Our day started out very early in the morning, we had to be ready to go by 8:30am. It was a bit rough because some of us were tired from the activities from the day before and it was pretty hot by the time we had grabbed a light breakfast. However, we were ready and excited to get to our bike tour. We went straight to Lebo’s Soweto Back Packers where our guide and bikes were awaiting. Before the tour could start we tried out the bikes for size as well as for safety, we had to make sure that the breaks worked. After we all had our “perfect” bike we were off and it was a rough start because we went up hill for a few minutes, for those of us out of shape it felt like a very high mountain, our legs were a bit wobblely by the time we reached the group.
On our first stop our guide gave us some background on the township of Soweto. He first asked what we knew about Soweto and a few people answered things such as the student uprising of 1976, the movie Tsotsi, which won an Oscar, and some other interesting facts. Our guide told us that in addition to all those things Soweto had its own soccer team, the Orlando Pirates.
Then he informed us that Soweto is one of the most famous townships in the whole world and in the African continent, it has over 4.5 – 5 million people living there, it is divided into 38 suburbs, covers 120 square kilometers, there are no tall buildings but a lot of hills which makes it difficult to see the entire township. We stood in one of the suburbs - Orlando West.
The suburb of Orlando West is home to 2 Peace Prize winners – Nelson Mandela and Archbishop Desmond Tutu. They shared the same street, common vision, fought for the same cause – Freedom and liberation of S Africa, but did not live in the same neighborhood at the same time. Another well-known person whom Orlando West was home to was the late Walter Sisulu, Secretary General of ANC (African Nation Congress), oldest political party in S Africa, which is celebrating their 100 years this year. Walter Sisulu was a mentor to Nelson Mandela, Sisulu recruited Mandela to the ANC party and he gave Mandela his first suit, Mandela’s first wife was a cousin of Sisulu. Walter Sisulu was married to Alberta Sisulu, she was known as the mother of Africa, she was very influential as well.
Another famous or well-known person from this area was musician Solomon Linda (sp) who wrote the famous Lion King song, in the Jungle the lion sleeps tonight, etc. The song came from Orlando West musician Linda and it took Disney five years to pay off the realty, this song was also used in Coming to America.
This is the home of many soccer players because during apartheid Rugby was more segregated and was for whites, however soccer was more available to all there weren’t that many restrictions on race mixing, no limits. Soccer became very popular in Soweto/Orlando West and it is the home to one of the giants Kaizer Chief’s
The tour in itself was awesome. We got to go through various parts of the township and learned about the different social class systems they have. There are three classes – first, second and third. The third social class used to be hostels for men during apartheid. These men were brought into the city from the rural areas by the government to work in the mines but during apartheid the government also used them as instigators and informants on the ANC actions and so on. The third class housing is actually on the outskirts of the Soweto suburb of Orlando West, so even then there is some separation between the classes. During apartheid people from Orlando West would not step foot in that area because it meant trouble. This section was also problematic in the sense that when the government brought people to this area it was only men allowed since they would need to work and they were brought over for short and long periods of six to twelve months at a time.
Additionally, you could tell the different class systems by the built of the homes. The third class homes/housing are the majority of the shacks, they are still not as well structured as the other homes/houses. The first class homes are full standing structures with working bathrooms inside the homes. However, the guide told us that some of the “nice” homes were sort of from old money and if the homes were maintained it meant that money still existed or that the families still had some money. The gates of the homes/houses at the end of the tour had beautiful gates and they were not for security reasons but instead to show them off.
At this stop we were able to have our first treat of the township and that was their locally brewed beer. Consumed from a cardboard carton into a plastic glass at a shebeen called "The Shack" in Soweto near Johannesburg during a cultural tour of the township. It is a Sorghum beer, which is indigenous opaque traditional African ale, brewed by a loose collective of South African brewery organizations using maize, wheat, water and yeast. It is not sold in bottle shops but is widely consumed in the black South African townships. It looks like a watered down strawberry milkshake with a few loose bubbles of pinkish white head. The aroma has a pungent yeasty lactic acid sourness and the palate is grain-like and sour with a thick grainy texture and medium body. There is no hop presence and the degree of sourness and alcohol content varies with the age of the brew (the fresher the better according to our guide). Like tasting your very first lambic beer, the palate needs to adjust to it and after a while you can consume it quite easily. Though I did not have the pleasure of tasting the beer, most of the other students enjoyed the taste.
After the beer stop and little bit of Zulu dancing where Andrew, main coordinator of trip, fell as he tried to dance, this was seriously hilarious! We moved on to have a township treat – cow cheek with pop, pop is like smashed potato but made out of corn/corn starch, has no real taste but combined with the cow cheek it is amazing. Most of the students enjoyed the cow cheek that was seasoned at our own taste with salt and/or paprika.
We continued our tour by going through the township and eventually heading towards the student up rise of 1976 museum/site, where there were a few monuments to commemorate the youth struggle during apartheid. The day of the up rise was July 16th, 1976. This site occupies the most famous picture of the up rise where Hector Pieterson was carried by a young man named Mbuyisa, who until today no one know if he is still alive. The site has a commemorative stone that Nelson Mandela unveiled on June 16th, 1992 in honor of Hector Pieterson and the other youth who lost their lives on that day as well as those that took the risk and were courageous to stand up against apartheid. The memorial site is very meaningful especially since it is right on the corner street where Hector was shot. There is a quote on one of the stones that reads “To honour the youth who gave their lives in the struggle for freedom and democracy”.
After this powerful site we went on to have some lunch. We had Kota’s, which were very similar to the Gatsby’s except that these one’s had egg on top. It was really nice treat. We moved on to check out Nelson Mandela’s old home, now turned into a museum, and then Archbishop Desmond Tutu’s home. Both homes are now located the same street that has also been labeled as the Nobel Laureate Walk. It was really nice to end our tour here because it was very uplifting. It was nice to see the change that these people had made even though they lived in the largest township of South Africa.
Finally after our 4 hour bike tour and possibly 3mile bike ride we headed to the airport. We arrived with plenty of time to relax before boarding. It was a nicer ride back to Cape Town and it was still sunny when we got home. We made it back just in time for some of Ivy’s home cooked meal. And Andrew successfully made it through his first complete airplane ride.
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