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Published: August 21st 2013
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an african proverb says ‘birds sing not because they have answers but because they have a song.’ wearing shorts for our legs, t-shirts for our arms + this proverb as our song, the troubadours landed down at a surprisingly cold + stormy cape town international airport.
the hope of meeting in depth creative south african’s living courageous + adventurous lives was quite an aspiration considering we didn’t yet know anybody other than the email contacts given to us by the remarkable amanda jackson (international advocacy + campaigns director of micah challenge).
deliberately only planning the first step of this new adventure, we left the airport with instructions of how to get to our accommodation. so we turned up to rene august + caroline powells house (our one contact) to the news that it was rene’s birthday + all of her amazing friends were coming to her birthday party that night - needlessly to say the meeting of creative ppl living courageous + adventurous lives had begun. whom else we would met was most mysterious but it was this mystery that drove us on..
we met desmond tutu. yes, i did say desmond
tutu, ‘the’ desmond tutu! it was all thanks to our new friend rene who is an anglican minister which has the draw backs of wearing silly gowns but with the perks of knowing ‘the’ desmond tutu personally as a friend! of course we didn’t know this until she casually mentioned that he runs a weekly service + asked ‘if we would like to meet him?’.. cough cough.. would we what?! heck yes we would!! despite the ungodly hour, we soon found ourselves face to face with one of the worlds truly epic heroes - i mean there are rock stars who say that this guy is their boss!
he finished the service by telling the story during the darkest days of apartheid when he used to say to p.w botha (the president of south africa), that we had already won + invited him + other white south africans to join the winning side.
we met the stunningly beautiful cape town. the quintessential melting pot, a city full of mind-blowing stories, interesting characters, beautiful scenery where the unexpected is always just around the corner. we did the big red double decker bus tour (to make up for
not doing one in london) where we heard her stories + got to know cape town a little better. khoisan + bantu ppls walked the earth of cape town from ancient times thru to modernity before the portuguese followed by the dutch + british decided to walk their grubby feet all over the ground - they claimed to be ‘helping’. this ‘help’ eventually led to apartheid. on top our red bus we drove past a bunch of large vacant paddocks in the middle of the city called district 6. in 1986, the once vibrant district 6 area was bulldozed + declared a white-only area.
cape town is domineered by table mountain + its mountain friends such as lions head (which we walked up its spiralling walking track) + lions bum which is a lower lying hill where we watched paragliders launch out into the sunset. we enjoyed a gorgeous day eating fresh fish + chips in kalk bay whilst watching the local seals try + sneak fish from the fishermen. on yet another such dazzling sunny day, we planned to go read in the kirstenbosch botanical gardens. as we entered the gardens we kept walking + walking
until we realised that we were half way up table mountain – we figured we may as well just keep going so we journeyed right to the top without any water!
cape town even fulfilled unmet premarital promises - when i was “tuning” lauren i said i would take her to see penguins (not that she ever expressed any desire to see this flightless bird) on the tassie nth-wst coast ‘someday’ – well that ‘someday’ came but at boulders near simon’s town! + we continued round the cape peninsula finishing with a spectacular sunset drive rounding chapman’s peak with stunning views.
we even met the spirit of madiba.. have you ever been locked in a room watching the hands journey round the clock face thinking ‘i really could be outside doing something better with my time’. yeah well i think nelson understands how u feel! haw-haw. now despite what u might think, based on the normally historically sound simpsons.. nelson mandela was not freed from prison by krusty the clown when he inadvertently helped his escape by telling the band to play vuvuzelas.
robben island (nicknamed ‘the university’) was where mandela
lived for 18 of his 27 years of imprisonment. being guided thru such a historically significant place by an ex prisoner was special to say the least. standing on the lime that mandela shovelled + the prison garden he built during his stay.
we met a wonderful group of ppl called ‘the warehouse’ who are serving their local community in its response to poverty, injustice + division. if u look up the words ‘courageous’ + ‘adventurous’ in urban dictionary.com u will find the definition is founding family craig, liesel, zac, eliza + vivian stewart. they put their heart + soul into repairing the damage created by apartheid governments. if u drive along wetton rd u will find ppl sitting by the side of the road sometimes all day waiting to be picked up by someone looking for a casual employee. it is a community with high unemployment, low education + gang violence. in a nearby suburb called manenburg there had been ongoing gang shoot outs during our stay in the streets while mothers were walking their children home from school.
now the national average of police in south africa is 1 police person per
300 residents. in manenburg which has the highest gang violence rates in the country it is 1 police per 3000 ppl! why? well there is concerns that corrupt politicians have invested drug related interest in keeping the area the way it is.
so what do u do when no-one else is doing anything.. well the warehouse + local residents staged a march against gang violence. one resident said ‘in most cases the community gives in to the shootings + as a person in this community i say we must turn it around. we must be able to say we’re not afraid”. residents carried white flags symbolising peace during the march.
we also met tony nzanzah + i gave a talk at the su national staff team who do great work in schools, holiday clubs + camps for underprivileged children. we went with sedrico husselman + the horsham group (from england) to athwood primary school which neighbours manenburg.
we met margie jensen + her flat mates mangel (jason) + liz. now margie is the south african micah challenge co-ordinator + doubled as our personal part time travel agent! she is working with
community groups raising awareness + standing up to corruption at the political + business level.
feeling like we had met cape town, we drove north to blaukrans bridge in hope of meeting ‘fear’.. yes that’s right 216 metres of it – the highest bridge bungy jump in the world. now as this is part 1 of my south african blog i must follow protocol + leave u with a cliff hanger.. in this case a bridge hanger. so here i was looking out into the raindrops falling into the misty blaukrans valley. i jumped out in the air between the rain thru myself + back again. + for a moment, just for a moment i was free.. freedom had conquered fear.
so did i survive this epic conquest of freedom over fear so that i could someday write this blog?! well ladies + gents i’m gunna leave u hanging, but u can find out next time in round 2 of our south african adventures!
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Rene August
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RE: Desmond Tutu
Thanx Ben - Just to say, Tutu still comes up to me and asks me what my name is ;) so about him being a personal friend... I wish