Once you have come to adopt Cape Town with all its challenges the biggest difficulty is not to love the city, says Bulelwa Makalima-Ngewana.
When I travel in South Africa and people ask me where I am from, I’m not always sure how to answer. Of course I grew up in the Eastern Cape, and worked in both Kwazulu-Natal and Gauteng, but Cape Town has been my urban home for the past 13 years, and come to shape me and my family’s way of life in entirely unexpected ways.
All are integral to me and I think I share this feeling with many people; most of us are from more than one place.
This is true particularly in Cape Town as our city has been shaped by generations of people who hold unique and specific identities and human connections.
From the first KhoiKhoi and San inhabitants of the Cape to cohorts of immigrants: from the Dutch and the British, to the slaves brought by the boatload from India, China, Malaysia, Indonesia, Madagascar, east and west Africa, to the Portuguese, Greeks, Italians, Germans, amaXhosa, amaZulu and other cultures from South Africa, Africa and the world. Today we cannot even imagine our city without them.
In the latest issue of the Cape Town Partnership’s community newspaper, Molo, themed on immigration, I was struck by just how much our city has been shaped by its global connections.
The Cape wine industry is based on knowledge brought over by the French Huguenots; snoek was first eaten and named by the Dutch who also pioneered the salting of it into bokkoms, itself often eaten with fruit chutney originally imported from Malaysia; Cape seafood such as calamari and sole was introduced by Italian, Greek and Portuguese immigrants; and, my ongoing reminder of my other home, the amaXhosa street food available on station decks and at taxi ranks is a direct import from the Eastern Cape.
The vibrant Cape Town as medley of culture, food, language, music, art, spirituality and personalities is the side of the Mother City that I treasure the most.
This creolisation is possibly why I have always been drawn to living in coastal towns – East London, Durban and now Cape Town. To me it seems that there is a direct, tangible pre-internet connection with the rest of the world that creates an urban space where difference is celebrated, we can all feel more comfortable being ourselves, and ideas and creativity are constantly stimulated by new juxtapositions.
Walking down Long Street last week, I heard spoken Wolof, kiSwahili, Somali and isiXhosa, which gave me such a thrill to feel that we live in such a wonderfully global city where we can experience a diversity of people and stories without the astronomical expense of international travel.
Take for instance the recent World Music Festival that many of my team members are still raving about. And, looking forward, at the wonderfully global and Pan-African line-up for the Open Book Festival coming up in Cape Town.
Also in Molo is the story of Harrison Mudukuti – Zimbabwean musician, political activist, father and former illegal immigrant, and now the barista who many a morning gives me my caffeine fix.
Who knew how much hardship was hidden under his irrepressible cheerfulness? Now I see his cheerfulness as indicative of a much deeper character trait of resilience and perseverance.
It is these real human stories – reflecting the diversity of people who live and work in the city – that we are trying to share through Molo.
We see the bi-monthly publication as an experiment in citizen storytelling, and hope that it will foster connections between people and a sense of belonging. Its name is a deliberate one, intended as a greeting – it is isiXhosa for hello – and we hope it invites readers to view the paper as a vehicle for conversation and dialogue.
It also serves as a launch pad and sets the tone for a new research study about migration and African liveability that we’re embarking on at the Cape Town Partnership. In order to better support people seeking opportunity in our city, the research will help in improving understanding of overall trends, economic contribution, personal experiences and risks.
It is about not only how immigration can be good for the city, both socially and economically, but also about Cape Town’s role in global immigration patterns.
After all, globalisation is a two-way connection, as emphasised to me by another story that stood out for me in Molo. It was about Thandi Dlamini from Swaziland who came to the University of Cape Town in 1994 to realise her dream of becoming a kidney specialist.
Now, 20 years later, a human being personally and professionally shaped by Cape Town, she is returning to her homeland to make a real difference with her medical expertise. It is people like her, impacting their world through connections that they’ve made in Cape Town, that are the greatest ambassadors to our city!
Sadly, this is something people tend to forget when faced with people who are different, and during troubling times it is often foreign minorities who suffer most. It seems to me that xenophobia could be addressed easily if we were all educated and had a clear understanding of each other’s stories as a people.
Under apartheid the majority of South Africans did not have the ability to travel beyond our borders. Thus people simply did not come into contact with people from other countries. Travel tends to broaden one’s perspective and understanding of life and other cultures.
This is what our Neighbourhood Communication Project in the East City is about: opening up channels of communication and conversation between people from different geographic, cultural and social backgrounds. As a way to surface the astonishing variety of people who converge on Cape Town, for several weeks project consultant Andrew Putter asked passers-by in Commercial Street where they came from, and how they got to be here.
These journeys – from as far as Kenya, Tanzania, Ethiopia and the DRC to local routes from Durban, Calvinia, Kimberley and Johannesburg – were plotted on maps of Africa, southern Africa and the Peninsula, ultimately presented as a public mural in Commercial Street during Creative Week Cape Town last September. Through this collaborative creative process Andrew managed to capture a sense of the rich diversity of people who move around and migrated to Cape Town, and reflect it back to the community, making people aware of each other’s journeys.
What draws people to Cape Town is in part this existing diversity, but also the way that Cape Town gives people the feeling that they have a contribution to make and the space to actualise their dreams – like British ballet dancer Andrew Warth, who founded the Zama Dance School in Gugulethu after a short work contract introduced him to the city, as well as human rights activist Braam Hanekom who founded Passop, a not-for-profit organisation devoted to fighting for the rights of asylum-seekers, refugees and immigrants in South Africa.
Braam’s Afrikaans-sounding name probably obscures his Shona-speaking Zimbabwean upbringing, which is a potent reminder of why we should never judge people on our own prejudices.
In Cape Town I’ve always marvelled at how there just aren’t any reductionist stereotypes in this city. One person might speak Afrikaans and live under a bridge in a cardboard shelter. Another might speak French, live in a flat in Maitland and import craft from Senegal. Yet another might speak English and live in Rondebosch and worship in a mosque.
In such a city that is made up of countless different identities and sources of heritage, people often wonder what makes you Capetonian.
I tend to take a generously liberal stance to this question. I hope this does not in any way diminish those who see themselves as indigenous born and bred Capetonians. My stance is that this is not a debatable issue: being a Capetonian is simply a matter of association and identity.
So, if you feel like you are a Capetonian, then you are a Capetonian. I’ve met people who have been here for six months and feel that this is the place they want to spend the rest of their lives; I’ve met people who have been in Cape Town for a long time and feel that they just can never leave the city.
It is this variety of people that constitute the soul of Cape Town, and in my view we should be appreciative of having a city that is able to hook your heart even though the challenges are there – and there are many challenges that face the average Capetonian daily. However, once you have, like me, come to adopt the city with all its challenges the biggest difficulty is not to love the city.
Some Capetonians, including me, are willing to let go of really prime opportunities in other places because of our emotional connection with this city.
Why that is will have to be a topic for another day. In the meantime, let’s all be proudly Capetonian in the most inclusive sense of the word.
Talk to me @darksjokolade
*Makalima-Ngewana is the chief executive of the Cape Town Partnership.
** The views expressed here are not necessarily those of Independent Newspapers.
Cape Times