A very interesting day. Johannesburg has approximately 8 million people, of which 2.5 million live in Soweto. A “township” or district. In other-words, where blacks have been moved to in the middle of the 20th century.
Some parts of Johannesburg have been all but abandoned due to gangs and immigrants, primarily from Nigreria. We drove through, not getting out. Some “civil disobedience” the night before in Soweto, with burned debris and rocks remaining in the road way.
Visiting the excellent Apartheid Museum is similar to visiting a Holocaust Museum without the “Final Solution”. Indeed, the incubation of apartheid came from Europe in the 30’s and 40’s with South Africa’s prominent thought-leader’s interest in Marxism and Aryanism. What the Nazi’s were unable to do in the 1940’s in Europe was attempted in South Africa in the 1960’s thru 80’s with the indigenous blacks. Their interest wasn’t in the blacks elimination, but in the development of a caste system, with the whites in a permanent superior position.
The election of Nelson Mandela in 1994 to the presidency of South Africa, who had been under a life prison sentence until 1990, was what our guide called a “miracle”. The country continues to claw back to normalcy. Unemployment is high, and education levels are low. It has and will be difficult, much work needs to be done, as civil war was narrowly averted. Nelson Mandela, I think appropriately, is considered South Africa’s Abraham Lincoln. He is honored and revered everywhere.
Our guide at Nelson Mandela’s house in Soweto
Posing in front of the Nelson Mandela statue at the Nelson Mandela Shopping Center
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