January 9th - 10th - Johannesburg, South Africa

Saturday, January 9th 

Randy and Fran arrived about 1 a.m. and we spent a couple of hours talking about their adventures with the gorillas in Rwanda.  What amazing stories and pictures.  They said it was well worth the cost, which was high, and they were right next to several groups of gorillas.  One of the young ones even came up and touched Randy's knee.  The gorilla knew he shouldn't but he snuck a quick touch anyway, which Randy captured on video, and then quickly ran away - quite cute.

Anyway, after such a late night we slept until almost 10 this morning and then just sat around talking and having peanut butter on toast for breakfast.  Luckily I still had some groceries left.  Eventually we decided we had to go out so we walked to Sandton Station and caught the gautrain to Park Station.  The Gautrain (pronounced How-train) has only one main route, the red line, so it's very easy to get around on.  There are two other lines but they are basically to the airport and to a residential area that we were not interested in seeing.  The train and the stations are very new looking and clean with no graffiti or garbage anywhere.  They don't allow food or drink in the area.  Even gum is forbidden so Fran had to keep swallowing her gum before entering.  The guards would actually stop her if she didn't.  The rules seemed pretty strict and strange but it sure made for clean enjoyable facilities, and the rides were very smooth.

Once at Park Station our original plan was to do some touring around but after talking to the lovely lady at the Hop-On, Hop-Off bus we decided to do most of our touring on another day.  Instead we went to have some lunch.  The same lovely lady sent us over to a nearby restaurant to have meat and pap.  The latter is sort of a thick mashed potatoes which they eat with their fingers and pick up the rest of their food with it.  It's basically the same as nsima in Malawi and different names in other countries.  I'm not overly fond of it but the meal was served with lots of gravy, which did taste good with it.  My chicken was also good, as was the spinach (or some kind of green) and other vegetable which was a mix of onions, peppers, carrots and beans.  I don't remember it's name.  

After that we wandered around the area for a while.  There was a huge train/bus station behind and we wandered from one end to the other of it.  We also walked through the market behind, which was a bit sketchy but at least it was in daylight.  By the time we came out again it was starting to rain so we decided to head back on the gautrain and get some groceries and go back to the hotel.  To get to the grocery store we had to go past the hotel, which was a good thing since it had started raining.  We sat around and did some more visiting while the storm raged on.  Then the rain let up so Randy and Fran decided to walk to the store for groceries as it was almost dinner time.  I stayed home as my knee was bothering me again.  They returned with some groceries and a pizza for dinner and the rest of the evening was spent relaxing and enjoying ourselves while the rains began to fall again and we had another thunderstorm.   

Sunday, January 10th

We had another light breakfast in our apartment and then walked to the Santon Gautrain station and went to the Park station where we bought our hop-on hop-off bus tickets and caught the 9:30 bus.  Our first stop was almost two hours away at Constitution Hill.  We decided to go there first as it closed at 3 p.m.on Sundays.  The first part of the trip was very long and I have to say that I was getting rather bored at times.  The stories as we drove along were interesting but there wasn't really a lot to see and we were covering a lot of distance.  Stop 5, about an hour into the trip, was the Apartheid Museum and we were going to go back to it later in the afternoon but since it was over an hour along the route, even that didn't seem like it would be possible in one day.  However, that was the plan.

We eventually made it to Constitution HIll and we spent quite a while at the site which has many parts to it: the ladies prison, the men's cell blocks, the isolation areas, the awaiting trial areas, the old fort prison and ramparts, and the newer Constitution Hall.   We bought our tickets but had some time before the tour started so we went to the ladies prison, which was not on the official tour.   This building is now used as an office / administration area.  However, there are still exhibits around and off of the main entrance, which was a large oval entrance hall two storeys high with white columns all around and arched doorways on the first floor and arched windows on second floor.  There was a lovely black high railing all around the top floor in the main lobby.  That, along with the shiny polished floor below and all the daylight filtering in, made the entrance look very nice and inviting.  However, as the story goes, this was not a nice area at all and new prisoners had to walk across this floor and stand there waiting to hear what was happening to them.  To say they were not treated well in this place would be an understatement.

Several of the exits off of the main hall on the first floor took you into exhibit halls or rows of cells.  The cells were not large and in each one they had an exhibit about an individual prisoner who was once "a guest" in the facility.  The exhibits were interesting as many of the ladies had not done a lot wrong.  Many of them were arrested because they were making home-made beer, a staple for the blacks at the time but not allowed by the white government.  Some were arrested for pass exceptions - not having the pass issued to them so they could walk on the streets or in certain neighbourhoods.  A few were actual political activists like Winnie Mandela but at that time even her charge was mainly just speaking against the government, nothing drastic.  In most cases the exhibits told you what happened before, during and after their incarceration and some of the stories were truly inspirational.  We didn't get to second floor as we had to get to our tour and I don't know if it was mainly offices or more exhibits.  

Our tour started in the old Number 4, just one of many of the cell blocks that once existed during Apartheid, but probably the most notorious.   Again, many of the prisoners were arrested more because of the colour of their skin than any crime they committed, and they were treated very poorly.  The conditions were unsanitary and crowded and cold, and the prisoners were fed very little.  The diet you received was determined by the colour of your skin and what you did while in prison.  The whites of course got the best food including meat.  The blacks got very little and generally no meat or dairy.  The one exception was for the prisoners who worked all day and they of course needed a bit more protein to do their jobs.  The isolation wings were really just rows of doors and that's about as big as the cells were.  The group rooms were much larger but were way too crowded.  The toilets and eating areas were outside and they were right beside each other and, since no one could be left alone or unguarded, everything was open to everyone at all times.  

Mahatma Gandhi was a prisoner here.  Obviously not a criminal, he was arrested for speaking out against the conditions the Indian miners were facing in the country and holding peaceful demonstrations and marches, and for refusing to get and use his pass as a non-white person.  Being Indian he was neither black (native) or white so his pass would be for a "non-white" or "Asian" person.

The new Constitutional Court is the home of the Constitution, the highest law of the land.  It is built around the remaining stairwells of a the old Awaiting Trial Block, and is very open and light to represent the fact that the Court would be open, accessible and transparent.  Various columns slanted in different directions within it are metaphors for trees and represent the fact that native Africans traditionally met under trees to discuss matters of importance.  The court hearings are always open to the public as another display of openness, accessibility and transparency.  There was an art display down the halls of the Court and we also took a look at that.

All of Constitution Hill is on the site of the Old Fort built by Paul Kruger in 1893 to protect the area from British attacks and to watch over the gold miners in the valley below.  It became a jail (gaol) after the Anglo Boer War.  White prisoners were held in the Old Fort itself, which had better facilities, while others were held in the less-glamorous facilities near by.  Nelson Mandela was the only exception.  When he was arrested in 1962, he was given a bed in the hospital wing of the Old Fort.  The whole Constitution HIll complex was interesting and I would have liked more time to look at more of the exhibits in detail but we were rushing through our tour and through the day so we didn't have much time.  We saw the Hop-On, Hop-Off bus coming in so we caught it and were on our way for the rest of the tour.

I no longer remember whether we made another stop on our way around but I think not.  I think we just went back to the starting point, ate in the same little mall area we had eaten in the previous lunch time and then caught the Gautrain back to our stop, walked around there for a bit and then walked back to our apartment.

I guess I should say something about the rest of Johannesburg since we did see a lot of it as we rode around on the bus.  Jo'burg is definitely an interesting city.  There is beautiful old architecture and big brick buildings that are impressive, and there are small buildings with ornate decorations like balconies with railings and they too are impressive.  And in amongst all the old you see shiny new skyscrapers of steel and glass that are equally impressive but in a different way.  There are squares and boulevards with statues and monuments, and lots of trees everywhere.  There are brightly coloured paintings and mosaics on some of the buildings.  There are huge shopping malls and there are narrower streets where the vendors sell their wares on the sidewalks or from small kiosks or just off blankets on the street.  There are lots of people around some of the areas at some of the times and other areas almost seem deserted, probably like any big city.  

The bus tour took us past the old mining district where there was a walking tour you could take but we didn't do that.  We could see some of the large outdoor mining equipment as we drove around the area.  It also went past the Gold Reef City Casino , Hotel and Theme Park.  It looked like a very busy place but we decided against spending time there.  The only part that really interested us was the mine tour where you went down into an old mine to see how it worked, but that took more time and money than we were prepared to spend - or at least more than I was prepared to spend.  The other sights were mainly just big city sights like malls and special districts. Fran wanted to go to the textile district but we never made it there either.

One of the most amazing things about Jo'burg is that it has no large water source within the city.  The city was founded in 1866 during the gold rush and the gold was discovered under the ground.  With no major river or lake nearby that was large enough to meet the needs of the city, much of the water is delivered by pipeline from a source over 500 km away.  I can't think of any other large city anywhere in the world that is in that situation.  The city itself has a population of over 4 million and the urban area surrounding it is about 8 million so a lot of water is needed.  Now I have to confess that someone told us about the water situation - possibly the commentary on the bus tour.  I don't think I ever saw it in print.

Whites represent less than 15% of the population in the city and English is the first language of only about 30%.  Zulu and Afrikaans are the other main ones.  South Africa actually has 11 official languages including English, Afrikaans and most of the tribal languages.  Canada can barely handle two!  And on that note I think I'll end the Jo'burg extras.