Report from “Männer aktuell” by Jürgen Bieniek
TRIP INTO THE MOTHER CITY
The South African harbour metropolis Cape Town is as multicultural, European and gay friendly as no other city on the African continent. It is not only the German tourists who fancy the Cape of Good Hope.
Text: Jürgen Biniak
There are just a few minutes left until we will land. When you look out of the window of the airbus it looks like a cut stronghold that looks down onto the bay and announces the beginning of the end of Africa. The Table Mountain, Cape Town’s landmark, welcomes the visitors after a eleven hours flight to South Africa.
If you never set foot onto African ground and your head is filled with nebulous stereotypes about the Black Continent, you will be astonished. South Africa’s 3 million-metropolis at the Cape of Good Hope is as European as no other city on the continent – multicultural and – on top of everything - gay friendly.
The “Mother City” as it is called affectionately by the inhabitants, is the cosmopolitan showcase of South Africa today, ten years after the end of apartheid and the black majority (77 per cent of 43 million) taking over political power. People from all over the world, but mostly Europeans, are attracted by the most beautiful city in the world. Among them, there are many Germans who leave their old lives behind and start over again here. Some people decided to stay at the Cape of gay Hope because of love. About 100,000 Germans are supposed to live in Cape Town and in the Western Cape Province by now.
Jens Merbt from Berlin is one of them. Two years ago he sold his gay erotic shop and emigrated to the south because of love. Here, he opened the gay sauna “Hot House” and some months ago the hotel “Metropole”. “There was no future for me in Germany”, he says and adds: “Just pay, work and the entire time pessimistic mood.” There is nothing new in Germany; this is different in Cape Town.
It is not too easy to get a work permit and the permanent right to stay though – in contrast to the times of apartheid when every German was considered as gain and thus welcome. According to the black government, if you want to live here, you have got to invest and provide new jobs for the black people. You cannot just squander your fortune.
Armin John and Freddy Schwarz, who “flew” from Zurich, confirm this. The couple was fed was fed up with the working stress and the permanent pursuit of material things. “You are working hard all your life and wait for pension longingly. Is this supposed to be everything in life?” They bought a derelict house in Cape Town and rebuilt it. Now they accommodate tourists on the Clarence House and additionally run the travel agency Pink Elephant Safaris.
The publisher and photographer Volker Janssen (58) has already left Berlin in 1996 and is perfectly happy. The founder of the Galerie Janssen in Berlin lives and works since then as publisher (among others gay photo books) in Simon’s Town, an idyllic coast city on the way to the Cape of Good Hope. He does not want to miss the unique beautiful landscape, the eight months Mediterranean climate and “the better contact between people” since he left Germany. And if this is not enough, there still is the interesting gay environment…
But no one comes here only because of this. Right from the first moment, the city exerts a fascination on you that will stay until you leave again. Is it the bright blue sky, the special light at the cape, which even allures advertisement firms to produce adverts here; is it the multicultural flair or the unique landscape whose vegetation actually is unique in the world? Or is it just the sun shining longer her than in Madrid or Rome and twice as long as in Frankfurt.
Maybe it is the fact that Cape Town does not appear to be very African. Cape Town and what tourists experience respectively is a mostly white city. In the centre at the foot of the Table Mountain, at the coast along the mountain range, at the Waterfront, the former dockland that has been transformed to a tourist Disneyland, and the districts Green Point and Waterkant, the centre for the gay community, mostly white inhabitants reside.
The black inhabitants of Cape Town usually reside in their own districts or in the so-called townships. These housing estates are formed by simple housings which are already noticed on the way from the airport to the city. They are relicts from the apartheid.
Until 1991, the strict racial segregation was the national doctrine with the most importance. No matter whether it was a park bank, the entrance for the post office, simply everything, also the residential estates where separated according to complexion. Jobs were distributed according to the principle black people do the dirty work and the white people make the decisions. Fortunately, this dark time is gone for more than ten years. But it takes time to make changes in structures and mentalities radically. In this regard, Cape Town has got a head start in comparison to other South African cities, because it already was liberal and insubordinate towards the rules of apartheid during the apartheid. But the further you come to the hinterland, the more you can feel the effects of a racism that has been prescribed for more than 100 years.
If you keep this in mind as (white) visitor, you can understand much better without feeling “guilty”. There is no reason to feel guilty, because you are a tourist in this country and thus the Cape Town people, no matter whether black or white, welcome you with a friendly atmosphere of departure. This is an experience that is a part of the fascination of this metropolis and the country.
If you travel to Cape Town for the very first time, you can easily spend two weeks here. Apart from the traditional sightseeing program the individual tourist finds many opportunities for an active vacation. A must is seeing the sunset on the Signal Hill and going up the 1,000 m high Table Mountain in a cable car. Here, you have got the Cape of Good Hope in your back and a breathtaking view. If you want to, you can also climb the Table Mountain during a day trip. In the surroundings, there are also numerous possibilities for hiking. The best days for swimming are in the South African midsummer (December until March) when the Atlantic is not quite as cool at the coast. On the way to the Cape of Good Hope, there are many vineyards with excellent restaurants and neat towns. If you like unaffected wild landscape and almost deserted beaches, you will get your money’s worth just a few kilometres from Cape Town.
This is true for the day trips to the hinterland of the Western Cape Province, too. If you want to know where the South African Pinotage in the supermarket at home comes from, you will have to go to Stellenbosch. This town is 50 kilometres from Cape Town and was founded by the Dutch in the very heart of the South African viniculture. In the hired car you follow the “wine route” to the vineyard Fraai Uitzicht near the town Robertson (about 180 km), one of the oldest in South Africa. Two gay men from Germany will expect you here. They have turned the derelict property to a Garden of Eden with a hotel and a restaurant and thus self-actualised.
Back in Cape Town you at first relax at the Hot House, drink a Cabernet Sauvignon and have springbok Carpaccio and an ostrich steak. With this base you can start into the nightlife. The milieu is not enormous, but sociable and communicative. Black people are the minority, but this has got nothing to do with racism, but with the fact that many of them just cannot afford the prices. Apart from the fact that Germans must feel like in a price paradise with their Euros – this is valid for all prices, in bars, restaurants or in boutiques – the gay bars have European standard. Thus, you feel at home at once. The newspapers Detail or Exit which are published every month for free inform you, which bar is in, has closed or reopened.
Cape Town’s tolerance proves in December each year since for ten years. In the year when Nelson Mandela was elected the first black president of the country and declared the birth of the “rainbow nation”, the first Gay Pride Event took place in Cape Town. By now, it is even worthwhile to plan your vacation in South Africa on this date. The highlight of this ado lasting for several days is the Mother City Queer Party, a titanic fancy dress party, and the parade through Cape Town. Every visitor, no matter how often he has been to the CSD will keep both as incomparable event in mind. The mega party has been celebrated for the first time in 1996 when South Africa got a constitution which protects homosexual people against discrimination, which was unique in the whole world. By now, even the introduction of the homosexual marriage is debated. This is astonishing, because the black population of South Africa traditionally and culturally rather tends to reject homosexuality. Cape Town is different in this regard, too, in comparison to the rest of South Africa.
If you want to crown your vacation with something special after ten days of Cape Town, you should go to the gay friendly (and German governed) five star lodge in the private nature reserve Grootbos for two days. In Gansbaai, about 180 km south east and not far from South Africa’s top-class resort Hermanus, visitors can explore the unique vegetation and a breathtaking coast area. If you go there in due time, you will experience the annual return of the whales for copulation into the Walker Bay. It is a very impressive wonder of nature. You might either watch it via telescope from the pool or move by boat closer to the marine mammals.
Such impressions will surely let you leave Cape Town with tears in your eyes. When you see the Table Mountain disappear, you already resolve to return. That there is no time difference to Germany is only the very last argument to accept the eleven hour flight.
Information & tips
# South African Airways goes from 1. September three times a week from Frankfurt to Cape Town without stops. Outward flights Wednesday, Friday and Sunday at 19.50 o’clock (arrival 7.45 o’clock), return flights Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday at 17.15 o’clock (no time difference!).
# You can get information about tourist features and capabilities for excursions in Cape Town and the Western Cape Province on www.southafrica.net and www.capetourism.org
# Information about the gay milieu, gay friendly or gay managed hotels and guesthouses is available on www.capegayguide.co.za or in the international gay guide SPARTACUS 2004/05 (Bruno Gmünder Verlag, 25.95 €). There are hotels right in the milieu neighbourhood. This year’s Gay Pride in Cape Town will take place from 16. to 19. December – the Mother City Queer Party, the big gay and Lesbian parade will be on 19.12.
# If you want a familial gay stay with a tour guide in house, you should reside at the Clarence House in the district Claremont south of the Table Mountain. The German tour operator Pink Elephant Safaris has got its branch here.
The tour operator from Essen (Bahnstr. 11, 45257 Essen, tel. 0201-486037) is specialized in gay friendly tours through the Cape Province and the rest of South Africa – further information on www.pink-elephant-safaris.de
# Information on the 5 star nature lodge Grootbos on www.grootbos.com
# About the crime rate: horrible news about holdup murderers and attacks on tourists have built a negative image during the last years. Actually, you have to be very careful in Cape Town’s city, but even more on Johannesburg. A special and always present tourist police takes care for security. If you keep to the prevalent rules (do not go all alone onto the street by night, do not display your valuables), you will be able to enjoy your trip just as in London, Paris or Rome. Day trips or excursion into the surroundings or into the hinterland are safe.
