Southern Africa - Day 2 (Part 2)

Tuesday, 14 January 2020 - Cape Town 

And then to Table Mountain. This has been voted to be one of the new 7 wonders of nature in 2011. It is at least 6 times older than the Himalayas, making it one of the oldest mountains in the world, and at the top it is 3 km across. Table Mountain has been personified as the Watcher of the South, a vengeful giant with storms at his command, a sleeping goddess, Keeper Father of colonisation and a Silent Witness of Apartheid. It was originally inhabited by the Kohi people who named the mountain, The Mountain of the Sea. 

I took the cable car to the top of Table Mountain, it got us out at 1,067 m above sea level. The highest point on Table Mountain is Maclear’s Beacon at 1,085 m above sea level. The cable car has been operating since 1929. The landscape on top of Table Mountain is really quite unique. Apart from flora that I’ve never seen before anywhere else that I’ve been to so far, the surface of the mountain top is really quite flat and easy to walk.

From the top of Table Mountain, you could clearly see the entire Cape of Good Hope. The Greek historian Herodotus recorded that Phoenician mariners may have rounded the Cape as early as 600 BC. The prevailing belief of the ancient Mediterranean saw Africa connected to a mythical southern continent, Terra Australis Incognita and could not be circumnavigated. The Portuguese were the first to challenge this belief through the epic voyage of Bartolomeu Dias in 1487-1488. It was named the Cape of Good Hope - for the promise of discovery held for establishing a maritime trade route between Europe and the commercial centres of the East. However, it was only 10 years later when Bartolomew Dias and the more popular Vasco da Gama chartered out a trade route around the Cape. 

You can also see Robben Island from the top of Table Mountain. This was where Nelson Mandela was imprisoned for some 27 years. For about 450 years, it served as a prison for European convicts, slaves from West Africa, princes from the East, lepers, the insane and thousands of South African political opposers. It is now no longer a prison, but serves more as a museum. It was declared as a World Heritage Site in 1999.

About 6 million years ago one could walk to Robben Island - it was connected by land. But if you look at the map of when the world was first formed, you would see that the entire continents were once all connected and over the years, with volcanic activity, earthquakes and the like it became what it is now. And then you have different flora and fauna, and different types of humans in different parts of the world. It’s ironic really - we all came from the same source and yet fight due to our superficial differences. Such is the world, such is life.

After Table Mountain we passed through Green Point; this is where the stadium that was built and used for the 2010 World Cup held in South Africa is located. Also passed the Groote Schuur Hospital - in 1967, the first successful human to human heart transplant in the world was performed here by Dr Christiaan Bernard. Things I never would’ve known unless I went travelling. Things no normal people would be interested in (roll eyes). 

Lastly, to the V&A Waterfront - this is like an entertainment hub with a shopping mall, restaurants and pubs and a merry-go-round overlooking the harbour. 

And then done with the city and back to the hotel. A slight headache was settling in either from jet lag or lack of sleep or lack of rest but of course I have to try the local beers so I did at the bar in the hotel - Castle Lager and Windhoek Light. The former is from Cape Town and brewed locally; the latter is from Namibia but brewed locally. As usual because I am always curious about local life, I chatted with the 2 bartenders and got a pretty interesting insight about Africa. 

I asked them why Africa is the way it is when it is one of the oldest civilisations in the world, it is rich in natural resources, and it has been independent of colonialisation for even longer than some Asian countries and yet remain poor and under developed. One of them said, “it is easy to defeat the white man but it is not easy to defeat your own brother because your brother knows all your strengths and weaknesses; he is you, and he will use it against you.” I liked his explanation. I thought it was very insightful. And unfortunately true. 

The other guy said something about not eating fish and I asked him why and he said his family name means ‘fish’ and this means that he cannot eat fish. This triggered something in my memory but it was only later when I was about to sleep that I remembered Emile Durkheim’s ‘The Elementary Forms of Religious Life’ and how he used the totemic beliefs of the Aboriginal people of Australia to argue that religion is man made through collective effervescence. I wonder if this fishy business is a totemic belief. 

After 2 beers my headache got worse and I took 2 panadols, washed some clothes and then I was out at 9 pm local time. But it wasn’t a peaceful sleep as I was worried about getting up at the right time tomorrow because the different time zones between Malaysia and the country that I am in sometimes confuse me, especially after a long flight.