We had a lovely, relaxing time in Capetown--so good to be able to drink tap water again! Our South Africa agenda was sadly unambitious, but we really enjoyed parking there for a while in a comfortable Airbnb apartment in a residential neighborhood with a fantastic cafe just up the street and a great view of Table Mountain in the distance.
We figured out the buses so that we could get around easily. And we spent a shocking amount of time eating everything from wild boar sausage to great cheeses. Also, it was fun to be in a city once again where we could walk and wander, including the colorful historically Muslim area of the city.
Of course, every day in South Africa is a political miracle in progress. Apartheid was still in force when I graduated from Dartmouth. (In fact, it was the anti-Apartheid shanties on the green that set in motion a series of protests and counter-protests that polarized the campus.) I was here in 1995, when people were enthusiastic about Mandela's election but worried the government would not last beyond him. (Their fears about bad governance were not irrational. Current President Jacob Zuma fired his well-respected finance minister during our visit, causing South African debt to be immediately downgraded to junk status.) But still, the fact that the society has held together in the face of such tectonic changes over the course of one generation is remarkable.
We visited Robben Island, where Mandela was imprisoned for nearly two decades. It's a sobering place with tours led by former political prisoners.
Robben Island is a little incongruous, however, as it's also home to a penguin colony and offers a beautiful view back towards Capetown.
Meanwhile, Capetown is just a beautiful place, perched between the Atlantic coast and Table Mountain. We made a trip up to Table Mountain and hiked around there for an afternoon.
Late in the day, the fog rolled in, making this sunset possible.
On our final full day, Leah and I went for a full day of wine tasting (leaving CJ and Sophie behind to make their way on the bus to a shopping mall, which they pulled off without a hitch). As noted in the title of the post, the food and wine is extraordinary. And the wine region just outside of Capetown is beautiful (and redolent of Sonoma).
Here we had a curious and inspiring insight into post-Apartheid life. We took a group tour with a Brazilian couple on their honeymoon and five nurses from Johannesburg. As we posed for our group photo, we arranged ourselves coincidentally such that everyone who was white was on one side and everyone who was black was on the other. One of the nurses said, "No, no. We must be mixed!" We rearranged ourselves. If you think about it, that says an awful lot (at least about one person's aspirations for South Africa's future) given that it was just a personal photo of a vacation wine tour.
We tasted 19 wines, with big pours and not much spitting. My photos became more artistic as the day went on.
We've now left Africa, after too little time, and have made our way to Mumbai, where we are staying with our dear friends Sumer and Sonali. Remarkably, we are on the back end of this adventure. Today or tomorrow, we'll book our tickets from Europe back to Boston . . .
We figured out the buses so that we could get around easily. And we spent a shocking amount of time eating everything from wild boar sausage to great cheeses. Also, it was fun to be in a city once again where we could walk and wander, including the colorful historically Muslim area of the city.
Of course, every day in South Africa is a political miracle in progress. Apartheid was still in force when I graduated from Dartmouth. (In fact, it was the anti-Apartheid shanties on the green that set in motion a series of protests and counter-protests that polarized the campus.) I was here in 1995, when people were enthusiastic about Mandela's election but worried the government would not last beyond him. (Their fears about bad governance were not irrational. Current President Jacob Zuma fired his well-respected finance minister during our visit, causing South African debt to be immediately downgraded to junk status.) But still, the fact that the society has held together in the face of such tectonic changes over the course of one generation is remarkable.
We visited Robben Island, where Mandela was imprisoned for nearly two decades. It's a sobering place with tours led by former political prisoners.
Robben Island is a little incongruous, however, as it's also home to a penguin colony and offers a beautiful view back towards Capetown.
Meanwhile, Capetown is just a beautiful place, perched between the Atlantic coast and Table Mountain. We made a trip up to Table Mountain and hiked around there for an afternoon.
Late in the day, the fog rolled in, making this sunset possible.
On our final full day, Leah and I went for a full day of wine tasting (leaving CJ and Sophie behind to make their way on the bus to a shopping mall, which they pulled off without a hitch). As noted in the title of the post, the food and wine is extraordinary. And the wine region just outside of Capetown is beautiful (and redolent of Sonoma).
Here we had a curious and inspiring insight into post-Apartheid life. We took a group tour with a Brazilian couple on their honeymoon and five nurses from Johannesburg. As we posed for our group photo, we arranged ourselves coincidentally such that everyone who was white was on one side and everyone who was black was on the other. One of the nurses said, "No, no. We must be mixed!" We rearranged ourselves. If you think about it, that says an awful lot (at least about one person's aspirations for South Africa's future) given that it was just a personal photo of a vacation wine tour.
We tasted 19 wines, with big pours and not much spitting. My photos became more artistic as the day went on.
We've now left Africa, after too little time, and have made our way to Mumbai, where we are staying with our dear friends Sumer and Sonali. Remarkably, we are on the back end of this adventure. Today or tomorrow, we'll book our tickets from Europe back to Boston . . .
did all that wine make another beautiful sunset "possible"...?
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