Cape Town Townships

Well, initially I had intended to update this every day, but obviously that has not been the case... With schoolwork and field trips and outings, somehow the days have just flown by! I will write an entry for each day from the last post until now and upload pictures for that day. I will begin where I left off last.

Wednesday, June 29, 2011
We spent our afternoon visiting a township about 20 minutes from UCT. The townships here expand in all directions for miles. So much so that, even at the top of an overlook, we could barely see the outermost shanties. Our guide told us that people arrive and add onto the outskirts every day (literally) and build shanties out of whatever they can find. I was nervous about going to such a poor area and how we would be perceived. These tours, however, have become fairly common and so most of the people just gawked at us as we walked by gawking at them.
We started at a welcome center where there was a Marimba band. They were awesome! They taught us some Xhosa words (with clicks and everything) and then had us play some of the instruments and sing a song. It was a lot of fun. We then headed out to our walk through the township. The government has started building homes for people that have lived there for 10-20 years, so there are some actual houses, but a lot more shanties.
I was most surprised at how homey the shanties felt. It makes sense, looking back, because they are these peoples homes, but it definitely made me appreciate everything I have even my cold little dorm room at UCT! Another thing that surprised me was the amount of kids running around unsupervised, some of which were maybe 2 years old. We were told that there is not really a problem with kidnapping, except when witch doctors (mostly from the Eastern Cape) come and steal kids to cut up and use their organs and bones for potions. This does actually happen. A township specialty is sheep's head, which we did try. I just had a small bite of meat that looked most like regular meat, I think it was part of the cheek. It was interesting... We also tried some sorghum beer, which they brew right there in the township, which tasted very much like yeast bread dough.
At the end of the tour we visited a local witch doctor, or Sangoma, who was very interesting and might have been drunk... All in all it was a good day and an interesting experience that really made me appreciate my life of privilege.

 Looking out over the townships. The farthest are the newest shanties and more are added every day as people move to Cape Town (from the Eastern Cape) in hopes of a better life.

 Adam and I, excited for the day to come!

 Rainbow! They are everywhere here!

 Everyone learning the Marimba song. I was photographer/videographer/chorus. I wanted to play an instrument, but everyone else jumped up before I could.

 Awesome art made from sand! I wanted the lion one, but it was sooooo expensive and would have been impractical to bring back home.

 Cool dude in the township. I loved his outfit!

 Houses (and boys) in Langa township.

 Cooking sheep's head, a township speciality.

 One of the guys in our group bought a sheep's head for R20 (~$3.00) and we all tried it. It was interesting...

 Unsupervised, tiny children. It was like this on every block.

 Cute little boy got really excited when we walked by. Just had to get a pic! He was really excited to see himself in the picture on my camera. Very cute.

 Township church with government homes, Devil's Peak and Table Mountain in the background.

 This is how most women in the townships carry their babies.

 Sorghum.

 Township boys and toilets on the left, shanties on the right.

The Sangoma and his "office".