Chopsicles

To anyone who has time to read blogs over the Christmas period, I hope you have a great break and get to share it with people you love. I’m spending Christmas day with Trevor and his family tomorrow then catching the bus up the coast on christmas night. I’m staying in the holiday town of Hartenbosch until about December 3rd. See you in the new year!

Well, last night was the Songs Worth Singing concert, the event for which we’ve been running the choir rehearsals for the past 5 weeks or so. I’ve uploaded a bunch of pics here. It was a really great event, with the aim of furthering reconciliation and understanding in this country. It was recording in the SABC studios and will be released as a DVD and CD and distributed to 1000 schools across the country to help the next generation learn the traditional songs. The blurb on the Department of Justice and Reconciliation site says:

Which songs continue to linger in the corridors of our minds? Songs from our slave ancestry, songs sung during the struggle for freedom and democracy, gospel songs… We hum them occassionally, sing them to our children as lullabyes and in turn it reawakens memories of our lived experiences.

A reference team comprising of musicians and poets will interrogate these questions. The team is tasked with the identification of music and poetry genres which would form part of a collection of songs and poetry.

Musicians, singers and poets will facilitate and participate in several workshops aimed at sharing skills and knowledge. Two major musical events are planned to celebrate the collaboration of artists in the workshops. A collection of songs and poetry will be selected and produced on a CD Rom entitled “Songs worth Singing”.

Well, thanks to some help from mum and dad, I’m now mobile in Cape Town with a Yamaha YBR 125. It seems like something that wouldn’t be a really high priority, but I’m extremely glad to have some wheels. Sitting in a cafe now feeling a lot more independent. I also picked up another book on learning afrikaans, so fingers crossed that goes well.

I keep meaning to make a comprehensive post on life in Cape Town but I don’t think that’s going to be possible, so I might just note some general observations. Obviously, South Africa has quite a complex and controversial history, particularly in relation to the Apartheid which was in place from the late 40’s until, though it’s difficult to believe, the early 90’s. I think that gives a texture and complexity to life here that takes some time to comprehend but I’m really enjoying the experience. Maybe I’ll try and divide this post into some sections eh?
Where I’m living
I’m staying with a nice bloke called Johan in The Strand, an area about 10 minutes walk from the beachfront. Its a smallish flat in a compound sort of thing with electric fencing and automated gate, though I don’t think its the most dangerous of areas - Johannesburg sounds a lot worse. The neighbourhood we’re living in is mixed. Although segregation and discrimination are now technically illegal, there are still some neighbourhoods which are predominantly white and which, I’m told, are not very welcoming to non-whites. Likewise, I don’t think that there are any white people living in the temporary housing/shanty towns. I’ve heard some complaint from white people about the strict legislation which is designed to restore some equality but has, as you’d imagine, had some impact on their business. Its unfortunate, but how else do you go about these things? Money and opportunity has to be redirected from somewhere.
The flat and the music centre are both located in the winelands area which is about half an hour’s drive from town.

Cape Town
Well, Trevor wasn’t lying - Cape Town really is quite a beautiful city. Its difficult to capture in photo because its so panoramic, but the city lies between a mountain range and the sea, somewhat like Cairns in Australia. I’ve seen some really stunning sunsets and its great to be in such beautiful surrounds. A drawback of this particular landscape seems to be that there is a tremendous amount of wind, though I’m mostly getting used to it. It really is one of the windiest placest I’ve ever been, unless its just the time of year. The insulation in our roof is, for some reason, lined inside the peaked roof rather than flat against the ceiling and most nights I have to shut out the constant ruffling - it sounds like someone shaking out a doona…all night… but I’m still as sane as ever.

Random bits

* The traffic here is disturbingly fast, with people often doing 160kmh+ on the freeways. When people wish to indicate to a car that they want to pass, they tailgate them, staying only a couple of meters away at these high speeds. Its really quite disconcerting.
* They call traffic lights ‘robots’. Odd.
* There are a couple of shanty towns (they call them ‘temporary settlements’ I think) just next to the freeway into town. We’ve been driving through some of these to pick up the choir members for practice. Its quite different to what I expected. Although the conditions are pretty terrible (though the government is now working to ensure all these areas have electricity and running water), the people are still lovely and its amazing to see such beautiful voices come from such surroundings. It makes me reconsider what the ’solution’ is. If the people were to have all of the conveniences that we have in Melbourne, would they be any happier? Hopefully you get what I mean, I’m not saying no change is required, just that I’m reconsidering what assistance is most appropriate. I think the project is a great start.
* The armored cars here (for moving money between banks) are seriously armored. They look like they should be in Iraq.
* In the poorer areas, like around the centre, there are a lot of really odd looking dogs - a result of constant cross-breeding. They are colloquially called ‘pavement specials’ because of the place of their conception.
* Dried meat called ‘biltong’ is a pretty popular snack, it doesn’t taste too bad.

Other notes

I’m really behind on my email. Don’t hate me. If you need to blame anyone, I nominate Strachan as my local representative, please let me know if you want his contact details or I can pass on any abuse.

I’ve uploaded more pics. On the weekend we were up the coast in Knysner and surrounds visiting a bikers’ church.

Well Sam, I didn’t manage to write a song, but I did put together this video. As usual, if the youtube link below doesn’t work, you can get the quicktime vid here. Actually, just looking at youtube, it seems to have dropped some frames, so check out the quicktime vid instead, if you can.