Exploring South Africa's "Mother City" and the Western Cape

For those worried that we tumbled into a no-internet hole of woe, don’t fret. We spent last week in Cape Town, South Africa. This was our first trip outside of Ethiopia since we moved to Addis in mid-August. Kudos to Maya’s school for squeezing a “Fall Break” just 7 weeks into the schoolyear. We all jumped at the chance to explore someplace new and very much “Africa lite” (don’t blame me for the term - although I agree entirely with that characterization). The headline being the time away was a delight (almost without asterisks…well, maybe one that we thankfully handled after sneaking into the country…see below for a teaser about the next post).

The southern hemisphere’s Spring handed us room-temperature highs and a relatively lush landscape. Cape Town’s copious delights distracted us from our usual blogging duties. We’re now back in Addis with stories to tell and pictures to share.

Let me attend to the latter first. If you’re looking for a quick visual version of our Cape Town explorations, the following gallery’s your jam. It took for-FREAKING-ever to upload using the internet here in Addis (one of the many differences with Cape Town). Most likely, I’ll add some more pics soon. But, once again, I’m stymied by the speed of the telecomm monopoly’s tubes here in Ethiopia.

Looking up Table Mountain (the dominant feature in all Cape Town pictures).

Looking toward Lion's Head, with Robben Island in the distance.

On the Table's top

At The Codfather - an immediately likable restaurant with a lovable name.

Helmets on for Cape Canopy Tour (zipline adrenaline-fest).

The "African massage" ride up into the nature reserve where the ziplines live.

The Kloof Street House. "Kloofing" is my new favorite word learned on this break (means "canyon diving").

The stairwell in the Zeitz-MOCAA museum.

Looking toward Table Mountain from the roof of Zeitz-MOCAA.

The first of many examples of William Kentridge's studio materials and artwork.

Shopping for a fez. Thinking I'll wait until Morocco...

District Six Museum's artifacts.

The inescapability of "Seattle" as an adjective. As seen in the V&A Waterfront mall.

Atlas Trading in Bo-Kaap (the go to store for spices).

Rugby fanatics. Respect.

Table Mountain, as seen from Bo-Kaap.

Madam Taitou's Ethiopian restaurant. I delivered the news that Abiy Ahmed won the Nobel Peace Prize. They were stoked.

Robben Island family portrait.

Our talented Robben Island tour guide.

Staving off sea sickness has its benefits - great view.

The lighthouse at the far southern tip of Africa. Or close enough...

Finishing off what we left in the fridge in our apartment. Custard chugging is not beneath me.

Finding a post box at the Cape Town airport. Mission accomplished.

I’ll rattle off a few impressions that refer back to the images galleried above. What we saw of the “Mother City” and the surrounding Western Cape was immeasurably gorgeous. Clean air, Table Mountain, the Atlantic Ocean, Cape Town’s waterfront, and everything on the peninsula down to the fake southernmost tip (the Cape of Good Hope) left us pleasantly reeling. Our first full day’s eagerness got us up Table Mountain on a scramble (with a wonderful guide from a company we wholeheartedly endorse). Like so many things on this Continent, you just gotta move forward and not think about how dangerous it actually might be. The same went for our hike a few days later down to Cape Point in Table Mountain National Park. The wind gets seriously gusty and there’s nothing like a railing to keep everything in check. Good focus and a healthy sense of “why not-ed-ness?” is what’s really required. Even the drive back up to Cape Town on the Chapman Peak road would’ve been terrifying were it not so darn lovely. By the time we went for a massive zipline tour that had us jumping off platforms over 100 meters above rivers swelled with Spring rains, it seemed downright tame to have a safety harness on.

Robben Island (where Nelson Mandela and so many other prisoners were held over the centuries), the District Six Museum (that summarized the horrible realities of forced relocations), the Bo-Kaap district (with its distinctively colorful houses and diverse population’s history) - these were some of the paths we traveled to learn what we could about Cape Town’s complicated history. Apartheid carries such negative narrative weight. It’s hard to even grasp the extent of what we don’t know. So we asked questions, looked for believable runestones, and read sincerely from what we found. The tour guide on our bus around Robben Island was an especially dynamic and inspiring voice of guidance. When I approached him thankfully on a break and told him that we’re Americans coming by way of Addis, he offered up a soulful “Addis is such a prayerful place.” Never mind that he sort of let the American side of our bio slide by - who could blame him? Even Cape Town’s inspired art museum (Zeitz-MOCAA) in a massively re-tooled grain silo along the V&A Waterfront sated me with freshly-packaged history wrapped up in a massive exhibit on William Kentridge (not previously on my radar).

The food - oh my head - and the surprising random delights. We just soaked it all up and asked for more. Including seeing “Ad Astra” at a 4DX theater (where the seats rattle and hum, the room fills with smoke and mist, and the idea of just hanging onto a small bag of popcorn gets flipped well down the unlit aisle of history). We visited the penguins on Boulders Beach, laughed at the signs about pesky baboons, and nearly slipped in a diabetic coma after seeing the sweetness of a baby ostrich on the roadside in Table Mountain National Park.

We made our way back with a suitcase filled with random delights. Cocoa powder, olive oil, toilet paper, duty free M&Ms, biltong (South African beef and ostrich jerky), cheese and butter, and so much more. All of which we agreed were “clothes” when asked at the airport upon our return. Close enough.

Oh, and to address the “asterisk” mentioned above - the immigration powers that be at the airport almost didn’t let us into South Africa. I’ll leave the nitty-gritty for an upcoming post to dig down deeper into that mildly upsetting story. It’s a pleasant contrast with the ugliness of what so many people face crossing the world’s borders currently, being so fully coated in white privilege and incomparable advantages. Still…we were surprised that we could’ve been sent right back to Addis upon arrival just because we forgot one document of dubious value to the situation at hand. Live and learn, I suppose. Ciao.