The Cities of Pretoria and Johannesburg

The flight to Jo'burg was uneventful (no lost luggage) although we had to sit in different seats, we were met by our transfer driver and whisked off to Pretoria.

Pretoria.
Our hotel, the Arcadia was a 3 star basic hotel but it was clean and tidy and the service was good. The Arcadia was just down the hill from the Union Building (South Africa's administrative centre) and in the middle of a bustling commercial and residential area where we were definitely in the minority.

Although we didn't visit the CBD of Pretoria we walked around an area of 4 - 5 city blocks close to the hotel. At no time did we feel unsafe in the sea of African faces. Any people we had contact with were friendly. Pretoria is called the Jacaranda City and the streets are lined with these introduced trees and present a colourful display.

The highlights of Pretoria were the Voortrekker Monument and Museum and the Afrikaans Cultural Centre. The Voortrekker celebrates and commentates the great treks into the northern hinterland by the Afrikaans people in the 1800's and the Cultural Centre celebrates their achievement, language and culture.

We also visited the Union Buildings and I had a really good guided tour of the University of Pretoria (but more about that later).

Johannesburg

We both found Johannesburg more interesting than Pretoria it seems to hold more history and culture from both the old and new South Africa. We spent all day yesterday touring; firstly a 1/2 day tour of Soweto and then a visit to the Lesadi Cultural Village.

Soweto was so different for what we had imagined. Soweto is a city of over 2 million people mainly African peoples representing all the major tribal groupings. It is a city of contrast with affluent suburbs with very nice houses. Our guide told us that there were several millionaires living in the City and he showed us some of their houses. We also saw the house of Archbishop Desmond Tutu and Winnie Mandela.

We were taken to one of the poorest areas of the city an shantytown and despite having to step over a dead rat found the experience enlightening. We were guided through the township by a young unemployed man named Eric (his African name I cannot pronounce), he gave us a short history of the town and explained about the lives of the people. We found the houses to be spotlessly clean with gardens growing, serviced by electricity but only one water tap per street. The water was the same as we got in our hotel so it was safe and clean.

The people we met were very proud and friendly.

Razor wire around everything, some good vegetable gardens, even some lawns and a day care centre for working parents in the squatter camps.

The highlights of this part of our day were the visits to Nelson Mandela house, the Hector Peiterson Museum (the first child to die from police bullets in the 1976 student protest against the introduction of Afrikaans as the language of instruction in schools after years of struggle English is the language of instruction) and finally the Catholic Church where these children sheltered from the police.

All and all an emotional and humbling experience.

The visit to Lesadi exposed us to the cultures of 4 tribal groups; Zulu, Xhosa, Basotho and Pedi. We walked through actual villages and got a feel for their daily lives and language and were then treated to a spectacular display of dance and song. The tour took some 2 1/2 hours and was followed by a wonderful buffet meal full of traditional food and bush meats plus some very tasty dessert. Deidre was particularly taken with the Kosksisters a very sweet pastry deep fried.

We didn't get back to the Hotel til after 21:00, today we are walking around Jo'Burg by ourselves until we catch the train to Capetown.

We have felt safe walking around, we have been careful but have not found the experience as daunting or frightening as we were lead to believe.

We will add photo's to our posts latter on so keep an eye out.