Southern Africa - Day 26

Friday, 7 February 2020 - Johannesburg to Malaysia 

Today I travel home. I am sad. I love travelling. I love Africa (I always knew I would). But now I have to go home and earn some money. I go home to a very uncertain future. I go home to an empty house. I go home to nothing. 

No, no, not nothing. I have the Notorious P.U.P. She is all I have in this world. 

Right. Back to my boring life of being a slave for the next few years or so 😭.

Southern Africa - Day 25 (Part 3)

Thursday, 6 February 2020 - South Africa 

By studying Mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA), scientists can trace all modern humans to a single common female ancestor who lived about 200,000 years ago, and she’s from Africa. The mtDNA is transmitted only from mothers to their children, and it passes almost unchanged from generation to generation. The slight changes that do occur result from mutations that geneticists think have been developing at a constant rate through time. By measuring the amount of change in mtDNA in modern populations, it is possible to trace human genealogy over thousands of generations, back to a common female ancestor of all living humans. 

When scientists tested certain African groups, particularly the Khoisan people in Southern Africa (bushmen), they have found more variety in their mtDNA than in populations living outside Africa. This means that those Africans have been around for more generations than any other people, according to geneticists. This correlates with fossil discoveries - the oldest fossil evidence of modern humans thus far have been found in Ethiopia and South Africa. This supports the “Out of Africa” theory, which argues that humans originated in Africa and then spread to populate the rest of the world. 

As I walked out of the museum, I read this interesting quote on one of the stone tablets lining the walkway: “Africa is the birthplace of humankind. This is where our collective umbilical cord lies buried.” I really like this quote 😁.

Then, although this was not in my plan, I went to the Lion and Safari Park. I had to pay Arthur a little extra for this but certainly cheaper than if I had arranged it with the hotel so I was happy with this. Here I got to touch 4 simply adorable lion cubs which were about 5 months old!!! 😍😍😍 their fur is actually quite rough. Then a short safari ride where I saw many, many more lions, African wild dogs (they have very big ears and appear spotted - they are commonly mistaken for hyenas but are proper canines whereas the closest relative of the hyena is (I never would have guessed) the mongoose!), a giraffe named George and some cheetahs. 

Although these animals are wild, they were born and bred in the park itself so they are not really WILD wild as in they don’t need to hunt for their own food. Some of the lions here are white, but they are not albino, just whitish fur because they inherited a recessive gene. The guide informed me that in the wild they would be rejected by the pack as they view white fur as a defect. So strange. In the world of mankind it is the other way around 🙃.

Then to the Mall of Africa (apparently the biggest mall in Africa) to look for some make-up for Amma which cannot be found anywhere in Malaysia nor can it be shipped to Malaysia 🙄. Luckily I found it. It is now the end of summer heading into autumn here in Johannesburg; the weather is actually quite nice about 27-28 degrees Celsius and much colder at night. The government shuts down the electricity from one town to another to save money. As it was quite late when we were driving back to the hotel, we drove in darkness: there were no streetlights and no lights even in the mall!

Before going to the hotel I bought dinner (Nando’s Hotpot which cannot be found in Malaysia I know not why) and then back to the hotel where I said goodbye to Arthur, eat, shower and pack with a terribly heavy heart because tomorrow I leave Africa although my heart is still here 😭. 

Southern Africa - Day 25 (Part 2)

Thursday, 6 February 2020 - South Africa 

So, this is what I learned from the museum - as much of the information that I could remember, anyway:

About 250 million years ago when land and oceans were forming on the surface of the earth, all the land in the world were joined together in 1 super-continent known as Pangaea. Then about 200 million years ago, this super-continent separated into 2: the southern part is known as Gondwana and the northern part is known as Laurasia. Then, what is now the Indian subcontinent broke off from the east coast of Africa and moved north, slamming into Asia and creating the Himalayas. This had profound effects for the African climate, drying out air currents, reducing rainfall and eventually causing savannah to replace forests. In the history of Earth, there has actually been 5 major extinctions altogether, dinosaurs were the fifth at 65 million years ago. 

Human evolution was not a single chain of adaptations - it was more like a tree or bush of parallel lineages. Some lineages were successful, or able to adapt to changing environments, while others were not and became extinct (theory of natural selection). Our family tree probably began with an ape species that lived between 8 and 7 million years ago. The same species is thought to have given rise to the African apes. 

The earliest claim for a hominid so far is Sahelanthropus tchadensis, found in Chad in 2001 and dated at about 7 million years old. There are some others found in Ethiopia. About 4 million years ago, another species of hominids known as the Australopithecus anamensis was found, and this was followed by Australopithecus afarensis about 3.6 and 3 million years ago, best represented by the Ethiopian fossil “Lucy”. 

Then the family tree branches out to Paranthropus (which means ‘parallel to human’) and Australopithecus africanus. Both these hominids walked upright and lived at about the same time as our direct predecessors in the genus homo. But Paranthropus became extinct about 1 million years ago. The Australopithecus africanus had human-like teeth and hands but also some ape-like features like a small brain, flattened nose and forward projecting jaws. They lived between 3 and 2 million years ago; Mrs Ples and the Taung Child are examples.

The earliest species of the genus homo, our most direct ancestors, appeared about 2.3 million years ago. Distinct because of their bigger brains and more prominent noses, ultra-adaptable, omnivorous. There were many species of homo: the first was homo habilis (1.9 million years ago, had the mental and physical capacity to fashion primitive stone tools, fossils found in Kenya and Tanzania); homo ergaster (1.7 million years ago, advance tool use and ability to harness fire for cooking and warmth which allowed them to leave Africa for cooler climates); homo erectus (in Asia - the Java man, Peking man); homo antecessor (found in Spain; Latin for ‘pioneer’ or ‘explore’, about 800,000 years ago); homo sapiens idaltu (in Ethiopia and South Africa, from 160,000 to 250,000 years ago); homo heidelbergensis and homo neanderthalensis (Europe, tall, big-boned, heavy built, 120,000 years ago); homo sapiens (about 70,000 to 200,000 years ago in Africa; some of the earliest fossils have been found in Ethiopia and South Africa). 

These immediate ancestors looked like us and were fully “human” - they could think and communicate symbolically, were self-aware, and they created complex social and cultural ways of life. DNA analysis shows that modern humans spread out of Africa perhaps 60,000 to 40,000 years ago and replaced the last, now “dead branches” of the family tree in Europe and Asia. 

Southern Africa - Day 25 (Part 1)

Thursday, 6 February 2020 - South Africa 

Today I visit the Cradle of Humankind. It stretches over an area of about 470 square km that is dotted with about 300 caves. Inside the caves there are thousands of fossils of hominids and other animals, dating back to about 4 million years, to the very birth of humankind! How exciting! The whole area known as the Cradle of Humankind has been declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1999. The most famous fossil found here is ‘Mrs Ples’, a skull more than 2 million years old, and ‘Little Foot’, a skeleton which is between 3-4 million years old. 

First I went into the Sterkfontein cave. This cave started forming about 20 million years ago, and is mostly made out of dolomite (a soft sedimentary rock). There are many caves here but this is the only 1 which is open to the public. We walked 60 m down, where the temperature was about 18 degree Celsius. More than 40% of hominid fossils of the world are found here; there are more than 9,000 fossils here. Fossils are remains of plants and animals that have been preserved in sedimentary rocks and formed over time as organic material is mineralised into stone. A ‘Hominid’ is a bipedal primate i.e. can walk upright on 2 feet. There are also stone artefacts found that are up to 2 million years old, which are the oldest dated stone tools in South Africa. 

As mentioned before, the most famous hominid fossil here is known as ‘Mrs Ples’ - (short for Plesianthropus transvaalensis which means “almost human from the Transvaal”). It has features of both human and ape as well. Now it is classified as Australopithecus africanus (southern ape of Africa), a distant human relative which lived more than 2 million years ago in the Cradle of Humankind. It is called ‘Mrs’ because they thought it was a female due to the small brain cavity and small socket for the canine teeth. But some others argue it may have been a young boy. The fossil’s human-like features included the ability to walk upright, and a brain only slightly larger than a chimpanzee. The “Taung child” (not found here) is another example of Australopithecus africanus; it is a 4 year old child with ape-sized brain and human teeth. But this was found in Taung, the North West Province of South Africa. 

Walking through the cave and to the place where another famous fossil was found - ‘Little Foot’. The fossil was mummified before being covered in sediments, and was subsequently calcified and preserved in breccia for millions of years. So the skeleton is almost complete, which is rare. He is one of the most ancient human ancestors yet discovered, at 4.1 million to 3.3 million years old. He is smaller than most modern humans and had a smaller brain. He walked upright but had powerful hands and a slightly divergent big toe; so he was probably still good at climbing and slept on trees. Scientists believe that he may have accidentally fallen down into the cave because there were many openings into the cave which cannot readily be seen from above ground; perhaps also because he was just making the switch from living on trees to walking upright on 2 feet and therefore not very stable yet. 

Finally we reached the point of the cave where there was an underground river. This is quite cool but there are also pretty strong currents here and there is at least one diver who lost his life exploring the depths of this underground river. Then the trek back out of the cave which was easy enough but you really had to bend and crawl at  some places which was pretty cool!

From the cave I went to the museum of the Cradle of Humankind which had loads of information about the beginning of the world, the changing landscapes of the world as well as the birth of the various species, humankind included. There was something like a raft that you have to ride to get to the exhibition theatre, and this was really fun but quite scary at first because as usual I was alone and didn’t know what the hell was going on! And of course if the raft crashed into the water there was no one I could turn to for help but fortunately nothing of the sort happened. 

Southern Africa - Day 24 (Part 4)

Wednesday, 5 February 2020 - Johannesburg, South Africa 

There is another sad story here. South Africa is full of sad stories as a result of the apartheid rule. And what I gather from the locals are that although apartheid is officially abolished, there is still racism here and therefore still a lot of resentment, anger and frustration. In 1976, the government of South Africa wanted to introduce the Afrikaans language as a compulsory language in all schools. This was a language mainly used by whites and so the blacks were not happy about this ruling; it was yet another white rule forced upon blacks. 

Students therefore organised a protest which was to take place on 16 June 1976; they decided not to tell their parents or teachers about the protest. By 10.30 a.m. there were between 5-6,000 students gathered at Phefeni Junior Secondary School. It was a peaceful protest, students gathered and sang songs in their native languages. 

The police officers dispatched to the march were unprepared. They had no loudhailers so their command to disperse was barely heard. Then they released their dogs into the crowd, causing utter panic. Then a policeman started shooting at the children; one bullet hit a 15 year old boy, and another a 13 year old boy named Hector Pieterson. Soon after, streets were barricaded, students were burning cars, government buildings and liquor stores across Soweto. The riot police arrived. And thus began the Soweto revolt. 

Another 93 people were shot dead by the police over the next 2 days. Protests soon spread throughout the country. At least 600 students in total died, thousands wounded. After the uprising, Orlando West High, along with 310 other schools in Soweto, was immediately closed. 95 schools in Soweto were destroyed or damaged at the time. Despite the many deaths, injuries and destruction or damage to property, the Soweto revolt strengthened the liberation movement; the spirit and determination of the school children resonated around the world and helped motivate the struggle for freedom and democracy in South Africa. 

I walked along part of the street where the students walked in protest back in 1976, past Orlando West High, and was in the exact spot where Hector Pieterson was shot by the police, which is near the Hector Pietorson Museum.

Just across the museum there were road-side stalls selling souveniers. In one of these stalls I saw a few chains where the locket or pendant was a lion’s tooth. The seller informed me that they are from lions that naturally died or were killed by other animals (lions are not allowed to be hunted in Africa) in Maasai Mara National Park, Kenya. I can’t be sure if it’s real but it was the only stall there selling this chain and it certainly looked real so I bought one. Real or not, I shall imagine that it is and feel like a lioness whenever I wear it 😁.

And that was the city tour. In the evening my friend Andre came to the hotel and we had drinks and caught up with old times. Sometimes it’s nice to catch up with old acquaintances; especially acquaintances who are just that: acquaintances and not someone disguised as a friend 🙄. Andre is from South Africa but he has never been to any country in Africa apart from South Africa itself. But he is intending to start travelling soon; he has just bought a camper van. He has also joined a friend of his in a company supplying labour and this got me thinking, I should also have a firm of my own with a partner so that I can take off whenever and she will take care of business, and vice versa. And come what may, we will always have something (income, that is) to come home to. 

The problem, as always, is finding someone reliable 🙄. 

Southern Africa - Day 24 (Part 3)

Wednesday, 5 February 2020 - Johannesburg, South Africa 

Funnily, Hillbrow is walking distance from the High Court, the Prosecuting Attorney’s Chambers and Gandhi Square. I would have thought that these places were safe but who knows. There was some sort of protest going on outside the High Court. Unfortunately the entrance of the High Court is just beside the road so the protest was causing traffic congestion. Luckily our court complex in KL is quite far away from the main road so when there are protests it does not cause traffic disruptions. 

From the High Court to Gandhi Square. There was a statue of Gandhi here; apparently because he always walked in this area to go to the law courts on the old government square. He kept offices near the law courts from 1993-1910. He returned to India in 1914 after 21 years in South Africa. He defended those accused of non-violent resistance to discrimination in the courts. He himself stood trial here for political offences and was sentenced to his first term of imprisonment in 1908. From their birthplace in Johannesburg, Gandhi’s ideas of Satyagraha (passive resistance or “soul force”) spread across the world. 

So that was the city of Johannesburg; next, to the township of Soweto. On the way we passed another upper class city known as Gold Reef City. You could see remnants of the gold mines of yesteryears in the distance all around Johannesburg. The city of gold 😁. We also passed a mall called Maponye Mall. According to Arthur, this was the first mall to be built by a black man in South Africa especially for the people of Soweto. 

In Soweto, first to the Apartheid Museum. I didn’t enter the museum, just took photographs from outside. See how cultured I am! (🙄) There are 2 Nobel Peace Prize winners originating from Soweto - Nelson Mandela and Desmond Tutu (Archbishop of the Roman Catholic Church). This I find to be quite cool and something to be really proud of. Also passed the Baragwanath Hospital which is apparently the 3rd biggest hospital in the world. It was formerly used for British soldiers during the Boer Wars. It covered really a huge area! 

Then to Nelson Mandela’s house at 8115 Vilakazi Street, Orlando West, Soweto. The house was built in 1945 as part of a Johannesburg City tender for new houses in Orlando. Nelson Mandela moved here in 1946 with his first wife, Evelyn Ntoko Mase and his first son. They divorced in 1957, and from 1958 he was joined in the house by his second wife, Winnie Mandela. Nelson Mandela was to spend little time here in the ensuing years, as his role in political activities became all-consuming and he was forced underground (1961), living a life on the run until his arrest and imprisonment in 1962, and sentenced to life imprisonment in 1964. In 1963, the south western townships, of which Orlando west is part, was officially named Soweto. 

Nelson Mandela returned to this house for a brief 11 days after his release from Robben Island in 1990. He then moved to Beverly Hills, Soweto, before finally moving to his present house in Houghton. His wife Winnie Mandela their children continued to occupy the house until after Mandela was released from prison. It had been burnt twice (remnants of blackened bricks at the top part of the house) and been shot at (2 bullet holes in the wall) by the police, and Winnie Mandela used to shoot back. How cool! 

Then we just walked around Soweto. Although most townships are not considered safe due to high crime rates (reminds me of the favelas in Rio), Soweto is pretty safe thanks to the fame of Nelson Mandela and Desmond Tutu which brought a lot of publicity, tourists, journalists, etc so it has become more developed than the other townships. Other townships include Tamesi, Alexandra and Diepsloot (the most dangerous place in Johannesburg and possibly in South Africa). 

Southern Africa - Day 24 (Part 2)

Wednesday, 5 February 2020 - Johannesburg, South Africa 

The guards inflicted psychological torture on the inmates in isolation cells; they switched the lights on and off at different times, so that the prisoners didn’t even know what time of the day it was. Diet was only rice water which is the water that is left after washing the rice. In these dire circumstances, cell number 13 became known as Lucky No. 13 because it was facing the courtyard so sometimes when the window is opened you can see and communicate with the other prisoners. 

The Awaiting Trial Block stood at the heart of Number 4 where it operated as a jail for nearly 100 years. The cells held black male awaiting-trial prisoners. It was demolished in 2001 to make way for the new Constitutional Court which was established under the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa in 1993, and opened by Nelson Mandela in 1995. The 4 stairwells were retained as a haunting reminder of the horrific experiences of many black South Africans.

I also visited Mandela’s cell, which was in one of the sickbeds (wards). His second stay here was in August 1962. While in hiding, Mandela posed as a driver but was arrested outside Howick in Natal. He was held in one of the sickbeds for a few weeks before being transferred to Pretoria to stand trial. The authorities told him that he was held here due to his status; he had privacy, a bed, his books and the space to prepare his defence. Some suspect that he was put here because it was easier to guard him here than in the crowded communal cells, because they were worried that he was planning an escape. 

Then I visited the women’s prison (certainly better conditions than Numbers 4 and 5, but also segregated between whites and non-whites. There is a Flame of Democracy in one of the Awaiting Trial Blocks; it was originally ignited by Nelson Mandela on 9 December 2011 and has been burning ever since. 

Then on the tour again and we passed the Nelson Mandela Bridge. This bridge is about 295 m high and connects Braamfontein and Newtown across the railway lines. We also passed Carlton Centre, a 50 storey office building which is also a shopping centre. It is the tallest building in Johannesburg (possibly in South Africa) but I didn’t go inside to go all the way up. 

Next, to Hillbrow which according to Arthur is the second most dangerous place in South Africa after a township called Diepsloot. Actually I wouldn’t have known it, it looks ok from the outside. There are many immigrants here from Nigeria, Mozambique, Congo, Zimbabwe etc and they are involved in drug activities, prostitution, robberies, hijacking etc. Unfortunately I can’t tell the difference between the immigrants and the locals because I can’t really tell the different languages apart and they don’t really have distinctive features from one country to another. 

Ever the adventurer, I walked around this area to just have a look at the everyday life of the people in the heart of Johannesburg. I could tell that Arthur himself was nervous although he would not admit it and although he tried to play it cool. One thing I noticed is that there are no whites around at all. The streets looked quite old and dirty, and it was very crowded. To be honest, I don’t think I would’ve dared to walk alone here.