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Published: June 15th 2009
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Johannesburg * Some Violent Content
Time is sure flying by! I am officially finished with my first semester of grad school. Last Thursday I turned in my final paper for the course and then I set off for a weekend in Johannesburg. A friend of mine had a dental conference in Joburg and so Andrea and I thought we would tag along and see the big city. Johannesburg is very different from Durban and that was evident right away when we arrived. It was late at night and I don’t think freezing can even describe how cold I was! I know those of you from Alaska are laughing at me right now, but it was really cold. The temps at night got down into the 40s and my little sweater was not sufficient to keep me from losing feeling in my extremities. Thankfully on Friday the sun came out and things warmed up, a bit… Andrea and I set out in a minibus to an area called Newtown where we went to a market before meeting up with some other Amb. Scholars who were studying at Wits. We had a coffee with them, hit up the oriental market (its name,
Sunset
The sunsets here are breathtaking! not mine) had some lunch, then headed out to Constitution Hill. Constitution Hill is the area of the new constitutional court as well as a former prison. Seeing this prison was incredible, the brutality that occurred inside those walls to prisoners such as Nelson Mandela and Mahatma Gandhi was astounding. We saw the solitary confinement rooms, the rack where prisoners were held while they were beaten, as well as the accounts of both prisoners and guards on the horrendous conditions. They had available examples of what the prisoners were fed, based on race of course, as well as other inspections and routines they were forced to adhere to. After seeing the Apartheid Museum on Sunday I still think this prison 4 as its known, was the most eye-opening, education and moving thing we did in Joburg. Another part of Constitution Hill was a temporary exhibit of the Xenophobic attacks that happen just a year ago. A plain room was set up with photos depicting the stomach turning attacks on immigrants, refugees and other non-South Africans. My isiZulu professor told me people would take on a Zulu name to try to blend in but then the attackers would ask them if
they knew the isiZulu word for an obscure body part like elbow, and if they could not name it they would know they were foreigners and then beat or kill them. Nobody here is denying that racial lines and tensions still exist but it is astoundingly sad that these attacks still happen especially on this scale. Where is the rainbow nation?
So after experiencing Constitution Hill we went back to our friend’s place on campus and got ready to meet up with others for dinner and a movie. It was great to see where I would have been living at Wits! I then split up with Andrea and Mike, went for dinner and out to see the movie White Wedding. I may have already told some of you about this movie, it is my favorite movie ever. I have seen it twice now and can’t wait for it to come out on DVD next week. It is a romantic comedy about a man heading to his wedding in Cape Town, it’s great because I have been almost everywhere in the movie, but it’s also just the fact it is a South African movie that makes it so wonderful. They
use terms that I am now familiar with and let’s just say I can relate to their car issues in the Eastern Cape! The movie is hilarious and is done in both English and Xhosa. I think there is a bit of isiZulu in there as well, but I can’t tell because both isiZulu and Xhosa are very close. If you ever are just online check it out on youtube under White Wedding Movie Trailer.
Okay this is going to be a long blog! So back to Joburg, on Saturday Andrea and I headed out confident with our minibus skills. Minibuses are like big vans that are usually driving at erratic warp speed around town. They are cheap and pile people in on top of each other to get to their destination. Unfortunately these busses are still a very good representation of a racial divide in South Africa. So Andrea and I sat in the front this time which meant we had to count money and give back change but it also meant we had a better chance of getting off at the right spot, there are no actual stops you just have to tell the driver. We encountered a
problem when we realized the English speaker that had helped us was no longer the driver. The driver kept asking me where I was going and I tried to tell him and only got the same response from him, Bree street. I would reply no we are going to Yale street, Yale street off of Enoch. Him: Bree street? Me: Yale Street. Him: Bree street? Me: Okay fine yes we are going to Bree Street. Him: Okay! (big smile) So somehow we ended back at Bree street which was the same area we were in the day before. We decided just to relax a bit, I found a photography exhibit on drug addiction and rehabilitation, went to a market, and had some lunch. We worked our way back to the hostel, met up with Mike and headed to a nearby mall. On our way I saw some of the largest, fanciest homes I think I have ever seen, they were incredible but kind of looked ridiculous considering their surroundings. Why would you have this huge fancy house in the middle of Joburg? That night we met up with our friends at a place called Mama Shabeen, Shabeen is traditionally the
word used for a township bar so this place had some character! Six of our friends came and we had a wonderful evening. We even tried Mopani worms which is actually more of a grub and let me tell you are terrible!
As I mentioned above on Sunday we went to the Apartheid Museum which gave a complete history back from when the settlers arrived through to the new constitution and reconciliation acts. The museum was good and informative but I still think Constitution Hill was the most moving thing we saw! The drive home was long and in the end was rainy, full of accidents, and us almost running out of petrol! Going to Joburg I wasn’t sure what to expect, I had been told bad things about the big city, but all in all I really enjoyed it. It was a big city so there were things to do but also a huge meld of cultures. Here in Durban a few different cultural groups make up the majority, which in some ways I like, for instance I know what language to greet people in, and I feel like I am getting to know these cultures more since
there are less of them. But in Joburg I met people from all over Africa and learned new words in many different languages.
I am on vacation now until I start my winter class in July, so I am just hanging around working on my thesis. My close friend is leaving to go home to Australia soon so her and I may do a couple weekend jaunts now that I have my new little Soho. I am still a bit nervous about driving, actually it’s more parking that is challenging, but I am getting around. I can’t believe in a week I will have been living in South Africa for 5 months! Thank you all for your emails and support and for still reading my blog 5 months into it!
Nihamba Kahle
Kayse
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