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Published: February 15th 2010
Heidelberg
HeidelbergGood bye winter, hello leiderhosen. After 44 hours of travelling we arrived in Jo'burg with a stop over in Frankfurt. Our friend Kath who lives there came and picked us up in FRA to do a quick tour through the beauitful city of Heidelberg. So we cruised the cobblestone streets and decided to do as the germans, have some sauerkraut, sausage and beer - das is good!
We arrived zombie like in Jo'burg this morning. Minor heart attack when the drug dog stopped and barked at my bag and they told me they would need to do a search. What the... of year forgot the bananas in the backpack. Phew!
We didn't want to sleep all afternoon so decided to a tour of constitution hill. So here is a little history lesson for you history buffs. If you are not, skip to the bottom.
The hill was formerly the site of a fort which was later used as a prison. The Old Fort Prison complex is known as Number Four. The original prison was built to house white male prisoners in 1892. The Old Fort was built around this prison by Paul Kruger from 1896 to 1899 to
Heidelberg
Heidelberg protect the South African Republic from the threat of British invasion. Later, Boer military leaders of the Anglo-Boer War were imprisoned here by the British.
The Old Fort prison was later extended to include "native" cells, called Section 4 and Section 5, and, in 1907, a women's section was added. An awaiting-trial block was constructed in the 1920s. Both political activists opposed to apartheid and common criminals were held at the prison. Mahatma Gandhi was imprisoned here in 1906, and striking white mineworkers in 1907, 1913 and 1922.
Under the apartheid* government, only whites were held in the Old Fort itself, except for Nelson Mandela, who was given a bed in the hospital section when he was as an awaiting-trial prisoner in 1962 prior to the Rivonia Trial. Joe Slovo, Bram Fischer, Albert Luthuli and Robert Sobukwe were also inmates.
The site housed prisoners until 1983, when it was closed. In 1995, the Constitutional Court justices began looking for a permanent location for the new Court and this is the site.
God bless wikipedia.
We are staying at a great guest house and eco farm called Ekala complete with it's own sheep herd, rabbits, geese
Soccer Stadium
Soccer Stadium and fruit orchard. http://www.ekala.co.za/. Better yet a good bottle of wine can be bought :-)
Tomorrow we head off to Zambia so stay tuned for more...
* Apartheid was a system of legal racial segregation enforced by the National Party government in South Africa between 1948 and 1994, under which the rights of the majority black inhabitants of South Africa were curtailed and minority rule by whites was maintained.
Racial segregation in South Africa began in colonial times, but apartheid as an official policy was introduced following the general election of 1948. New legislation classified inhabitants into racial groups ("black", "white", "coloured", and "Indian"), and residential areas were segregated by means of forced removals. From 1958, Blacks were deprived of their citizenship, legally becoming citizens of one of ten tribally based self-governing homelands called bantustans, four of which became nominally independent states. The government segregated education, medical care, and other public services, and provided black people with services inferior to those of whites.
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francois
non-member comment
sweet
good lord, 44 hours is a long time. Looks like it was worth it.