I spent today with Jessica, and we had plans to see if the cable car to Table Mountain was running. If it is very windy they will close the cable car, but today it was perfect. To get to the mountain, we decided to take the city sightseeing bus. We got to see all different parts of South Africa.
We drove past the Castle of Good Hope, many statues of famous South African people, and many churches. We also got to drive through District 6, which was the area most hit by Apartheid. Apartheid was a huge racial issue in South Africa for many years. The black people were enslaved by whites, and during the worst time of Apartheid, they were all moved from their homes into a separate area. It reminded me very much of the Holocaust. The government demolished many of their homes in order to build things for the whites of the country. This was faced with much opposition, and because of international opposition, the government did not build anything on the confiscated property. To this day it remains grass and weeds. They even left one building that had been demolished without cleaning up after. You could see the bricks from the building lying in the rubble. When the democratic government took over in the middle of the 1990s, they were supposed to turn the demolished grounds into new homes for the people that had been displaced. Still nothing has been done. There is one section that has been rebuilt, and 27 families live in those homes.
In another section of town, all of the homes are painted bright colors. This is where the freed slaves lived. As slaves, they had not been able to wear bright colors, only drab ones. When they finally had their own homes, they painted them in bright colors. The homes look really beautiful. On a side note, when these people had been slaves, they only had one day where they did not have to work every year. On this day, they held a festival where they used face paints and danced in the streets.
Jessica and I stopped at Table mountain to try to go up, but the lines were so long. It would have taken 2 hours to get the ticket and then 2 hours to get through to the cable car. She had a field program today, so we did not have time to wait. She is looking into getting tickets online. At least that would only lead to a 2 hour wait.
After that we took the bus to Camps Bay, which is a very popular, expensive beach. This is the area of town where you will most likely find the famous people of South Africa. I got some work for my Marine Biology class done again, and then we hopped back on the bus to go to the wharf. We saw a famous lighthouse, the stadium from the 2010 FIFA World Cup, and Robben Island. I have a trip to go there in two days.
At the wharf, we got lunch at a place similar to a McDonald’s or Burger King, but the burgers were real. It took about 10 minutes to make the food, and the burgers came with barbeque sauce and mayonnaise on them. The French fries had an interesting seasoning on them that was delicious. When we finished we shopped for a bit and then headed back to the ship.
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