PORTRAIT NEWS

Dawn Kennedy interviews author Roger Smith, who has shaken up crime writing with his visceral portrayals of Cape Town’s brutal underbelly.

You grew up in Johannesburg but set your stories in Cape Town. Why?

Well, Dust Devils is set mainly in KwaZulu-Natal, with a bit of Jo’burg and Cape Town, but, yes, Mixed Blood, Wake Up Dead, Capture and my latest, Sacrifices, are set in Cape Town, which is South Africa’s most schizophrenic city and remains fascinating to me.

In the late ’90s (like a lot of Jo’burgers) I moved down to Cape Town. For a couple of years I lived quite happily inside a bubble of sun and sea, then I fell in love with (and later married) a woman who grew up on the Cape Flats and my vision of Cape Town had to expand dramatically.
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The last few months have seen violent strikes in the Winelands. Three people have been killed, vineyards burnt down, and access to wine farms and major roads was blocked. 021’s editor Bernard Franz talks with Mark Solms, a renowned psychoanalyst and Franschhoek wine farmer, about the sense of land, chicken for charity, and what it meant to him when a farm worker with a 7000-year-old stone tool declared, “My people were here before yours.”  read more

Heidi, you’ve just come back from Washington D.C., where you attended your first board meeting as a director of the Global Sustainable Tourism Council. Tell us a bit more about it.
There are 13 representatives of big companies and smaller organisations on the board, including major companies, some academic institutions, and several trade associations. Jennifer Seif of Fair Trade in Tourism Southern Africa and I are representatives from Africa. We meet at least every three months via digital conferencing, and once a year in person. It’s a three-year term of office.  read more

Cape Town is fast establishing itself as an epicentre of big-wave surfing. Our reefs and shores,
lashed severely by deep At lantic storms, throw up some of the biggest waves that the planet has to offer. 021 meets some of the wave warriors brave and crazy enough to ride these gnarly beasts.

Cape Town is a city of superlatives. We’ve got the most gruelling long distance swim (The Cadiz Freedom Swim) and the world’s largest timed cycle race (The Argus). Here’s another: the best choice of the biggest waves within the shortest distance. Given the right conditions, on the 15 km stretch between Misty Cliffs, Kommetjie and Hout Bay, there are three world-class waves that entice wavehounds to brave their slippery slopes, dubbed by bigwave surf enthusiast Barry Futter the Prince, Queen and King respectively. read more

Near Vanguard Mall, the suburb of Rylands is the traditional religious home of the
Cape’s Indian community. Apart from temples in Rondebosch, or in Cravenby near
Parow, the three temples situated in Rylands encompass important deities of Indian
faith – the one in Ruth Road is devoted to Shiva, the one opposite the new Virgin
Active and Shoprite near the Gatesville Plaza is dedicated to Vishnu, while in Jeram
Street, not far from the Galaxy nightclub, Shri Radha Krishna Mandir is the spiritual
home of those who worship Krishna. read more

CARNAVON. Local scientists say that if South Africa wins the race to host the Square Kilometre Array space telescope, their first project will be to try to locate intelligent life in South African politics. According to a spokesman, organic life had been found in Parliament, but it lacked certain basic attributes of intelligence. “It was just algae in Armani and bacteria in Beemers,” he explained. read more

Did you know there’s a Chinese temple in the middle of Paarden Island? Privately funded by members of the Taiwanese community, Mar Tzu temple is predominantly for Taiwanese fishermen. As 200 boats pass Cape Town harbour per year (making it one of the most important ports of call for Taiwanese fishing fleets worldwide), it is at Mar Tzu that many crew members come to pray, express gratitude, and ask for counsel. The Cape Town temple is one of only a handful of very important Taiwanese temples outside of Taiwan.  read more

Company Gardens, the green, relaxed and romantic soul of Cape Town, is the perfect venue to enjoy your city in summer. Join 021 for a stroll in this shady abode, learn about your city. Here are the first clues:

1
We start at the Anglican St George’s Cathedral on Wale Street. It hosts an exhibition on apartheid resistance in its crypt, and a labyrinth for contemplation in its cloister. To get there go inside the church and follow the signboards. How many different colours of stone make up the labyrinth?


2
South Africa has three capital cities read more

Take the N2 to Somerset West, then take the Baden Powell turnoff, go left, and CTFS Boulevard, freshly painted in white on the curb, invites you to drive down a sweeping avenue. After you have signed in with the security guards, you enter a 17 000m² complex of four soundstages, like airport hangars, built from square concrete blocks. The spacious emptiness feels like a gust of fresh air. Everything is gleaming new, as though the paint has only recently dried. Welcome to Africa’s first state-of-the-art, ultra high-tech film studio – a surreal world of movie-making where, next to shack-lands, millions of rands are spent meticulously creating transient realities that are discarded after only a few weeks.  read more

In each issue, 021 asks a bestselling author to wax lyrical (or vent spleen) about the Mother City. With his next novel African dawn due out in October, Australian Tony Park puts some insights to paper.

I get annoyed When people who don’t know any better say Cape Town’s not Africa. I toss such sweeping generalisations into that special dustbin reserved for similar rotten chestnuts like “the real Africa”, and “wild Africa”. If Cape Town was, as the naysayers would have you believe, a little blog of Europe on the southern tip of the African continent, then I wouldn’t want to go there.
As a writer of novels set in Africa, I look for inspiration every time I visit the continent. read more

Beaches have always been popular hang-outs. Our strandloper ancestors found them just as inviting as we do. With the sensual sand between your toes and the hot sun stroking your skin, it's easy to understand why. But coastlines are also places of drama and history. From archeological secrrets to recent conflict, Bernard Franz reveals the high jinks and skulduggery that have taken place along our shoreline. read more

Dawn Kennedy penetrates the tattoo lover’s world, a place where pain, pleasure and permanence meet.

Close your eyes and you could be at the dentist. The ink pen, the tool of the tattoo artist’s trade, makes a surprisingly loud and intimidating drone as it is switched on for the first time. It is used to make a 1.5mm deep puncture in the skin, into which tiny amounts of indelible ink are deposited. Master tattoo artist Manuela is numb to its pneumatic noise. Having heard it for innumerable hours, she finds it a comforting, familiar sound. So much so that she says, “I get uneasy if I don’t hear it.” Sonja Myberg is having a geisha, the epitome of refined Japanese femininity, tattooed on her inner arm, stretching between the wrist and elbow. This, her eighth tattoo, is a Sailor Jerry design. read more

God’s playground could look like this: boulders tossed like marbles onto vanilla sand greeted by the sparkling Atlantic Ocean. Near Camps Bay, Maiden’s Cove is a priceless treasure tucked beneath three pampered bowling greens, and with views stretching from Lion’s Head across to the Twelve Apostles. It also is the home of 10 men who have been sheltering here for nearly two decades. Dawn Kennedy goes to meet them. read more

From Camps Bay, via the Arctic to 10 Downingstreet, 021 maps Lewis Pugh’s journey form cold water swimmer to environmental activist.

Meeting Lewis Gordon Pugh in person, it’s easy to fathom what drew him to the Arctic. His chiselled, cheek-boned, icemelting good looks cry out for a sleigh and a pack of huskies. His handshake, despite the wintry evening, is warm. But if you’ve swum one kilometre across the North Pole, surely even the chilliest Kalk Bay night would barely register.

You’ve certainly seen him. He’s the guy in the Investec advertisement who pops up between icebergs, causing you to choke on your popcorn in the movies. He’s the solitary figure swimming back and forth in Steenberg Dam before sunrise.
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Dawn Kennedy gets on the same wavelength as Cape Town ecopreneur Joseph Feigelson.
Joseph Feigelson is passionate about sprouts and eats nearly three hands full a day. It’s no wonder, 13 years ago they cured his debilitating heartburn. The alternative was acid reflux surgery, a rather unpleasant procedure. Since incorporating sprouts into his diet, Joseph has abundant energy and hasn’t spent a single day sick in bed.

As well as giving him back his health, sprouts have been sustaining Joseph financially and he has feathered his nest in the most novel way – with a home sprouting kit called Kitchen Garden. It’s ingenious in its incredible simplicity: a cardboard box containing six jam jars, some gauze, elastic bands, six packets of seed, a metal structure and a tray – everything you need to grow sprouts in the comfort of your kitchen – and it’s yours for R400. Within three days, having rinsed
your seeds twice daily and allowed them to drip-dry on the tray, you will have an abundance of edible sprouts; your very own garden in a jam jar. read more

021 caught up with Derek van Dam at caramello’shis favourite haunt on kloof street. For many Capetonians, listening to e.tv’s daily weather report on the 7pm Prime Time News is a deeply entrenched evening ritual. After all, living in a city that can boast several seasons in one day, it helps to have some guidance as to what to wear. Perhaps this explains the disproportionate number of females glued to the weather broadcast? Or can the sudden enthusiasm in the last few years for e.tv’s weather report be attributed to weatherman Derek van Dam’s twinkling blue eyes, charming personality and mid-western American drawl that makes cloud formations sound deeply fascinating? read more

Cape Town’s Stadium has a much-admired glass roof. Let’s hope that Mark Kulp doesn’t shatter it with his vuvuzela blowing. 021 put on some earplugs and went to meet the man determined to make the most noise during the World Cup. Clean cut, articulate and well mannered, Mark gives a mature, responsible first impression. But when he starts turning the handle of his WW2 siren, a naughty schoolboy gleam lights up his eyes. Ten revolutions later and a deafening wail emits from the contraption, causing the cleaning staff to flee the Ajax football
club building in alarm. read more

Lifting the bow is the first challenge. It’s anchor shaped and almost as heavy. Coach Christopher Human instructs me to pull back the string until it touches my nose and fix the target through a pea-sized sight. All this is to be accomplished with Zen-like grace and focus. The resounding twang as I release the bow and the sound of the arrow hitting the target sends waves of gratification through me.

Archery is one of the main skills that allowed us to evolve from club-wielding unruliness. Standing in the middle of a barren field in Ottery, sun beating down, I reconnect with some ancient instinct. Clutching my lethal weapon, I’m a ‘don’t mess with me’ Artemis woman who never misses the mark. read more

One way to identify tourists in De Waterkant is to see them jolt up from their coffees at the firing of the noon gun. Indeed, the bang is not for the fainthearted. Once used to measure time, the 18-pounder, smoothbore muzzle-loader was relocated from the castle to Signal Hill, because even locals complained about the noise. The thundering sound of a 200-year old cannon fired from “Leeuwen Bil”, or Lion’s Haunch (Signal Hill), is one way to take note of history. To stare
into a void is perhaps another. Gaping at the outskirts of De Waterkant just off the upper end of Strand Street is the quarry, which provided the material to construct the Cape Colony’s stately edifices, as well as some more humble dwellings. read more

Bernard Franz and Dawn Kennedy catch up with Helen Zille at 7am, a few days before the start of the 2010 Football World Cup.

BF: Madam Premier, are you always in the office at this time of day? I heard rumours that you sometimes schedule council meetings for 3am?
HZ: Ja, well, I’ve had meetings as early as 5am. I haven’t got any regular hours – it’s just dictated by the work I’ve got. If I have to get up early, I get up early.
DK: Let’s get started then. About the World Cup. Are you a football enthusiast?
HZ: I’m becoming more of a football enthusiast. My interest for sports used to end with the matches that my children played in. I’d go along to watch and be tense, excited and apprehensive beforehand, and live with the buildup and the aftermath. I’m quite impatient when it takes too long to get a game done. I like the action immediately. But what I’ve realised is that... read more

Ghion is where the thundering Blue Nile crashes 40m down from the bed of an old lava stream. Granted, other waterfalls may carry more water, but to Ethiopian Orthodox Christians, Ghion is Paradise, the place where Adam and Eve frolicked before the fall.

This explains the fervent attachment of the Ethiopian faithful to Ghion. To some, it is holy because it is the garden of Eden. Others praise it as a fountain of fertility, sexual energy, and wisdom. One monastery boasts holy water reputed to heal all ailments. Oral tradition links Ghion to the remarkable legend of a monk who, it is said, surfed upstream on a pillar of basalt until he reached the waterfall. On stepping ashore, he lost his Bible. Devastated, he implored the river to return it to him, but to no avail. Unwilling to leave without his Bible, the monk remained on the riverbank, persisting in prayer and meditation until the river bed twitched, belched loudly, and fl ung the Bible before his feet.
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021 travels Africa in search of the unexpected and discovers that Ethiopia is a country with a logic all of its own.

‘WHY ETHIOPIA, OF ALL PLACES?’ the elderly lady asks, ‘What’s the attraction?’ Before I can think of a reply, the highspeed train we are travelling on is sucked into a tunnel, shutting my ears tight with the pressure of too much air. For a moment, everything is silent. What strikes me is the total lack of imbalance, as if we are all securely suspended in a hot-air balloon, or submerged in a deep crevice in the earth, holding our breath. read more

Where is the Garden of Eden, or the grave of Adam? Where did Mary, Joseph and baby Jesus live after they fled from Egypt? Many schools of western theology tend to simply overlook these questions.

The average Ethiopian orthodox Christian, however, might have an answer.You can try it yourself. Stop a farmer in the streets and ask him for directions to the arc of the covenant or to the graves of Isaac and Jacob, and chances are you will see an index finger rising towards its location. Then again, by the time you reach the imperial town of Axum, the monasteries of Debre Damo or the underground church labyrinth of Lalibela, some questions you had at the beginning of your travels might not matter any longer. Take Lalibela: after a journey of three days, the bus scales one final rise and comes to a halt. I see nothing but a village set in the magnificent landscape of the Amharic mountains. What is this tiny hamlet’s claim to fame?  read more

Next to Waikiki, Muizenberg corner with its soft wave and long ride is the best place to learn to surf in the world. 021 throws on some slipslops and goes to check out this supremely mellow scene.

On some days, the surf at Muizenberg rustles like the grass skirt of a Hawaiian dancer. Once the South-easter decides to relent, Surfer’s corner is as close to tropical as it gets in Cape Town. Even more so if you close your eyes and imagine a promenade of palm trees, and the faint whiff of coconut wafting in from the jade ocean. Muizenberg offers a welcoming 22° C water tempertaure, compared to the nipple-numbing 16° on the other side of the peninsula. Maybe that’s why Muizenberg beach attracts a different crowd than the arch tribes that congregate around Clifton, Llandudno or Camps Bay. At most, Cliftonites and their ilk brave a quick splash. In Muizenberg, people spend hours playing in the water, in as many different ways possible: swimming, boogie boarding, kite surfing – you name it, they’re at it. And the café scene opposite the beach is distinct too. You don’t see a lot of Jimmy Choos strolling around here. There’s little cocktail sipping and even less oyster eating. Lungis and slip-slops rule.
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021 discovers that beauty is beyond the eye of the beholder at the Lancashire Manufacturers Beauty Pageant. Friday night at the Grassy Park Hotel, where the annual Lancashire Manufacturers Beauty Pageant is being held. The Grassy Park Hotel is not an obviously glamorous setting. In the events hall, laminated wood walls are lined with dartboards concealed behind mirrors advertising Richelieu brandy. 1970s globe lampshades hang from the cherry-red ceiling. A faint scent of alcohol and cigarette smoke permeates the wooden fl oors, long scuffed
of varnish, lending an aura of disappointed dreams.  read more

Looking into a living body without a heart in the chest cavity was a moment that altered history. Like stepping onto the moon, it crossed a frontier of what people considered possible. 021 recreates the drama of the first heart transplant that took place at the Groote Schuur Hospital in Observatory. Rushing towards town at Hospital Bend on the N2 is not the best time to appreciate the splendours of Groote Schuur Hospital. The imposing historic architecture is hardly visible behind the huge modern concrete wing blocking it from view. The other side of the freeway might be more serene, with springbok and mountain zebra roaming on the grassy slopes of Devil’s Peak, but the flurry of 2010 construction activity on the road itself lends a rather hazardous note to your car-window safari.
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Whether he’s applying make-up for celebrities at the FIFA final draw on December 4 in Cape Town, or cutting hair in his Observatory salon, stylist Shaughn Adams knows how to free your inner diva. Aphrodite, the Greek goddess of beauty, is often depicted emerging from the ocean, seaweed draped nonchalantly in her hair. But modern goddesses, taking their cue from the media ideal, need more grooming, and less algae, before they appear in public. read more