OneWayTicket

Day 78: South Africa, home away from home

It's been three days since we crossed the Atlantic. We're pros now at three-hour nights: grab whatever little sleep you can on board, somehow stay awake the entire day after you land, and finally sink into a long, exhausted sleep.

It was a nine-hour flight from Brazil to South Africa. The wife was particularly happy because she finally got an Asian vegetarian (no fish or eggs) meal, after being rebuffed in South America ("Sorry, we have discontinued vegetarian meals," was the frosty response from a TACA, Trans American Airlines, flight attendant last month).

So, here we are in Johannesburg, reputedly one of the world's most dangerous cities. Hmmm. Just the other day we were in Sao Paulo, vying with Jo'burg for that title. And you know how we enjoyed big Sao.

"You're going to Jo'burg?" The question is normally followed by a look of barely restrained consternation. We faced it from quite a few fellow travellers from US and the UK. I, too, had read a lot about how the downtown area of South Africa's capital had been abandoned by businesses and had been taken over by thugs. I pictured gunmen at street corners.

Instead, we found a home away from home, a vibrant, diverse city, a melting pot of many cultures: African, India, European and Chinese (and 11 official languages, not far behind our 22, but only 48 million to our one billion odd). We also found ourselves in one of the greenest cities we've ever seen. We've been travelling for a while now, and after seeing Jo'Burg we promptly struck Cape Town off our list. Sure, it's pretty, Table Mountain, wine trail, swimming with sharks/dolphins and all -- but we did all that in New Zealand, right? 

We're staying in a peaceful suburb called Mondeor, just outside the famous township of Soweto, epicentre of the anti-apartheid struggle that grabbed the world's imagination. For the last two nights, I've slept till 11 am, something I haven't done since I was a teenager. It's dead quiet at night, and the winter chill (about 5 deg C) helps of course.

We're staying with my old friend Noel Ndhlovu and his wife Sylise and their two rambunctious kids, Khensani -- one of the most expressive and smartest seven-year-olds we've ever met -- and her younger brother by 18 months, Mika, a car expert who can identify passing cars by their logos but is otherwise the most well behaved little boy I've seen (though his mother doesn't seem to agree).

The family has put its life on hold (Noel and Sylise run a marketing company from home, apart from some wonderful work producing newsletters that make the disadvantaged aware of their rights) and are driving us around every nook and cranny of this wonderful city. We've already done the Apartheid Museum (make sure you allocate an entire day if you ever visit); spent a day at Soweto (the wife will write more about that later, she's being lazy); spent an evening Braai-ing; watched Mandela's 90th birthday celebrations in London live on telly; and eaten out at a variety of interesting places right from Moyo, one of the best African restaurants in town, to Golden Peacock at the Oriental Plaza, a largely Indian run shopping complex which attracts shoppers from all parts of Africa (and even some diplomats) where the menu included an iconic dish called Bunny Chow.  

Noel and I went to graduate school in the U.S. together, and there have clearly much has changed ever since we said goodbye nearly 15 years ago. Not just in his life.

South Africa -- once heralded as the world's rainbow nation because of its diversities and promise -- appears to be on the cusp of what some here call its "second transition" (the first being the passing of apartheid and the euphoric birth of the rainbow nation in 1994). We find around us a period of leadership change, the autumn of Nelson Mandela's life, fear of the road ahead, and, as Noel interprets it, a strange and strong streak of negativism.

The newspapers are certainly more pessimistic than any media back home. There are no stories of hope and change, no delving into the lives of ordinary South Africans. Instead, there is a daily soul searching about decisions and declarations: the courts have just declared that the Chinese should be regarded as black for purposes of affirmative employment; the aide of the man who will likely be the next president has declared he will kill for him; the presidential hopeful, Jacob Zuma, is accused of everything from corruption to sexual impropriety. And so, much -- admittedly well written and engrossing - soul-searching goes on.

But South Africans -- despite an unemployment rate close to 40 per cent , violent crime and transitional angst -- have much to be thankful for, as we've found. Infrastructure is much better than back home. The roads are smooth, the pavements are intact, and traffic -- despite what the locals say -- is orderly. On our visits to malls we found cars flowing smoothly around roundabouts, unregulated, waiting politely for each other. Boss, these places would have been jammed within five minutes back home. And the literacy rate is about 75 per cent, leaves us in the dust at 60 odd.  Sure, their soccer team -- the quaintly named Bafana Bafana -- have embarrassed them by losing to Nigeria and Sierra Leone, but there is much to be positive about.

South Africans of Indian origin, we find, have a reputation: Keeping to themselves, staying loyal to India, squeezing bargains out of every deal, and being industrious. Not too surprising that most Indians, both Hindu and Muslim, are of Gujarati origin, with a smattering of Naidus from Andhra. Some Indians were deeply involved in the anti-apartheid movement and some are strong nationalists but the general stereotype is strong and true – certainly during cricket matches -- to form.

But there's much good-natured ribbing of Indians, and their influences are strong. Noel, Sylise and the kids like Indian food, so I had promised to cook some. Sylise took me to a wonderful spice store, but when I did start cooking some kheema, I found she well stocked with spices, from garam masala to cloves. It's not just the food and the feeling that home is just one flight away that makes us feel that makes us feel at home. South Africans are like us: warm and welcoming.

So, staying with Noel and Sylise has been exactly like staying at home. You can take them for granted and there are no awkward first-world formalities, no ceaseless thank yous, pleases and the like. We are so comfortable and relaxed after more than two months of keeping ourselves on the move that we now really need to get galvanised and make bookings for Kruger National Park, a magical, sprawling small-country-sized refuge for the continent's wildlife -- from lions to zebra.

With this peaceful, easy feeling, it's easy to smile at awkward jokes about, well, ourselves, from a white South African after a brilliant morning of walking around in a sprawling nature reserve behind the comfortable home of our hosts yesterday. "Ah, Indians, so we'll charge you 8,000 rand," the woman joked, "but you'll get me to give it for much cheaper eh?" After she found we were journalists, she asked what language we wrote in. English? Her eyebrows rose. “Not in all those dialects you have?”

Ah well, I never claimed my English was very good.