(I'm back in Cape Town now with my computer and better Internet. I've added photos to all of the Joburg posts if you want to go back and see what I was talking about.)
I always have a knee-jerk reaction to guided tours. It's not that I don't find them informative--it's just the walking slowly in a clump that immediately identifies you to everyone around as a tourist, the lack of chances to get lost, the rehearsed jokes--I just prefer a clumsier, more nonsensical way to see a place. I also cringe at the idea of poverty tourism--something I've heard about in several parts of the world, LA included. While I get that it's important to expose people to the realities of poverty, it's hard to do in a way that doesn't come off as exploitative. On the other hand, what was I to do in Johannesburg, where some of the city's most well known sites also lie within its biggest township?
I had to break my own rules and take a guided tour of Soweto.
Besides the fact that Soweto (South West Township) is legally under the same jurisdiction as Joburg, it could easily be its own city. It's a massive ecosystem 3.5 million people strong--that's bigger than Johannesburg's city center. While parts of the township are as affluent-looking as any American suburb, other parts are made up of rows and rows of corrugated tin shacks with no electricity or running water.
I booked a Soweto tour through my hostel. Besides the driver, it was just me and two young people who are studying the tourism industry, so were only riding along for educational purposes. (A side note--these are the fourth and fifth people I've met in South Africa who are studying hospitality and tourism. That could be a coincidence, or it could be evidence of a new, growing industry.) In three and a half hours I know we barely scratched the surface of Soweto.
At our stops in the township, the driver and the students stayed behind in the car while I got out to look around. At our first stop, that meant I was alone wandering through one of Soweto's most impoverished areas. The driver connected me with a local volunteer guide who walked me back through the shacks and pointed out a daycare.
He told me about using pit toilets and collecting water in a bucket from a community tap and getting used to total darkness at night after the government realized people were stealing electricity from streetlights and shut them all off. "Take pictures!" everyone encouraged as I walked through this community. There were plenty of things to take pictures of, but I didn't take that many in this area, I couldn't help feeling a little disrespectful snapping away at people in their homes.
Two massive towers that used to be part of a power plant are a major Soweto landmark. Once, they served the white people of Johannesburg while polluting the black townships, now they are no longer active, but they have been made into a huge piece of public art which celebrates Soweto life in murals.
Nelson Mandela lived in Soweto once. Before he was imprisoned in Cape Town's Robben Island prison, he had a small brick house there with his second wife, Winnie. The house is now a museum. Mandela's birthday was last week, so the messages of well wishers are still hanging on the walls outside the house.
Just down the road from where Mandela lived, sits another Soweto landmark--perhaps the township's most well recognize. Soweto rose to global infamy in 1976 when black schoolkids who, under a new Apartheid law, were being forced to speak Afrikaans at school, decided to strike. Police opened fire on the crowd of children killing 176. The tragedy was a major turning point in the struggle against Apartheid. Today, the spot is a beautiful memorial and museum.
I left Johannesburg in the afternoon after the tour. I almost didn't go on a Soweto tour, but after visiting I was so glad I did. I think I would have missed out on an important place in South Africa if I hadn't.
I always have a knee-jerk reaction to guided tours. It's not that I don't find them informative--it's just the walking slowly in a clump that immediately identifies you to everyone around as a tourist, the lack of chances to get lost, the rehearsed jokes--I just prefer a clumsier, more nonsensical way to see a place. I also cringe at the idea of poverty tourism--something I've heard about in several parts of the world, LA included. While I get that it's important to expose people to the realities of poverty, it's hard to do in a way that doesn't come off as exploitative. On the other hand, what was I to do in Johannesburg, where some of the city's most well known sites also lie within its biggest township?
I had to break my own rules and take a guided tour of Soweto.
Besides the fact that Soweto (South West Township) is legally under the same jurisdiction as Joburg, it could easily be its own city. It's a massive ecosystem 3.5 million people strong--that's bigger than Johannesburg's city center. While parts of the township are as affluent-looking as any American suburb, other parts are made up of rows and rows of corrugated tin shacks with no electricity or running water.
I booked a Soweto tour through my hostel. Besides the driver, it was just me and two young people who are studying the tourism industry, so were only riding along for educational purposes. (A side note--these are the fourth and fifth people I've met in South Africa who are studying hospitality and tourism. That could be a coincidence, or it could be evidence of a new, growing industry.) In three and a half hours I know we barely scratched the surface of Soweto.
At our stops in the township, the driver and the students stayed behind in the car while I got out to look around. At our first stop, that meant I was alone wandering through one of Soweto's most impoverished areas. The driver connected me with a local volunteer guide who walked me back through the shacks and pointed out a daycare.
Two massive towers that used to be part of a power plant are a major Soweto landmark. Once, they served the white people of Johannesburg while polluting the black townships, now they are no longer active, but they have been made into a huge piece of public art which celebrates Soweto life in murals.
Nelson Mandela lived in Soweto once. Before he was imprisoned in Cape Town's Robben Island prison, he had a small brick house there with his second wife, Winnie. The house is now a museum. Mandela's birthday was last week, so the messages of well wishers are still hanging on the walls outside the house.
Just down the road from where Mandela lived, sits another Soweto landmark--perhaps the township's most well recognize. Soweto rose to global infamy in 1976 when black schoolkids who, under a new Apartheid law, were being forced to speak Afrikaans at school, decided to strike. Police opened fire on the crowd of children killing 176. The tragedy was a major turning point in the struggle against Apartheid. Today, the spot is a beautiful memorial and museum.
I left Johannesburg in the afternoon after the tour. I almost didn't go on a Soweto tour, but after visiting I was so glad I did. I think I would have missed out on an important place in South Africa if I hadn't.
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