The Beginning of the End

First of all, my apologies for being an absentee blogger the past 10 days. Between soccer, the museum, and research, I haven’t had much free time at night to go to an internet cafe and update the blog. So without further delay, here is a basic run down of what I’ve been up to.

Museum:
My work at the museum has continued along similar lines since my last post. Since creating the publicity poster, I made a display in the museum’s coffee shop advertising the new exhibit and displaying entrance information in the hopes of increasing awareness among museum visitors. Since last week, I have only been stopping into the museum for a few hours each day to help out with small projects, so my time there is quite limited.

Research follow-up:
I have dove into follow up research from my senior thesis. In the past two weeks, I have been at the National Library of South Africa going through newspapers on microfilm, and I have had several meetings with professors at both the University of Cape Town and the University of the Western Cape. Bouncing around from place to place has kept me extremely busy, but I have gotten a lot of useful advice and information out of it. I still don’t know what will be my next step going forward when I return home, but I will figure that out when the time comes.

World Cup:
In my last post, I raved about this pizza-esque dish called flammkuchen I enjoyed at the Biscuit Mill food market. Well, through some internet research, I discovered that the people who made it have a restaurant in downtown Cape Town, about a ten minute walk from the museum. Since it’s a German restaurant, I figured that it would be a perfect place to watch last Wednesday’s semifinal between Germany and Spain. And it was. I got to enjoy another flammkuchen, and although the results didn’t turn out favorably for the German fans in attendance, a good time was had by all.

It’s hard to believe that as I am writing this, I only have another week in Cape Town and that the World Cup final is just 2 days away. I’ll be sure to update on Monday about what is going to be an awesome finale to what has been an awesome tournament–and an awesome summer–so far.

GO SPAIN!

Moving On

It’s been a pretty eventful week here in Cape Town as the World Cup progressed into the knockout stages and I transitioned away from working on the Offside exhibition.  Now that it’s officially open, I’ve been tasked with helping some of the members of the Exhibition Department to think of ways to market it.  Since the new exhibition and the Fields of Play exhibit are located in the District Six Museum Homecoming Centre about a block away from the main museum building, many visitors come to the museum without even knowing that there is a separate building to explore.

From my perspective, the biggest problem is that there are no signs or clear publicity material educating visitors about Offside and Fields of Play.  So that’s where I decided to start.  With some creative inspiration and help from Microsoft Word, I spent a good deal of time this past week creating a poster to be displayed at the museum entrance and at the welcome desk.  On the poster I put the museum entrance fee information (a visitor to the main museum building pays an entrance fee of 20 /$2.50, while entrance to both buildings costs R35/$4.50) along with a description of the new exhibits.

My hope is that prominently displaying the pricing schedule for both exhibits will inform visitors right off the bat that there is more to see.  Obviously this is a small first step, but I am hoping that it will help to increase the number of visitors who engage with the exhibitions and also increase entrance fee revenue for the museum.  An extra R15 a head could really add up for a non-profit so dependent on outside funding.

Other than my work at District Six, I have also been starting some follow-up research from my senior thesis on the political origins of the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission.  After engaging with the topic over the course of the year, there are some lingering questions I want to answer.  Although I have already handed the thesis in, I am trying to take advantage of my time in Cape Town to interview a few important figures and consult more primary sources.  Depending on what additional information I am able to find, I am considering trying to edit my thesis and publish it in an academic journal.  It’s a bit of a long shot at this point, so we’ll have to see what happens.

So while I have been putting in a good amount of hard work, I have been making sure to fully enjoy all that Cape Town and the World Cup have to offer.  It’s been fun cheering on the US (especially after their win on Wednesday), and despite their loss on Saturday night, it was awesome to finally see them advance into the Round of 16.  With the US out, I’ll probably be cheering for Argentina and Ghana.

And since no blog post would be complete without a food reference, Saturday morning I made a triumphant return to the Neighborhood Goods Market at the Old Biscuit Mill just outside of downtown Cape Town.  Every Saturday morning, around 50 food vendors gather in a barn/tent outside of a refurbished Biscuit Mill to sell everything from crepes and curries to falafel, gourmet steak sandwiches, and pan-seared tuna.  It’s like any urban food festival (such as the Taste of Buffalo) except nicer, less expensive, and with full-sized portions.  For the record, I ate a delicious falafel, date and walnut muffin, and flammkuchen (I have no idea how to describe it—you’ll have to check out this link)—all for about $8.  Needless to say, now that I have weekends off from the museum, I will be back next Saturday!

 

A Work in Progress

So close, but not quite enough.

That’s the best way to decribe Bafana Bafana’s 2-1 victory over France yesterday afternoon.  But although South Africa impressively notched its first-ever win against the French soccer team, its 1-1-1 record in group play was not enough to move on to the Round of 16. 

Cheering on Bafana Bafana for in its last World Cup match was a blast.  In their heart of hearts, South Africa’s fans (this one included) were hoping for a repeat of the 1995 Rugby World Cup in which an unlikely South African squad charged to victory on home soil.  To make the dream come true, the team had to outscore France by four goals (and therefore achieve the goal differential necessary to place South Africa above Mexico in second place in the Group A standings). 

For some time in the first half, the impossible seemed likely.  South Africa’s offense was on fire, and the team got a boost from an early red card issued to France that brought the squad down to ten men on the field.  In the end, though, Bafana Bafana’s best effort was good enough to send France home without a single World Cup victory, but not enough to prevent South Africa from becoming the first World Cup host nation not to advance out of group play.

In the past two weeks, there’s been a lot written by commentators—foreign and domestic—about this year’s South African team: how they’ve united a nation divided along lines race and poverty, how they’ve injected a sense of enthusiasm into a nation prone to division and contestation, and how they’ve reinvigorated a unique South African pride dormant since the Mandela years.

Part of me wants to believe that these pundits have it right.  As I have written in previous posts, it has been incredible to see the excitement that has taken hold in support of Bafana Bafana.  In many ways, it appears as if the country stands united.  On game days, the streets are flooded with green and gold with vuvuzelas blaring from all corners of the city.  And as cliché newspaper stories observe, 16 years after the end of apartheid, black and white South Africans gathered around televisions in bars, cafes, and fan parks to cheer on their team.

But it would be all too simple to say of a country as complicated as South Africa that one game, one team could transcend all of the barriers that divide its people.

Most South Africans live in parallel worlds still painfully divided by the legacy of apartheid.  So while cheering on a soccer team in the streets of Cape Town allows for an intersection between these separate lives, it is only temporary and fleeting.  When the final whistle blows, a diverse crow of South Africans clad in green and yellow return to neighborhoods, churches, and schools shaped by a history of racial segregation and bogged down by lingering economic disparity.

These rare moments—when the nation stands together— show the power and potential of what is possible in this Rainbow Nation.  But they also point out how much work remains.  Indeed, South Africa is a work in progress.

The excitement continues

Last Friday’s World Cup opening game between Bafana Bafana and Mexico ushered in a new level of football hysteria here in Cape Town.  In anticipation of the 4pm game, streets were full of supporters in green and yellow, and crowds in bars spilled out of the entrances.  Long Street, the main bar strip in downtown Cape Town, was so crowded that every single bar closed their doors and stationed bouncers at the entrances in order to stop more zealous fans from entering.  Luckily, with a horde of people pushing up against me at the doors of Long Street Café, I was able to persuade the door man to let me in just in time for the singing of the South African national anthem.

The vuvuzela-blowing, singing, and chanting that had filled the streets all day continued throughout the match, and the enthusiasm in the air was incredible.  With the home team advantage and the support of a nation behind them, Bafana Bafana notched the first goal of the game, but Mexico answered later in the second half, ending the game in a 1-1 draw.  For a squad widely dismissed as one of the worst teams in the tournament, South Africa proved that they did indeed belong on the World Cup pitch.

Since Friday’s game, what I have been up to can be described in two words—football and the exhibition.  On Saturday, the other Duke students and I headed into to Museum to help the exhibitions staff with installation.  Later on in the day, we walked to the FIFA Fan Park in front of City Hall—which is less than a block away from the museum—to watch the US team take on England.  Unsurprisingly, USA fans were greatly outnumbered by English supporters dressed in red and white and waving their flag.  After Steven Gerrard’s early goal, it seemed like it would be a lopsided game, but with tough play and a lucky break from the English goaltender, the US pulled away with a 1-1 tie.  Needless to say, the few US fans in the viewing area were celebrating when the ref blew the final whistle.

Work on Monday flew by.  Although things were hectic preparing the exhibit for the opening the following night, my mind was focused on the Italy-Paraguay game that I would be attending that evening at Cape Town Stadium.  The experience lived up to my expectations.  It’s been a lot of fun watching the soccer games on TV, but actually being there in the stadium—experiencing the sights, sounds, and emotions first-hand—was incredible.

Since most of the roads near the stadium were closed and traffic was totally clogged downtown, we decided simply to walk to the game instead of taking a taxi.  It seemed like a good decision as we weaved through streets jammed packed with commuters driving home and tour buses and taxis dropping off fans at the game.  But with the glowing Cape Town Stadium in sight about a kilometer ahead, the clouds opened up and unleashed a torrential downpour of rain mixed with hail.  Everyone walking to the stadium got drenched—especially because FIFA bans umbrellas from the stadium, so no one had one on them.  The rain began to let up as we went through security, headed inside the stadium, and made our way to our incredibly positioned seats at midfield, under the stadium’s roof.

The game itself was a lot of fun.  We were surrounded mostly by Italy fans (I was cheering for Paraguay, the underdogs), but luckily no one nearby was blowing a vuvuzela (they are ridiculously loud and equally annoying in person).  Paraguay scored first near the end of the first half, unleashing a wave of excitement from the few Paraguayan supporters in the crowd.  Unfortunately, Italy managed to answer in the second half with a goal off of a corner kick.  Overall, I really enjoyed the experience.  The soccer was entertaining, but the most exciting part of the game was when everyone in the crowd did the wave (and it lasted for three laps around the stadium!).

Tuesday was the day I had been working toward since my first day back at the museum three weeks ago.  All day we swept, polished, mopped, and ran around the exhibit hall making sure that everything was in order.  By the time 6pm rolled around and guests began to arrive for the Offsides exhibit opening, we were finished, and the exhibition looked awesome.  After speeches from the British High Commissioner in South Africa (the exhibition was partly funded by the British Council), Bonita, the director of the District Six Museum, and Tina, the head of the Museum’s Exhibition Department, a vuvuzela was blown to mark the exhibit’s official opening.  The evening was particularly rewarding to see the guests enjoy all off the hard work we have put in.  And the hors d’oeuvres were delicious.

Wednesday—Youth Day—was a public holiday in South Africa commemorating the June 16, 1976 student uprising in the Soweto township outside of Johannesburg.  Sadly, instead of enjoying the day off, I found myself back at the Museum helping out with their annual Youth Day public program.  This year, many of the former residents of District Six gathered to visit the newly opened Offsides exhibition.  After serving the guests tea and coffee (it still amuses me how intense South Africans are about their tea—one woman rejected a cup I served to her because it was rooibos tea and not the regular Ceylon tea variety), museum officials gave a near repeat of their speeches from the night before.

Unsurprising to me, however, the program seemed to devolve as the day progressed.  Upon entering, each of the guests was given a different color circle to divide them into three groups.  The new exhibition is a bit small, so not everyone could visit at once.  As soon as the larger group was divided, things fell apart.  The guests—many of whom are in their late 60s and 70s—did not listen to instructions.  Instead of cooperating with the rotations that were planned, they just went wherever they wanted.  I couldn’t help but laugh on the inside while all this was happening.  Last year’s Youth Day celebration was similarly thwarted by rogue guests, so it all came quite expectedly.

I’ll post back at the end of the weekend with more about this past week.  I wanted to get this up ASAP since I have been bad about updating the blog.

The Games Begin

The front page of today’s Cape Times is emblazoned with a big, bold headline reading, “It’s here.”  But anyone who has been in Cape Town the past few days didn’t need a newspaper to tell them that the World Cup has finally arrived.  Since Wednesday, euphoria and enthusiasm have been coursing through the city.  You cannot walk 10 feet without seeing a South African flag, and you can’t go more than a minute without hearing, somewhere near in the distance, the buzzing sound of a vuvuzela (if you don’t know what this is yet, just watch a World Cup game and you soon will).

A parade through the city center last night drew more than 50,000 people—more than I have ever seen in the downtown area, especially at night time!  South Africans and soccer supporters from across the world were dancing in the streets and revelling in the excitement of the 30 days to come.  And this afternoon’s opening match between Mexico and South Africa’s nationally team, Bafana Bafana (translated literally, it means “the Boys”) has literally paralyzed the city.  Businesses are closing early, and right now, at around 11am SAST, the streets are already filling up with fans donning green and yellow.  It is going to be an awesome day and an awesome tournament.  I can’t wait to be a part of it.

Couch Hopping

It’s been an interesting first week in Cape Town to say the least. After three uneventful yet exhausting flights (Buffalo to JFK, JFK to Amsterdam, Amsterdam to Cape Town), I arrived at the airport around 10:30p on Saturday night. My co-workers from the District Six Museum Tina and Chris were there to greet me and take me to Tina’s sister Judee’s house in the Southern Suburbs, where I would be staying until I moved into my permanent accommodation on June 1 (3 days later).

Judee’s hospitality was wonderful, and on Sunday she and Tina’s mother treated me to a wonderful homemade and hearty chicken pie (after I slept in until around 1pm). And on Monday, I drove into work with her and took the train into the city to the museum.

But on Tuesday—move in day—things went awry. Through Gumtree, a South African version of Craiglist, I found an apartment in the suburb of Observatory (where I lived last summer) occupied by a UCT student who was going home to Johannesburg during the winter break, from June 1 to July 22. It was great timing for me, (I will be headed back to the States on July 19), and the price was very affordable. It all seemed perfect until I saw the room. It was filthy, the bathroom was incredibly small, the shared kitchen was disgusting, and the other occupants of the complex were, to be polite, a bit rough around the edges. Not that I can’t get along with people different than myself or tolerate a less than ideal living arrangement, but the sum of all these factors convinced me that this wouldn’t be the greatest fit. And then there was also the fact, as I learned from a colleague, that some students living in that area had been stabbed a few months back.

Thus began a frantic search for housing and a string of sleepless nights on couches and floors. I spent the next two days in internet cafes back on Gumtree looking at any and all housing available for short term leases, calling numbers listed on postings, and visiting apartments and houses. Later in the afternoon on Wednesday, I found an ad listing a room in Tamboerskloof, which is a suburb within walking distance of the main city center, and also where I lived my first summer in Cape Town. I called the woman whose number was listed on the ad, and to my delight, she told me she had one room left.

Tamboerskloof is located on the slopes of Lion’s Head, so walking up the streets is entirely uphill. With an address in hand for a room to check out, I hiked up the very top of Woodside Ave (coincidentally, it’s a block away from where I lived while participating in DukeEngage). As I walked up the driveway to the house, an older woman in a wheelchair perched at the door waiting, with a dog alongside her. I introduced myself, and she invited me inside, explaining that her dog, Rikki, was both blind and deaf.

Having to prod Rikki along (since calling out to him was useless), she showed me around her house and took me to the room she was renting out. The room was very nice with its own bathroom, and the house’s kitchen was fully furnished and equipped. I asked who else lived there, and she replied that her grown son did, and she remarked that he works until late at night at a neighborhood deli. (I frequented that deli my first summer in Cape Town. As soon as I saw her son, I immediately remembered his face—he was guy who we always said was so creepy.) As we were talking, she explained to me that she is a night owl, so I wouldn’t have to worry about coming in late. In fact, she said, she and her son often stay up late watching movies. (It’s true…last night I came in at 1:30am, and they were both laying on the couch with blankets, watching the Discovery channel.)

So despite the strange living situation, I decided to take the room. Having slept at Judee’s house, on my co-worker Chris’ couch (it wasn’t big enough for me so I rested my legs on a chair I pulled up next to the couch), and on the floor in the bed and breakfast the DukeEngage students are living at, I moved in to the house in Tamboerskloof on Friday. It’s in a nice location right around from where the DukeEngage students live, I can walk to work, and it’s very safe. In fact, it is located literally right next to the Russian consulate in Cape Town, which has a 24 hr hour armed guard outside. Hopefully it will be a bit nicer than my house in Observatory, which had been broken into several times before.

Aside from the whole housing saga, things have been going quite well. It was great to be back at the museum, see all of my co-workers, and of course, revisit all of my favorite lunch spots. In fact, things at the museum are a bit hectic at the moment, and I quickly got thrown into the hustle and bustle. The Exhibitions Department is busy putting up a new exhibit to complement the existing “Fields of Play” soccer exhibition (“Fields of Play” explores the history of soccer in Cape Town and the role of forced removals in shaping the various leagues). The new exhibit is titled “Offsides,” and it focuses on the racism African soccer players faced when playing in professional leagues in Britain. The official opening is June 15, so everyone is trying to complete the installation in time. I myself have spent a lot of time painting the silhouette of a soccer stadium crowd on one wall of the exhibition area.

On the whole, this past week and in my previous two summers at the museum, seeing how much planning and effort goes into making an exhibition—from research, writing, design, and installation—has given me a new appreciation for museum work. When you walk through a museum, read its panels, and look at its photographs and artifacts, it is only because the tireless behind-the-scenes efforts of so many people.

Needless to say, a lot of the focus on football exhibitions at the museum is anticipation of the World Cup, which kicks off on Friday night with an opening game between Bafana Bafana (the South African national team) and Mexico. In the run up to the cup, soccer fever truly has taken hold here. South African flags (and lots of flags from other countries, too) are flying everywhere, from cars windows and elastic fabric covers around the side mirrors of cars to office building windows and street vendor stalls. Renovations to the airport and train station are complete, streets have been cleaned, security guards are out in full force, World Cup banners are flying on street lamp poles, and the Fan Park set up in the Grand Parade in front of City Hall is starting to take shape.

This week, things are about to get very exciting in Cape Town—and across South Africa. It’s going to be exciting to see South Africa take center stage, and it will be even cooler to get to be a part of it—I bought tickets for one of the games in Cape Town, a match between Italy and Paraguay on June 14. And as much excitement as the month-long tournament is bound to bring to the southern tip of Africa, it is going to be very interesting, too, to see what happens when the dust settles and the country is evaluates whether it was all worth it, whether hosting the cup brings the increased tourism and economic development government officials have promised it would deliver. I suspect I will have more to say about that in the weeks ahead.

After this monstrous post, I am ready to go to bed. Now that I am established and have fully moved in, I hope to be able to update this more often. Check back soon to see what happens as the days in the World Cup countdown (which number in the 600s when I first set foot in South Africa in May 2008) winds down to zero.

Round 3

Welcome back to my blog!  Over the next seven weeks, I will be chronicling my third summer in South Africa.   It will prove to be quite eventful with my normal working duties at the District Six Museum coupled with the pandemonium of the 2010 World Cup.  I leave today for Cape Town, with layovers in NYC-JFK and Amsterdam Schipol.  After 30 hours of flying, I will arrive in Cape Town at 10PM South Africa time on Saturday night (4PM EST).  Check back soon for my first post!

Off to Joburg

At 6:20am tomorrow, I leave Cape Town behind and head off to Johannesburg for a whirlwind 36 hour visit. After I arrive Thursday morning, I go straight from my hostel to the University of Witswatersrand to interview Professor Deborah Posel. From there, I head to the Constitutional Court to meet with Justice Albie Sachs.

I have Friday free, and I am thinking about hitting up some of the museums in the city before I head to the airport in the late afternoon for my 7pm flight to London.

I am not sure if I will have internet access after tonight, so wish me luck and a safe trip home. If all goes well, I will land back in Buffalo at 1pm on Saturday!

The Final Days

Four days, and I will be gone from the country I have called home over the past two summers, not knowing when or if I will ever have the opportunity to return. Thinking about leaving South Africa is sad and exciting at the same time. Part of me is happy. I can’t wait to be at home again, enjoy the comforts of life in the U.S. (more than 4 TV channels, fast and unlimited internet!), and savour what’s left of summer vacation.

But at the same time, part of me is holding onto the life that I have grown accustomed to over the past two months or so. Each day I board the train, hop of at the downtown station, and navigate the crowds and street vendors milling about their daily lives, I feel like I fit in a bit more. I can look at the train timetables and understand where exactly each train will be going. I can glance at the posters placed on street poles promoting the day’s newspaper headlines and comprehend the latest political events and local gossip. I can rattle off street names and directions off the top of my head.

In spite of (and, in many ways, because of) its chaos, complexities, and contestations, Cape Town has grown on me, and no amount of endless rainfall can take that away.

My last weekend was very enjoyable, although a bit sad. Friday night, one of my housemate Joel’s co-workers, Intebeko, hosted a going away party for all of our house, since many of the people were leaving on Sunday. Intebeko lives in the Gugulethu township (an all black area), so we knew that we were in for quite an experience. After a quite harrowing car ride there (our van broke down several times in the middle of a busy road), we were greeted with a raucous party with plenty of food and booze. At the end of the evening, we joined Intebeko’s friends in turning the garage into a makeshift dance floor—South Africans really know how the enjoy themselves.

Saturday night, I was invited by Bonita, the director of the District Six Museum, over to her house for dinner. Aside from her and her family, several of my other co-workers (Tina and Chris from the Exhibitions Department, Mandy from Education, and Thulani from the Sound Archive) joined us, each bringing a dish to share. Let me say that the meal was fantastic. I got to sample a wide variety of traditional Cape Town recipes—all of which were delicious. I especially enjoyed boboetie (pronounced ba-beau-tea), a sweet mince meat curry.

After being on such a high from Friday and Saturday night, Sunday was a bit of a downer. Five of my housemates who have been here for the past 8 weeks were leaving to head back to the States. After spending so much time with each other, we were all very close, and it was sad to see them go. Thankfully, pretty much everyone goes to either UNC or Duke, so it will be fairly easy for us to keep in touch and see each other, due the proximity of our schools.

Sunday did have its silver lining, however. As you may recall, I mentioned in a post from my first week here how badly the choir at the Catholic Church near me sings. Well, in the past 9 weeks, they haven’t gotten any better, and my housemate and Church buddy Ainsley left mass every Sunday laughing at their interesting melodies. Last week as we walked out of Church, we joked about joining the choir for our final Sunday. What was just a mindless joke turned into a dare, and of course we had to follow through. So 30 minutes before the 11am mass, Ainsley and I headed to the Holy Name Catholic Church to join choir practice. It was hilarious, and I enjoyed figuring out exactly which choir members were responsible for the extremely off-key singing. I even was allowed to play the tambourine for the music during mass! The choir (average age 65) loved us, and as we left, they told us at least 5 times that they would pray for us.

After Sunday, I think that I will be hanging up my choir robes for good.

Seven Days

It’s been a bit of a crazy week here in Cape Town. Record rainfall has hit, soaking everything and everybody to the core, flooding roads, and wreaking havoc in the townships. Thanks to my nice waterproof rain jacket, I have been surviving the wetness, but I am anxiously anticipating the nice summer weather that is waiting for me back in the States when I return next Saturday.

My second to last week in South Africa has been going quite nicely, although it has been a bit hectic (a word South Africans love to use). Last weekend, I spent Saturday afternoon climbing Lion’s Head again. It was not as nice weather as the last time I ascended the peak, but it was a neat experience since there was a cloud at the top and we got to be in the middle of a cloud while climbing! Other than that, I just hung out around our house and watched several (perhaps one-too-many) movies.

Monday was my final official day at the District Six Museum. After weeks of work and a frantic few days of writing and formatting, I finished my final report and handed it over to the museum staff. Today (Friday), I will be meeting with my supervisors at the museum to discuss my findings and how the museum can move forward. Hopefully it will go well, as all of my work this summer will be for naught if I cannot sell the permanent staff on my recommendations. I will try to upload the document to the blog in the near future.

As far as my history research for my thesis on the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission, I have been keeping busy with that too. After endless phone calls and emails, I was finally able to locate the documents I was looking for. Since last Thursday, I have spent countless hours scanning and photocopying reports, memos, submissions, and other random documents associated with the passage of the Promotion of National Unity and Reconciliation Bill, the act that set up the TRC. I have been extremely lucky that those who I have been able to get in contact with have been extremely helpful and generous in sharing their time with me. As fate would have it, the material I am working with is not all in one place, so each day I make a circuit around Cape Town hopping from one organization’s archives to the next. It’s a bit like a scavenger hunt, except the more documents I find, the more reading I have to do!

On a final note, I finally figured out my plans for my last week. Thursday morning, I will be flying to Johannesburg. Thursday afternoon and Friday morning, I hope to meet with several people there to talk about my research. And then Friday at 8pm SAST (2pm EST), I begin the long, 20 hour-long trek back to the United States.

Seven days and counting…