouse, the world famous Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens, Boulder’s
Beach penguins, and Simon’s Town for lunch, a darling seaside English village with Cape Dutch
architecture.
Cape Dutch Architecture and us at at Rost en Vrede Winery in the Stellenbosch Region.
Our wine tasting day dawned cool and rainy. We visited three wineries in the
Stellenbosch region: Rost en Verde, Bilton, and Thelema; and one, Rickety Bridge, in
Franschhoek. Surrounded by Cape Dutch architecture and fields of grapevines just beginning to
bud (we are south of the equator here so it is early Spring), we tasted wonderful Merlot, Shiraz,
Bordeaux blends, wooded and unwooded Chardonnay and sweet Chenin Blanc wines. We loved
Thelema’s 2006 Cabernet Sauvignon with mint which apparently is unavailable in the USA, and
their 2008 Sauvignon Blanc which we drank with our seafood dinner one night at Baia
Restaurant.
The other Cape Town days were cool to warm and sunny like an October day in San
Francisco-- to which this city is often compared. The architecture is Cape Dutch and British
influenced. The British ruled South Africa for much of the 19th century until independence in
1910. Most South Africans speak English as a common language, but there are 11 official
languages.
To us, the most colorful part of the city is Bo-Kaap where we signed up for a Cape Malay
cooking class. Bright yellow, turquoise, lime green and pink houses march up Signal Hill and
add an almost Caribbean feel to this old neighborhood. Our young guide, Nizaam, explained that
the residents are not really Malay, but a blend of cultures descended from slaves the Dutch
imported during the 17th century. Their roots lie in Indonesia, India, Malaysia and elsewhere
and more than 90% are Muslim.
Before we actually got cooking, Nizaam toured us through the local museum and the
mosque (our first time ever in a mosque). At the spice shop, he opened spice bins used in Cape
Malay cooking–aromatic cumin, spicy cardamon, bright golden tumeric, and fragrant coriander.
At the local Halal or Muslim butcher shop we tasted locally cured meats before heading to
Faldela’s kitchen.
Bo-Kaap Neighborhood Fadela, our cooking teacher
The tiny and energetic Fadela opens her family’s home for cooking classes on a
regular basis between her teaching job and family responsibilities. She also routinely takes in
foreign students for weeks at a time. In this hands-on class we learned to cook chicken curry
with tomato and onion sabal, spicy beef samosas, a bread called Roti, and Malay donuts for
dessert. Nizaam taught us to eat with only our right hands (no utensils ) and use Roti to sop up
the pungent curry.
Cape Town offers a host of good restaurants. In our B&B’s neighborhood we ate at
several places–steaks at Nelson’s Eye, gourmet burgers with the young and energetic at Café
Royale on Long Street, and pasta and pizza at Bacini’s. On the Victoria & Albert Waterfront we
liked the Belgian restaurant Den Anker, Cape Town Fish Market, and Baia.
The Waterfront’s large mall contains scores of stores. But for us, the de Waterkant
neighborhood has the best one of a kind specialty shops selling African crafts and jewelry.
One sunny afternoon we rode the tramway to the top of Table Mountain and viewed the
peninsula below from Cape of Good Hope to Robben Island.
Penguin at Boulder's Beach Our guide at Robben Island
It seemed fitting to visit Robben Island Museum on our last day in South Africa.
Between 1961 and 1991, over 3000 political prisoners were incarcerated here by the Apartheid
government, including Nelson Mandela from 1964-1982. Our tour guide once was a prisoner
here too.
As we walked down the prison corridor, we stopped in front of Nelson Mandela’s tiny
cell. Each of us took turns photographing the bleak surroundings while listening to our guide’s
stories about the conditions then. Prisoners were allowed only one family visit each six months
for 30 minutes. They had no beds until 1974, and were forced to work breaking up rocks and
mining lime. Pretty grim.
As we rode the ferry back to Cape Town, we realized how far South Africa has come
since 1996 when Nelson Mandela became President. Crime, poverty, unemployment remain
daunting problems, but most non-white South Africans we spoke with, while acknowledging the
serious problems, wanted us to understand that freedom, democracy and human rights had
infinitely improved their lives and given them hope. They said please don’t forget that. We
won’t.
Happy Travels, Janet and Stu
P.S. A photo gallery with additional African images will be published as Postcard #4 next week.
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