Preserving a Heritage
Friday, August 11 |
| Last night and tonight I am staying by myself, of choice, in downtown capetown in an elegant spot called the Cape Heritage Hotel. Iit is part of a block of buildings, including a cafe, a wine shop and an iron foundry, that have been restored. The hotel is comprised of five buildings, all elegantly restored, and each room designed to reflect a different time and culture in Cape history. I gather they are not full, so I was offered my choice of the superior rooms for the standard room price. I am in an Africa room with elegant tapestries on the wall, beautiful wrought iron lights, and a very Donald Trump bathroom larger than many typical hotel rooms. |
| One problem with expensive hotels is laundry. They charge for each individual sock, and at that rate, cleaning all the close that had seen me through the bush would have cost half as much as the room itself. Last night I persuaded Jaques, the young man from Cameroon who gave me my original tour of the hotel, that there had to be a better way, so today I am having it "just washed" (and I assume dried) for a set price, although I don't know what that is. Never mind, the Internet charge is only the cost of the phone call. |
| Last night I went out with a young woman named Kerri whom I had met in New York. She is a physiotherapist and a friend of my friend Tina in New York. A friend of hers joins us, who has a flower shop in Stellenbosch. I plan to stop there tomorrow to get some flowers for the final dinner in Delheim. |
| Tonight is the final dinner here in Capetown. Today I have to figure out where we can go. Tomorrow night I will cook for the Sperling family and I have been wracking my brain for what to serve. I think it will be paella, with shrimp and chicken and calamari if we can find it. Any suggestions for a spectacular dessert? At this point you may be wondering about planning a trip to South Africa, so I will add a few observations. |
| After all the comments I made about bathrooms in China, I am happy to report that every bathroom, public or private, has been clean, working, and definitely includes a seat. The bathrooms at our campground two nights ago included not only showers but a large bathtub. One way they keep people employed here is to provide lots of service. In the morning a woman came into the campground to take all our dishes and wash them for us. I had been ready to use my Girl Scout background and start scouring them with sand! |
| It is difficult to complain about the price of anything when dollars make you feel so rich here (there are now more than 7 rand to the dollar where there used to be two) -- and there are those who can remember back to when a rand equaled a pound! Nevertheless, individual taxis are expensive, and I don't know how locals afford them. That is why group taxis (12 people squeezed into space for eight) are so popular. Kerri explained last night that one of the causes of the taxi-bus wars is the fact that many policemen own taxis -- it is a major entrepeneurial business -- and therefore aren't going to stop the illegal ones, check credentials, etc. The government shut down both buses and taxis for one day, which did nothing but inconvenience the one million black people who live in the suburb of Khayelitscha. The dispute continues, although I don't think there have been any killings this week. Kerri said that her cleaning woman arrived one morning having just witnessed a passenger shot and killed on the bus in front of her. Kerri replied, "I made her a cup of tea, but what more could I do." Indeed the general feeling of hopelessness about this problem is a serious morale problem in Capetown and I sense there are similar problems in other areas. Everyone understands that if the taxis get away with this on the routes in Kaielitscha, it will be only a matter of time before they take the rest of the suburbs hostage. |
| I am off to interview a woman I met yesterday who is going to tell me her story about "passing" as colored when she was actually black. More on that later. Oh it is so nice to be able to write the story as I go along. |
