Travelog for: Jubilee Bunny

Hmmm my tummy is nice and full, and I feel like going to sleep now, not travelling around on the bus. Surely I can have a quick nap, there can't be anything more interesting to see...

We are going back in the direction we came from. The Prof is telling us we are going to see some place called Jeppestown...yawn... Fi told me that , when he was still alive, her father worked in Jeppestown. She says it is really not such a nice area...

The Prof tells us that Johannesburg was expanding so rapidly, that they knew they would have to create more residential areas. They could not go to the South because that is where the mines were, no one ever considered going to the North as they never thought it would ever get that big, so the toss up was: should they build to the East or the West? The company that was to do the expansion was called Jeppe & Ford Estate Company. They could not decide which would be better so they chose to do both Jeppe decided to build up the east side and named it Jeppestown after himself, and Ford built up the western side and named it...Fordsburg... vain bunch, weren't they?

Well Jeppestown took off with a bang and became quite a residential area. Ford built his side slightly different, he made it both a residential and a business area, and it boomed too.

Today though, Jeppestown is a run down industrial area. We passed the original men’s hostel. Oh. My. Goodness...





I can't believe people can live in such squalor.

Here is one of the original buildings that still stands today.



Fordsburg has a bit of a sad history, which you can read about now, because the sun was at the wrong angle to take photos of by the time we got there...

Basically the government decided (under the Group Areas Act IE. apartheid) that all the Indians needed to move out of the area where they had built up their businesses and move to an area set aside for them called Lenasia, 32 Kms (20 miles) away. There was of course great resistance. The government closed down the schools in Fordsburg, forcing the Indian community to move or to travel to Lenasia every day for the children to be schooled.

Eventually the government built a huge shopping centre called the Oriental Plaza for the Indian businessmen to rent out and continue with their trading, in an effort to undermine them.  However, the Indians turned the Oriental Plaza into a huge success and the area is now quite a busy trading site again. In recent years Fordsburg has been affected by the same decline as the rest of Johannesburg.

Next to Fordsburg is a town called Vrededorp, which was an area set aside for the Malay people. It was built to the same plans as a black township called Orlando in Soweto. It comes as quite a shock to see it. It also has a very sad history , which you can read here. Sorry, Fi just could not take photos because it is one of those towns where each and every single family sit on the outside 'stoep' (veranda) on a Sunday afternoon, for want of anything better to do. Taking photos felt like an invasion of privacy. Especially in such a desperately poor community; and even more so as they were watching our great big bus with open mouthed astonishment. Clearly not to many tours go through there then! Interestingly it was a very mixed community but mostly white and coloured (Malay).

Well after that little trip I was wide awake again! Then the Prof said we were off to a market. Oh, I do like to shop!

So, I guess there will be no shopping then. We were told to leave our bags on the bus and we were in Fi's bag...man...oh well we will wait till she gets back to tell us about it then.

I can smell something delicious....what is it? Pork chop?



Fi says to tell you that that woman's face is not that colour naturally, she has red ochre on it.

Okay, I am quite excited to see these photos of the market...



The Mai Mai market is the oldest market in Johannesburg. It is traditionally a Zulu market. In the 'old days' white people needed a special permit to gain access. Though truth be told, chances are these days none of them even know of its existence. Fi had never even heard of it after thirty odd years of living in Jo'burg.

Here is a little replica Zulu hut.



It is in a rather unsavoury part of town, but it has been taken over by some local council agency that is determined to rejuvenate and revive it to a pristine state. People actually live in the market, but plans are underway to relocate these families as it is quite unsuitable for children to be living in these conditions.

These two don't seem bothered at all! They are having loads of fun in an old crate.



Oh! It's not quite your usual market then... it is a 'muti' market. Muti is traditional medicine. When we read the other day at the Botanical gardens that 8 out of 10 people use traditional medicine, I bet you had pretty little visions of berries and flowers. Welcome to the reality.



I'll show you a closer look. WARNING: this is not for the faint hearted.



Those were ostrich legs, a crocodile and who knows what else...

These are various skins and carcasses...



These are roots and plants. Muti is not only used for headaches and tummy aches...but for all sorts of things you might consider  'witchcraft'.



Although this looks all nice and tidy and rather like an old fashioned sweetie shop, be warned, those jars contain things that will make you want to vomit! Read this for a bit more info on some of the contents. The shop they talk about in this article is this very one.



The whole place had been dug up to repair the sewerage pipes so it was a bit treacherous to walk through.



Two Zulu children.



Traditional bead work. As well as being a muti market, this is also a traditional crafts market.



Most of these hides are illegal, they are from endangered animals. That thing with its head still attached is a baboon. EEEUUUWWWW!



Oh well, it is Sunday after all...



These may be goat tails, they are used in traditional dress.



These sandals are a traditional design usually made from buck skin. The heart shaped cut out bit has buck hide in it but that little tick is a slightly modern twist... not so sure these are genuine Nikes!



The Prof told us that they have been making these wedding kists (or trunks) since the market first started...



But they are making more of these, and doing a booming trade because of the high AIDS death toll...



Right, time to leave, chicken for supper anyone?

You know, I am REALLY glad we went to that market AFTER lunch...

It is time to head back to the university through the CBD.

Look, great big buildings and a tiny little corner cafe!



Apparently, Jo'burg was designed on a tight grid system with lots of 'corner' spots for a...ahem... good reason. This was not the first gold rush that South Africa had experienced (although it was certainly the biggest and most enduring).

The authorities had seen what had happened in Standerton when the 'gold diggers' had arrived and had the foresight to plan ahead with Jo'burg before they disclosed the news of the gold. They knew for instance that the type of man who was going to rush over and forsake everything for dreams of riches was not your ordinary upstanding model citizen. He wanted three things: somewhere to sleep, somewhere to drink, and the company of (how shall we put this?), ladies of the night. Those corner properties were for the ladies and their large revenues collected in rent and the same with the beer halls.

This old building has a sign on it that says it is for re-development. Next door is Dr Zunga & Mama...bet he gets his prescriptions filled at the Mai Mai market...



The trouble with tightly built tall buildings, the sun never gets in...



Here is a rather modern building in amongst the old ones.



Sadly, there are lots of for sale signs. It will however be nice if the buildings are bought and refurbished to their previous glory.



Like these ones...



This is the rather nicely kept (on the outside at least) Magistrates Courts.



We got off the bus in Main Street, where the Mining Houses have their headquarters. They have done such a nice job of cleaning up the street. They have had the buildings sandblasted to remove a hundred years of grime, re paved the road, planted gardens, displayed interesting objects and put up information boards. Well done! Now if only they can tackle the rest of town like this...



This is a mine head on display...



Here we are in front of one of the buildings.



This is the detail above the door of the same building.



This relief goes round the entire wall of the building, showcasing all of South Africa's animals.




Aren't we brave? Staring danger right in the...actually, could we move?



Fi says she remembers this statue so well from her childhood, but it was in a different place then...



Oh, this explains it! The Oppenheimers are the South African equivalent of the Rockefellers. They are a very wealthy mining family.
The poor bucks were vandalised by those naughty people who steal metal that I mentioned earlier...



Here is a front view.



This building is slightly less ornate than the other.



You know, during the week it looks exactly like this, but with taxis!



This is Main Street almost a hundred years ago...



And this was used for crushing the rock to extract gold. It was also vandalised for the metal and the original beams were used for firewood! Honestly, some people have no sense of history.



Here is the description.



...and a close up.



This is a rather attractive building.



This is an unattractive building that they have disguised with artwork...



Here is an interesting board about the stage coach.



Can you read it now?



Here is something else Fi only vaguely knew about, the Mapungubwe Rhino. This is obviously a reproduction. The original one is only 15cm (6Inches) long!



Here is the write up on it.



We are being called back to the bus...

We pass the ANC building which celebrates Nelson Mandela's 90th Birthday.



..and the 'Trust Me Tavern', which we don't!



Our next port of call is Fordsburg and Vrededorp which I have already mentioned.

On the way, we pass through Newtown, which is also a 'cleaned up' area. This is Museum Africa, which Fi says she has to visit one day.



Here we are back where we started! Educated and exhausted, and it is a long drive back home!

We were all invited to a party today and the theme was 'The Olympic Games'. We were all quite excited to represent our countries!



First up were the equestrian events. Whoa Nellie!



We sat out the sprinting as we stood no chance against these fine athletes...



I gave the javelin a go though, don't worry, the car was just fine!



All four of us, together, could not make the weights even budge. Natalie showed us how, declaring "they are not so heavy!" Show off...



We were so quick at throwing discus that the photos were blurred! No point in showing you!

Next up was boxing... I had a little problem with my gloves at first...



After all of that physical exercise it was time for a drink and sugar boosting snack...

This was the only swimming going on today, this is the Winter Olympics!



I stand corrected, here are the synchronised swimmers...



We sang a rousing chorus of 'Happy Birthday' to the birthday boy and tucked into some scrummy cake.... cutting that cake was also an Olympic event!



Finally it was prize giving...

The bronze goes to Canada! Represented by Synapse.



Joint silver to Australia and England! Represented by myself & Fiona



And the winner is.....ta da! The superior athlete, Pinky Bear from Germany!




What a fabulous day!



But now I need to go home for a hot bath and a muscle relaxing massage...

There are quite a few new ToyVoyagers visiting Fi, the children are on holiday, spring is definitely in the air... what better excuse for a picnic?

We all gathered outside in the garden, even Threadbear and Eloise joined us as it is so nice and warm today. Fi provided quite a nice spread...



NormaNikkers was very excited so find a strawberry that was almost the same size as her (guaranteed not genetically modified...hmmm....)



Bullet made friends with one of the dogs...



Oh...groan...I ate too much! We all settled back to listen to a story...but it was so nice and warm, and our tummies were full, the birds were singing (you could hear them so nicely when the neighbour switched off his angle grinder!) and the blanket was soft...



...zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz...Hmm? Ah ...what? Me? Sleeping? No, I'm just looking up at how blue the sky is....really!

One of the new TVs to arrive, is a little bunny called Gracy, she has come to help Fi and Threadbear sort out all the bears and soft toys that they have collected... and believe me when I tell you they need all the help they can get... what a mess in Teddy Bear Central... look...



Of course, we got roped in to help too. We had an 'Indaba' (Zulu word for a gathering or meeting) to try and decide the best way to go about sorting every thing out.



Synapse, being a brain cell, came up with a great solution. We open up the very large boxes and tape the bottoms. Then we stack the large bears at the bottom and fill up with medium size bears then the smaller bears, so they don't end up crushed after all the hard work Threadbear and Eloise have done sorting them out. We count them as they go in.

THEN, we write down the box number and the amount of bears in each box. Each box gets a little yellow sticker with the same information on it.



Once all the boxes are full, we stack them neatly to one side. Once they are out the way we can tackle the rest of the mess...

We all agreed this was a fine plan and got to work...we made very sure WE didn't end up in the boxes!!!! I had a little difficulty at first with the yellow stickers sticking to my paws, but I managed very cleverly to pull the backing off only half way, stick it down then pull off the remaining backing…not just a pretty face you know!



Some of the bears still need ribbons and some of them need a bit of fixing up... like this poor bear who has bad cataracts...



Ah! Much better....



Fiona is sewing up some holes in a bear skin rug....



Oops! Not a rug! Bullet helps her add stuffing while she holds it open...don't get lost in there!



Almost done...last few stitches...



Doesn't look very happy about her renewal does she?



Oh, silly me. Pass the black wool please....



Well, we sorted out bears for HOURS, and we packed four of those huge boxes...BUT... we still weren't finished and we were tired so we called it a day.

Well. What do you know! No sorting out bears today, we are all in the car and heading...um, just where are we going?

To someone's house...oh, it's Vicki and her children. But we are not getting out the car, she is getting in her car! We are going on a joint expedition: two Moms, four kids and TWELVE ToyVoyagers! That should be fun...

Boring, we have been stuck in traffic for AGES due to road works, but here we are at the University of the Witwatersrand, wait, we are driving through, right up to the gate on the other side. Were we just taking a short cut? Nope, now I see where we are going...The Origins Centre



Now we can all truly say we have been on the African continent!



We stopped to read the plaque, on the way in.



It says: On Dec 23, 1924, Raymond Dart discovered the Taung skull, which proved humankind began in Africa. Using one of his wife’s knitting needles, he scraped through rock for 73 days to reveal the million year old face of an early human baby with a full set of milk teeth.
As you walk in to the museum, you go through a giant representation of the world made of hand woven wire. Wow, that must have taken the artist ages to complete...



Here is a welcome home for humans, guess they never expected us to visit!



And...



Actually, our journey did not begin there. We kept bumping into a camera crew who were filming, they glared at us and we swiftly moved on! The room we missed was full of Stone Age flints and tools. It was cleverly called the 'journey to the microchip'. When humans first started using 'tools' they were rather crude and clumsily shaped big stones. As they progressed, the tools became smaller and more refined.

We also missed the skull collection, but we came back to it afterwards...



This is a replica of the famous Taung 'baby'.



And this is the even more famous 'Mrs Ples', who lived just up the road from Fi!



Here is her tag. It says:

STW% (Mrs Ples)
Approximately 2.5 Million Years old.
Found in 1947 by Robert Broom at Sterkfontein Caves, this fossil hominid was originally classified as PLESIATHROPUS TRANSVAALENSIS.  The individual was later incorporated into the species AUSTRALOPITHECUS AFRICANUS. Broom argued that the remains represented a middle aged female at the time of death. From this, the name 'Mrs Ples' from the original genus has stuck. Recently a number of researchers have argued that the specimen actually represents a male.










The next few sections were all about time lines of human development on the different continents and DNA...



The next section, the main focus of the museum, was about the San. You are probably more familiar with the term 'Bushman'. The story of the San is an incredibly sad one, and I am warning you now, you may need tissues...
















There are a lot of untruths that people believed about the San...



This is the replica of a burial of a five year old girl. She was clearly loved, her parents have placed shells, necklaces and other items in the grave with her.











The San were noted for their rock art, a rich history of their lives, but not easily understood.







Some of the rock art is easy enough to understand, it was either engraved or painted on rocks, depending on the area it is found in. These are Elands, either engraved or painted..





This looks like a Wildebees.



Here is an original and a repaired reproduction.




This is another myth...








The San were one with nature, nomads that had no fixed property. they hunted when they were hungry, they travelled, following water. They had a rich spiritual heritage as well. They did what was known as a 'trance dance' (the oldest human ritual) where they danced themselves into a trance in order to speak with the gods, or make rain.

All of this was about to come to a brutal end, with the arrival of the European colonists...










The colonists, took the land as their own, the San were forced out. Starving, they hunted the animals that were now the 'property' of the European settlers. They were killed or arrested as a result. They were slaughtered in their thousands.

We are going to skip ahead a bit, to the exit of the museum, where the beautiful poems of the San are written on animal bones...









This one says: 'I am the wind that blows away the footprints of the dead...'




I can't remember their names, but there were two people, a lady and a gentleman, who realised that the San were being exterminated without leaving a written history behind. They got permission to have some prisoners brought to them to record their stories, to teach them the San language and to tell the stories of San history.

Read them, weep...




















A British soldier had been sent to the mountain kingdom of Lesotho to find a Zulu King who had escaped from the British. When he reached Lesotho and saw how vast and mountainous it was, he realised that his task was impossible. He forgot about catching the errant Zulu as he discovered the San rock art in the area. He did a study on it, and got the remaining San to interpret the images that they portrayed. He published his findings in a document that was promptly forgotten by everyone.

Decades later, it was found and was the 'Rosetta stone' of San art, helping to unravel the secrets of the San paintings and engravings, as the few San that were left no longer drew on the rocks.



Okay, back to the main exhibit. We watched another short film (we had seen a few on the way through - bushmen hunting, the Trance Dance, rain making)



This is the story of a San hero. He was a chief who fought off the Boers. He handed himself over when he realised that his people were in danger. He was taken away to a prison in Pretoria on a train.



His people painted the story on the walls of the Makgabeng Shelter, and it is a rare depiction of trains in San art.






Another form of rock art also exists in South Africa, known as Khoe art. No one knows for sure who the artists were, but it is distinctly different from the San art. Whereas theirs was animals, people and mythical beasts, this is all geometrical shapes.










The museum exhibits now move on to Bantu rock art, but here is an interesting article on the Khoe and San if you care to read it.



Bantu art focuses more on initiation rites than story telling. (Initiation is the passage from childhood to adulthood)







This is a beaded figurine that is part of an initiation ceremony.



This one is part of a Northern Sotho male initiation ceremony.



It dates to the late 1800's. The crocodile was turned upside down and covered by a small thatch structure known as 'The Elephant". Food was placed in the crocodile and the initiates had to eat it without using their hands. The crocodile and the elephant are chiefly symbols. In this context they are to remind the boys of the role of the chief as provider and protector of his people.

The children were starting to get a little restless by now, luckily, in every few rooms there are computers that the children can play an interactive game on. They have to answer questions on each display and solve puzzles. The hardest one was moving blocks around to form the Khoe geometric pattern! We helped Natalie, as she was at a disadvantage, not being able to read! She managed to get the highest score....



One of the displays, was Perspex blocks with the names of all the tribes in South Africa (LOTS!)



When a light shone through them, the names were displayed on the floor...



Well that was the end of the museum...



But we stopped in the shop to have a look around...



Lots of 'recycled' craft, look:

Cleaning liquid buck...



Chip (crisp) packet bowl...



Soft drink can jewellery...



And this was pretty funny!



Well that was pretty interesting (and a bit sad). Maybe one day I will get to see more rock art in some of these other places...

Well, it seems there will be no more sorting out of bears for me...I am off on holiday with Vicki! We are off to the Eastern Cape...I hear it is spectacularly beautiful down there. We are going to George first, but I have no idea who he is... Oh! George is a place, not a person...silly me.

Well goodbye to all the other TVs staying behind with Fi, and goodbye to everyone reading, I'll be back in three weeks time.

Vicki came to fetch me and brought along the TV's visiting her to welcome me. I am going away on holiday with them all, yay!!

We packed our bags, there was great excitement, everyone talking together.... we got on the plane and almost two hours later we were in a town called George, situated on the beautiful Garden Route in the Western Cape.



Our first stop was the Wilderness Beach. It was beautiful but unfortunately the water was very cold!





Nicholas and Juanita took us to feel the water which was freezing! We decided to sit on the car bonnet and admire the scenery rather.



Sputnik and Holiday Harry were getting up to there pranks again!! Hope Vicki doesn't drive off now...



This is the view from the top of the hill. Just hold on tight Juanita please! It is a looong way down! A really pretty place though.



Around the corner, the river joins the sea and the railway bridge crosses over the Keurbooms River.



Sitting by the toasty fire at Vicki's step sister, Melinda's, house. It's quite chilly outside.





I could just doze off right here....

Woke up to this beautiful view of the mountains.



We watched some of the Olympic games on this huge television set!!



We were off to Oudtshoorn for some sightseeing. First stop the swing bridge. Nicholas was shaking the bridge as we walked across and making it swing and Juanita was shouting at him, we were all laughing.







Went to buy ostrich biltong for Vicki's stepfather. Biltong is a dried meat that is eaten all over South Africa as a snack and here it is made from ostrich meat. This meat has become very popular as it is cholesterol free. It tastes very nice too apparently, give me veggies rather, thanks!



Oudtshoorn is full of beautiful old buildings built during the ostrich feather boom.



The weather in Oudtshoorn was glorious and we drove through the Outeniqua mountains to get back to George, through the clouds.





We stopped at a viewing point but it was so cold nobody wanted to venture out of the bag. We were all cuddled up and warm!





Abeeku, the teeniest of us all, couldn't see a thing out the top of the bag, so he volunteered to come out and see the view.

And what a stunning view! Whew! Pity is was so misty and cloudy, you couldn't really see George in the distance. The dirt road is the old Montague Pass road which was the first road made to cross over the mountains. Eventually Purple Bun and I decided we would have a quick look...

We loaded up the car and together with Vicki's Mom and Juanita (Vicki's daughter) and Nicholas (Vicki's son)(the men had to stay behind and work!), Vicki drove us along the Garden Route to the Sunshine Coast and Port Alfred.

We drove over many rivers with beautifully designed bridges. The Storms River Bridge is one of the famous ones with it's deep gorge below. The story goes that the Italian architect who designed the bridge commited suicide by jumping off it because when the two sides were lowered they didn't meet exactly in the middle, there was a gap of a few centimetres!!



We finally arrived (500km later...) at this most beautiful hotel. It was called the Fish River Sun



Here we are getting some fresh air and admiring the fish pond at the entrance of the hotel.





This is where we were staying for the next week, yay!! Ooooh, what bliss! Vicki said there was a nature reserve on the hotel estate, I wonder if there are any bunnies there??

The Fish River Sun is actually 27km away from Port Alfred, so we took the little drive (after yesterday's 500km, it was little!!), and went to Port Alfred to do some sight seeing.





The whole area is very picturesque! And Vicki took lots of photos...

We drove down the East Bank and the West Bank of the Kowie River, which the town is built around. Hey! The beach!! Stop! We want to get out! I bet this water is freezing too... Juanita went to feel the water and said it was icy!



 



Vicki did some fancy photo stitching. This is the beautiful marina. There are five islands with stunning homes on them and people get around by boat.





Vicki said she could get used to this life, she wishes she could win the Lotto. Pity she can't become a toyvoyager, now that's the life!!

What many people don't know about Vicki, is that she is CRAZY about lighthouses! (And windmills but that's another story...). So here we are visiting the Great Fish Point lighthouse. South African Lighthouses. Lighthouse Adventures.







Once again, we held on tight (what is it with these people and heights!?) and went up the 58 stairs to the top. This is the shortest lighthouse in South Africa. The guided tour was very interesting, the lighthouse keeper even showed us the original clockwork mechanism that was wound up every four hours. Now everything is automatic and generator driven.

 

The view from the top. Wow!





On the way back to the hotel we stopped at a little town called Bathhurst, which was established by the 1820 settlers who came from Britain to settle in the Cape. Here is the church that was built by them. The whole area has been declared a national monument.



Enough for one day.... 'Home James'!

Aaaah! A beautiful sunshine day and we get to sit on the beach and feel the sand between our toes / hooves / paws, etc.



Holiday Harry pulled out the towel and sunglasses and caught quite a tan!



We walked down to the water and looked in the rock pools. The beaches are pristine, white, clean and untouched. Lots of shells around too. We gathered so many, we had to off load them into the bag.

 



Vicki organised for a hotel guide to take us for a drive, on a tuc-tuc, through the nature reserve. We saw a few animals but no bunnies! They're probably fightened and hide away.

 

 

Vicki's Mom couldn't help but feed this poor Vervet monkey. It didn't have any hands, poor thing.

 

After the beach, we came to relax at the pool. The pool was heated, everyone was happy!! They had a lovely swim (and rinsed off the salt and sand!), even Vicki!! I just rinsed my paws off in the water, as you know I don't really like getting wet!