Our Johannesburg Experience

Trip Start Jun 14, 2008
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Trip End Jun 29, 2008


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Tuesday, June 17, 2008

Today is Tuesday and we are heading down to Durban this afternoon after spending yesterday in Johannesburg.  Jamie and I definitely made the most of our first full day in J'burg. We  spent yesterday morning exploring Melville. It's a cute little neighborhood with a bohemian feel. 7th Street is the main street and is lined with restaurants and shops. It's size only required about 20 minutes to explore so we stopped at Xai Xai - the Jozambiquan Experience - for coffee to figure out our plans for the day. Given that it was Sunday many things were closed so we settled on visiting the Bruma Market.  Bruma Market was a typical open air market with a ton of craft stalls; mostly woodwork and other collectibles. We spent the afternoon there, made a few purchases and had a beer while enjoying some street entertainment.  Jamie even tried the pineapple on a stick coated with hot chili pepper. Not sure that was such a good idea! Back in our neighborhood we went to dinner at a Thai restaurant after our unsuccessful search for traditional south african cuisine.  The food was great; as was the bottle + of wine we drank Start of our first day in J'burg
Start of our first day in J'burg
 . After dinner we stumbled across the street to a lively little bar.  It turned out to be a great place - the manager and cocktail waitress were so nice to us and we met some guys from CapeTown who gave us a lay of the land.  After a few more glasses of wine - the effects of which we were still feeling this morning - we were definitely ready to go back to our room.

This morning we spent visiting the Apartheid museum. It is a great little museum that tracked the history of apartheid and the events that led up to the official government policy. Apartheid became official South African policy in 1948, even though the foundation had long been set, and was finally abandoned in 1990. The whole country was separated into Europeans and non-Europeans.  Blacks didn't have the right to vote or many other rights for that matter. The museum reviewed black opposition and rebel groups, but surprising to me there was little blood shed during that time. No doubt the long history of separation that led to the official apartheid policy and the practice of non-violent opposition common in South Africa (e..g, Gandhi) contributed to that fact. Must see for anyone visiting South Africa.
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