Cape Town Part 2

On my second visit to Cape Town I got to do a bit more exploring.  Having now traversed the city’s gardens, visited more of its restaurants, scaled Table Mountain (by cable car, not foot), visited the township of Guguleto and hung out in a local jazz bar, I can still safely say it is the most spectacular city I’ve ever visited.

One of the biggest thing going for Cape Town is how green it is.  While Jo’burg gets its rain in summer – mainly via spectacular late afternoon and evening storms – in Cape Town it rains in winter.  The lush mountains, fields and gardens make a refreshing change from the dry, brown landscape in the north of the country.  And the lights seems somehow slightly softer, bringing out the colours of Cape Town’s beautiful old buildings.

But while the food, wine and scenery are all there to soak up, it would be easy for them to mask the serious poverty and hardship that also characterises much of the city.  Nearly everything I read or heard about Cape Town lauded the city’s ‘diversity’.  And certainly the mix of cultures here is evident in everything from food to language to shopping.  But I am sometimes left with the uncomfortable feeling that the term ‘diversity’ in South Africa is really code for ‘inequality’.  At an architect’s talk in Jo’burg some weeks ago, one of the speakers described the city’s spatial diversity, citing as an example the way that street children turn public footpaths into private homes after dark, when they use cardboard boxes to partition sleeping places.  A diverse and creative use of space?  Sure, but hardly something to celebrate.

In Cape Town, the harshness of life in townships on the Cape Flats, the area to which entire black communities were forcibly removed during apartheid, seems even more stark owing to the lush green back drop of Table Mountain.  Tin shacks perch on the side of the freeway, looking like the slightest wind would make them crumble.  I’m told by one of my taxi drivers that the one next to the airport is home to illegal immigrants.

It seems to me that South African townships embody the best and worst of life here.  The poverty and crime are severe.  The unemployment rate is somewhere between 30 and 50 per cent.  But the sense of community in many areas is stronger than I have seen anywhere in the world.  On Monday night we visited the home of trumpeter Blackey and his wife Mama Sheila in the township of Guguleto, for dinner and a private jazz performance.  The food and music were great, but even more striking was the constant background buzz – of kids, adults and dogs – that filtered in from the street for the duration of the evening.  Jamie, a local Capetonian, was aghast.  She had never known such life on the streets at night, elsewhere in Cape Town once the sun goes down you won’t find much moving on the street but cars.

It wasn’t only the sounds the filtered in – while we sat on the couch listening to Blackey on the trumpet and his brother-in-law, Latch, on the guitar, a couple of young girls from a neighbouring house wandered in and out, curious no doubt to see who the visitors were, and an older guy came to join the group singalong at the end.  Mama Sheila explained that in Guguleto, you don’t invite people to visit – they just arrive.  And when you cook dinner, you must always make sure there is extra, in case you have visitors.

So the future in these areas is anything but hopeless.  As Blackey explains, you can’t expect to erase the pain of a century in just 17 years.  But he says that community-minded tourism initiatives, like the jazz safari that we were taking part in, help to provide financial support for families like his.  They will also help him to open the music school that he wants to start for children in his community.

Riding the cable car to the top of Table Mountain 

Bo Kaap - the original Malay quarters in Cape Town

The view to Lion's Head from Bo Kaap

On top of Table Mountain - apart from the congregation at the cafe behind us, wandering
around the top of the Mountain definitely had the feel of genuine wilderness. 

Walking on the top of Table Mountain

Rock dassies enjoying the view

Me enjoying the view.  You can see all the way to the end of
the Cape of Good Hope, the southern most point of Africa 

The Cape Flats from the air - this area, west of the city itself, is where the majority of black
communities were forcibly relocated during apartheid.  It remains home to a large proportion of
Cape Town's population and is a far cry from the city's wealthy northern and southern suburbs.

An informal settlement on the side of the expressway from the airport to the city 

Blackey and Latch play us some jazz tunes in Guguleto. 

The view over Franschoek - a small town about an hour's drive from Cape Town where we spent a night.

Franschoek

Driving along the coast from Franschoek back to Cape Town

More of the coast drive.  We stopped here to admire and photograph the incredible view and while we stood listening to the birds, we heard a kind of honking noise and looked down to see a whole family of seals on the rocks below!

Coffee at Haas - the best soy latte in all of South Africa 

Company's Gardens, right in the centre of town.  Populated with squirrels. 

Cape Town Waterfront

Seals enjoying the Waterfront

A cup of tea at the end of the day on the roof of the Cape Heritage Hotel. Sigh...