South Africa holiday: Township tour of Cape Town

An early start on Monday took us to the township of Langa (supposedly meaning “sunshine” in Xhosa). Our driver, a dweller of said township, took us on an experience I’ll not forget. Firstly, we travelled to church. This was full to capacity (with about 600 in the congregation as a conservative estimate). Some of our party were fairly moved by the service, though I had mixed feelings and was fairly untouched – it seemed like the kind of service I grew up with, although services at Holy Trinity in South Kensington were all in English. I found the sudden swap-over from English to Xhosa and back again for no apparent reason detracted from the message, which was kind of garbled and too much like hard sell for my taste. Oh well, horses for courses. The church was absolutely windswept as was the township itself, with 40 mile an hour westerlies blasting through.

Driving around the first part of the township, I was surprised at how orderly it was, with some concrete houses laid out in rows.

Next, we travelled to a shabeen, an informal pub. Informal just means that there is no licence, and therefore the government restricts its serving hours until the late afternoon.

Served here was some of the most disgusting beer I’ve tasted. Made of sorghum, this stuff is made en masse – fermentation time is a worryingly short three days - and served straight from the keg or barrel or whatever it is. The taste is weak yet sour, and quite unique, with a thick layer of foam on the top. The shabeen itself was buzzing with flies. One of the reasons these pubs are more heavily regulated is that there are no loos at all, prompting the question, where on earth do you go for leak? This lack of a satisfactory answer may account for some of the insect activity I suppose. I think this is the kind of place hardcore drinkers gravitate to. A very interesting experience indeed.

When the idea that people should be entitled to have any kind of fun outweighs the perceived need to raise taxes from alcohol sales, our pointless government, having successfully closed the last proper non corpo-pub, will force ordinary people to drink in places like this, as government approved beer will be over a tenner per pint as necking more than one of them will of course, encourage rampant terrorism and anyway, consuming more than one tenth of a unit will also be regarded by them and their media sheep as binge drinking. Bring on the sorghum.

On to the hostel: an especially grim place in the township which has got to be the most hemmed in place containing humankind beyond a prison I’ve been to. Some pretty nice people spoke to us there. I felt justifiably privileged living in my small house on the east side of London compared to these people. Hell, I am indeed.

Next was the healer (dubbed by me the witch doctor). Not sure if witchery goes on here, but the NHS its not. Practical healing involves animal parts so we’re not talking homeopathic remedies, despite the presence of lots of herbs.

Finally, a drive taking us past an unincorporated part of the township that comprised the kind of shack with neither electricity nor running water I’d thought would occupy the whole township. This was as desolate a place as can be. The next day we heard that around 400 of these shacks were burnt down that evening. It didn’t even make the national news as this kind of thing happens so often. Thank goodness no-one was killed or seriously injured. Unbelievable.

In the afternoon we sat in our hotel bar and drunk South African champagne. We then ate a rather lovely meal in an African restaurant. I don’t really buy into the brow-bearing “guilty am I” response to the townships. I was far too young to have been able to influence things during apartheid, and there is bugger all I can do about what has been left behind. But the sheer fucking irony of pouring wine down my throat, and having the cash to do so without thinking about it too much was not lost on me. Consider this: The average domestic help in Cape Town earns R80-90 per day. A bottle of mineral water in our restaurant was R15.00 (about £1.00 at the time of writing).

I have nothing but sheer admiration for those living in the townships (half of Cape Town’s population). They have remained patient far longer than any decent human being could expect.

Langa Township’s unincorporated area.