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Travel
First the Lions, then the World Cup Robert Mayes turns tourist in his home town to find a new Johannesburg ready for the spotlight

Travel

Irish Mail on Sunday April 26, 2009

April 26, 2009 Irish Mail on Sunday

Travel

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eep in the township of Soweto, not far from the beautiful new stadium that will host the opening of next years soccer World Cup, a railway line separates two very different worlds. The newly opened Soweto Hotel on Freedom Square, the townships first four-star hotel, is a haven of luxury, decorated in warm, earthy tones with plush furnishings, home-crafted tapestries and photographs of jazz musicians. In the reception, images of Nelson Mandela and other icons of the struggle have pride of place. I caught the news on a flat-screen TV, had coffee, orange juice, sliced fruit and yoghurt from the extensive breakfast menu. Yet barely a stones throw away or more appropriately, the kick of a ball is Sowetos oldest and poorest settlement. A footbridge over the line leads to old Kliptown, a shanty town with no proper sanitation, no electricity and fewer than 50 water taps to serve its 45,000 people. Shacks of corrugated iron jostle with mud-pack houses on the edge of a marsh. Floods can wreak havoc on its usually dust-choked streets. Rarely is the clich from the wrong side of the tracks so starkly illustrated. The contrast is typical of South Africa, and one that some might find rather bleak. For me, however, an encounter with Kliptown was uplifting in unexpected ways. But first, I should declare an interest. I was born and raised in Johannesburg or Jozi, as we like to call it and moved to Ireland four years ago, via Britain. From here, and up closer during regular visits, I have watched the country take its first unsteady steps as a beacon of democracy in Africa. This week, all eyes were on South Africa as it went to the polls, with a massive 80pc of its 48 million people turning out to vote the ANC back into power. Whatever about new president Jacob Zuma, his many wives and that song, Bring Me My Machine Gun, the country has truly grown up since the days of apartheid. Now, with a new leader and a host of new reasons to visit, South Africa is very much on the world stage. In June, Paul OConnell will lead the Lions to do battle with the Springboks. Later in the month, Brazil, Italy and Spain will arrive to play in soccers Confederations Cup. Finally, next year will bring the show weve all been waiting for, when South Africa will host Africas first soccer World Cup.

CITY OF GOLD: The skyline of central Johannesburg, with Museum Africa in Newtown in the foreground

GREAT ESCAPES
SO GOOD, THEY NAMED IT BEST: New York, New York. That was the verdict of Irish holidaymakers at the inaugural 2009 Irish Travel Consumer Awards. The Big Apple was voted as the best destination anywhere in the world and also,needless to say, in the US. Spain, that old favourite, won the best sun holiday award and Austria picked up the best skiing prize. At home, Galway is considered the best place for a break. The ceremonys MC, Kathryn Thomas, also received an award for her RT show, No Frontiers. A HAPPY BALTIC BIRTHDAY: Lithuania is celebrating one of those once-in-a-lifetime festivities: 1,000 years since the first written mention of its name. Oh, and its capital, Vilnius, is also this years European Capital of Culture. A great spot to sample this culture is the Vilnius opera house www.opera.lt where standby tickets for performances cost as little as E2. Aer Lingus (www.aerlingus.com) flies to Vilnius three days a week, while a double room at the Irish-owned Tilto Hotel starts from E95, with a 20pc discount for a three-night stay, 30pc for four and so on www.hoteltilto.com. GET LOST IN A TREE: Life imitates art in Costa Rica and fans of TV show Lost will be delighted. The enterprising Costa Verde hotel has turned the fuselage of a 1965 Boeing 727 into the countrys most exclusive suite, where you can hang on the wings (now balconies) and see the Pacific Ocean or the Manuel Antonio national park. Beacon South America has 10-day tour to Costa Rica from E2,103pps. A four-night extension at the Costa Verde costs E738pps. Phone 0818 300123. FAMILY TREATS: Its a family affair at Oceanicos Portuguese resorts this May and June. The first 500 bookings for parties of four for more than six nights will be offered treats such as rounds of golf, pampering at a spa, tennis lessons or water park passes log onto their website, www.oceanicoresorts.com lvaro Reynolds travel@mailonsunday.ie

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SOCCER CITY: The 95,000-seater stadium that hosts the World Cup final

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f Robbie and the boys pull it off and qualify, Irish fans will be taking out second and third mortgages to paint the Rainbow Nation several new shades of green. The beer will be cheap and the weather crisp and gorgeous but what about the crime, people ask. Isnt it dangerous? To answer that question, I decided to play tourist in my own home town, to venture beyond the malls and into parts of the city that most tourists avoid and most white South Africans rarely dare to go. I strolled around central Johannesburg, which some would have you believe is the seventh circle of hell. I walked through Soweto and took a bicycle tour through places most tourists barely get off the coach. My guide, Nathaniel Pala Sunnyboy to his friends drove me around Jozi in a gleaming black BMW to see how the government has poured millions into gentrifying the city centre. In the cultural district of Newtown, home to the famous Market Theatre, decrepit buildings have been transformed into museums, offices and designer penthouse apartments. People dine in the shade around the square, which hosts a flea market and occasional concerts. Museum Africa is a mish-mash of South Africas colourful history, while the Sci-Bono science museum has a steady trade of school tours and families. Nearby, South African Brew-

GETTING THERE
Robert travelled as a guest of South African Tourism www.southafrica.net and flew to Johannesburg via London with South African Airways. Fares from Dublin to Johannesburg are available from e500 return. Guide Sunnyboy Pala was provided by Johannesburg Tourism Company www.joburg.org.za. A de luxe room at The Soweto Hotel on Freedom Square is e125 per night B&B, with suites from e210 (0027 11) 527 7300 reservations@sowetohotel.co.za, For Lebos Backpackers and bicycle tours of Soweto with Charmaine Dlamini, log onto www.sowetobackpackers.com. eries runs a hugely popular brewery tour. A little further afield, attached to Witwatersrand University in Braamfontein, the ultra-modern Origins museum of rock art sets out a compelling case for Africa as the real birthplace of modern man. In midtown, the mining houses have turned eight blocks of Main Street into a paved boulevard and outdoor museum, with mining artefacts on display alongside artworks. A number of new residential developments have sprouted among skyscrapers twice the height of Liberty Hall and guides are offering walking tours. Art deco gems are everywhere its little known but Johannesburg is a close runner-up to Miami for concentration of deco buildings. Deep downtown is a little more challenging. As in parts of New York or London, locals say its best not to walk around unless youre confident where youre going. We diverted back to Newtown to the Kwa Mai Mai muti-market, a football field-sized open area where traditional African medicines are sold. Pilane Khumalo talked me through his stall of roots, barks and murky potions. Everything from tummy trouble to infidelity has a remedy here. A quick rub of mafuta allegedly increases a mans power, sexual or otherwise. An actual lions heart can be bought for R1,500, or about e120, to give you surprise, surprise courage.

And one for the World Cup: smearing lion fat on the posts is supposed to keep the ball out of the goals. Dodging bullets? Try a little ground buffalo horn. And if the green-eyed monster should rear its head, the skin of a black mamba will stop an unfaithful partner from feeling sexual pleasure with anyone except you. Of course it will. Lunch was another adventure, at Gramadoelas at the Market Theatre, where I tried crocodile nuggets that tasted like a cross between fish and chicken with the faintest hint of mud. I filled the afternoon with a tour of Constitution Hill, the extraordinary museum on the site of the Old Fort prison, where Mahatma Gandhi and Mandela were both interned for a time and prisoners were kept segregated in inhumane conditions. When the prison was closed, its bricks were used in the construction of the new constitutional court, a richly symbolic gesture at the heart of an architectural marvel which reflects the principles of South Africas much-admired constitution. As my guide, Vusiso, said: We can build our future using the past. But I was impatient to see Soweto, the endless sprawl that some four million people call home. On the drive, we passed the iconic Orlando Towers, a pair of cooling towers from a disused power station that have been painted with vibrant murals and which loom large over the t o w n s h i p s

skyline. The view from the top is said to be fantastic as you bounce from a glorified rubber band known as bungee. Thats right, you can bungee jump in Soweto, for R350 (E30) a go. I pencilled that one in for next time. As far as iconic buildings go, few can match Soccer City, the newly upgraded stadium that will host up to 94,700 people for the opening match and final of next years World Cup. Inspired by the African calabash, a gourd shaped fruit, the stadium is a pleasing organic shape. There is still some work to be done but it already looks like being one of the stars of the tournament. I had asked Sunnyboy to get me under the skin of the place and thats exactly what he did. On Saturday night, we hit a real shebeen in the Soweto suburb of Diepkloof, sitting on beer crates and necking 750ml quarts of Black Label. This was not without its challenges the shebeen queen was nervous at having a journalist,

FEEL THE BASSLINE: The nightlife in Johannesburg is vibrant, with a thriving jazz scene
and some of the other patrons were blitzed to the point that conversation was impossible. Fortunately, we could all talk soccer, and a man who told me his name five times was suddenly talking eloquently about Robbie Keanes move back to Tottenham. Our shebeen crawl peaked at a pub called uKhamba, which was hopping to DJs playing African house music. People danced wherever they liked, and in one corner, a butcher sold plates piled high with meat to be barbecued (braai) outside. I even had a little boogie until being told I danced like Mandela. The next morning was a scorcher. At the Holiday Inn, I stepped onto a sun-drenched balcony overlooking Walter Sisulu Square, named after Nelson Mandelas mentor, and the site where anti-apartheid activists signed the landmark Freedom Charter in 1955. A conical monument marks that auspicious day. The square is another focal point for regeneration, and the architecture is accordingly modern. In the shade, a market buzzed to the cries of hawkers and blaring radios, and newly planted acacia trees added a touch of green to a paved expanse sloping gently to the railway tracks. My guide for the day was Charmaine Dlamini, a bubbly journalism student. She runs tours with Lebos Backpackers, a youth hostel in Orlando which is rapidly making a name for itself among growing numbers of European visitors. I joined a bicycle tour with Charmaine, and we cycled through the townships, stopping to drink the local beer made from millet, and see youngsters practising their traditional dancing. Everywhere we were met with cheers and smiles and shouted hellos. We took in Mandelas first house and the Hector Pieterson monument on Vilakazi Street, which commemorates the most famous victim of police retaliation during the Soweto Uprising in 1976. Over in Kliptown, Charmaine took me over that footbridge and across the tracks. Dating from 1903, the township harboured Mandela shortly before he was imprisoned for 27 years on Robben Island. Otherwise, it seems largely forgotten. I met Bob Nameng, who runs SKY (Soweto Kliptown Youth), a community group which helps underprivileged children. Bob, a charismatic man with impressive dreadlocks,

FLYING: Bungee jumping at Sowetos defunct power station

gave me a warm welcome and sent me off with Ntokozo TK Dube. A former street child, 23-year-old TK says he is about to study tourism. He is an eloquent advocate for SKY, which teaches children skills and, where possible, give help with school fees, uniforms and three meals a day. We went to meet some locals in their homes. The tour was an eyeopener three or four families sharing a space a student would turn his nose up at in Europe. The poverty is pervasive, yet TK and every person I met was radiant in their positivity. Yes, I was born in a shack, he says, but inside I am a castle. It may sound cheesy but, given their circumstances, the sentiment was inspiring. Walking back to the SKY centre, I noticed two barefoot boys awestruck as they unwrapped a box of new Nike boots later I realised they must have been from Bob, an avid football fan. As I left, I felt a tap on my shoulder. A boy handed me something that had fallen out of my pocket. It was a R200 note, not far short of e20 and a fortune to him. Make of that what you like but I think were on the right track.

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INTREPID: Robert took a cycle tour of Soweto and tried the local millet beer

*Restrictions, terms and conditions apply. See website for complete details. Hollywood Rip Ride RockitSM due to open Spring 2009. Manta opens 22nd May 2009. Opening dates subject to change. 2009 Busch Entertainment Corporation. All Rights Reserved. 2009 Wet n Wild Orlando. All Rights Reserved. Marvel Super Hero character names & likenesses: TM & 2009 Marvel 2009 Universal Studios. Universal elements and all related indicia TM & 2009 Universal Studios. 2009 Universal Orlando. All rights reserved.