South African notes

I have never been one to keep a travel diary but I jotted down a few notes and reflections about my first trip to South Africa some years after the event and, given the notice that the world has taken of the place, I thought my notes and reflections might be of some interest to others. Here is what I wrote:-

I think it was in 1978 (during the Apartheid era) that I went to South Africa for 5 or 6 weeks. The University paid my way so I could do a survey there. Rather unoriginally, I was interested in surveying white attitudes to blacks etc. It was at that time an amazingly well-kept and affluent-looking place—at least in the white areas. Cheap black gardeners, I suppose.

The South African Indians were very interesting. They tended to live in big, opulent-looking houses and drive quality cars. Standing on the kerb in Johannesburg you saw dark men with European-type noses going past driving BMWs and the like. You also saw dark men with flat noses hanging out of dilapidated and overcrowded buses. The nose (race) seemed to make the difference. Apartheid discriminated roughly equally against all sorts of dark people but the Indians found the basically rather petty restrictions little problem (they did not, for instance, want to intermarry with the whites anyhow!) and were in fact at that time the richest Indian community in the world. They were averaging an income about 80% of the white average. So it was not Apartheid that explained negro poverty in South Africa. The sad fact of the matter is that Negroes are poor, violent and generally at the bottom of the heap wherever they live. And South Africa was the only part of Africa at that time where they did not from time to time have to face systematic mass-murder and famine. There was still a lot of sporadic black-on-black (tribal) violence and dire poverty among them but the South African border police were still there not for the purpose of keeping the South African blacks in but to keep foreign blacks out!

I took a drive through the notorious black township of Soweto with Leon Louw (a leading local libertarian). We needed no pass, suffered no restrictions and were even shown around by any government employees we approached. Blacks who saw us passing by waved. Most of Soweto comprises 4-room brick houses that are undoubtedly overcrowded but also seem solid enough. Water is laid on but I think they were just getting electricity (at the hands of WHITE electricians!). All Soweto houses had a yard of their own but I saw no greenery in any of them. As far as I could see, in Johannesburg it was only whites who were growing vegetables to save money! Isn’t that worthy of Ripley?

Incidentally, where does the name “Soweto” comes from? It sounds pretty African does it not? In fact it is simply an abbreviation for “South West Township”. Quite English, really!

I discovered some good foods in South Africa—particularly a type of curried Kebab called Sosaties. There was a mass-marketed Stout produced by S.A. Brewing that was very good too. The best I have tasted. And one of the Cape wines is unlike any other. It is a hybrid grape called Pinotage. It produces superb wines in South Africa but no-one else has much luck with it. Thanks to the moronic policy of several Australian governments it was for a time a prohibited import here. The best brand of South African wines seemed to be K.W.V. (translates to Co-Operative Wine-growers Union). All of black Africa drinks Cape wines when they can afford to.

White South Africans must at that time have been the most hospitable whites in the world. I know—from the doorknock surveying I have done. Only in South Africa was I regularly invited in when I knocked on people’s doors. They would answer my questions even if they were having Sunday dinner at the time.

After doing my door-knocking in Johannesburg, I took the train down to Bloemfontein. It was a slow steam-hauled train and rather took me back to my childhood train trips in Queensland. It was slow to minimize damage due to possible derailment (by black terrorists) and steam-hauled because there was at the time an embargo on supplying South Africa with oil. We passed a lot of shacks with blacks living in them on the way. It was notable that the corrugated iron roofs were always just held down with rocks rather than being fastened in any other way. When the train came by, the blacks would come out and wave to it. Lovely!

I stayed with Dr. Patrick Heaven (Yes, that really is his surname!) and his family in Bloemfontein and was amused when he introduced me to his fellow Afrikaner academics in the Psychology Department. They were all wearing ties! You would never see that anywhere else among psychology academics to my knowledge.

My trip to South Africa was in December so Patrick was kind enough to invite me to a family Christmas party when that came around. At the party a dear little Afrikaner girl (about 10) asked me: “And what do you think of our language?” I was delighted to be able to say (in complete sincerity): “I like the way you say “Dankie” (thank you)”. She seemed pleased with that.

Posted by jonjayray on Sunday, June 5, 2005 at 06:46 PM in No particular place to go
Comments (16) | Tell a friend

Comments:

Posted by Matra on June 05, 2005, 07:43 PM | #

“the Indians found the basically rather petty restrictions little problem (they did not, for instance, want to intermarry with the whites anyhow!) and were in fact at that time the richest Indian community in the world.”

At the time you were in South Africa I was attending primary school in New Zealand. My half-Indian friend’s mother was fanatically anti-Apartheid and as a result my friend opposed the All Blacks touring SA and the Springboks touring New Zealand. Most Kiwis, being more interested in rugby than anything else were all for an All Black/Springbok series. Yet I don’t recall my friend’s Indian mother having any problems with Fiji a place she visited regularly. I also went to Fiji several times and it was always noticeable that the ethnic Indians were in charge and the native black Fijians were the ones cleaning toilets etc. Later there was a black coup against the Indian-dominated government of Fiji. Indians seemed to do all right in the old SA but the Indian government was very hostile to SA. I doubt if any Indian government ever expressed concern regarding the Indian dominance of black Fiji. It seems only whites get this kind of conscience attack.

Posted by Svigor on June 05, 2005, 07:44 PM | #

Don’t you know they were all Nazi psychopaths, that’s why they appeared so “healthy?” Has your sogourn through Psychology taught you nothing John?

Nice piece, I enjoyed it, thanks.

Posted by Svigor on June 05, 2005, 07:45 PM | #

Hehe, that’d be “sojourn.”

Posted by Fred Scrooby on June 05, 2005, 08:05 PM | #

The hospitality comes from whites who face a potentially dangerous hostile race at close range being glad to see other whites: sort of “fellow whites,” “allies,” “potential reinforcements,” and so on—whether consciously or subconsciously.

Were there differences between the respective ways Anglo-Saxons (i.e., English-speakers), Jews (if you could distinguish them), and Afrikaners viewed segregation (the English-language word for apartheid, the word used in the U.S. South till D.C. forced segregation out of existence there—rightly, in my view)?

Have you been back since the ANC took over? Johannesburg (spelling?) is now the rape capital of the world and a deteriorating, crime-ridden disaster, the city of Durban apparently no longer even exists as a recognizable city—it’s gone in terms of being a First-World entity, vanished—and the whole country is become more or less a Third-World basket case, from what I understand.

Posted by Fred Scrooby on June 05, 2005, 08:30 PM | #

D.C. forced segregation out of existence there—rightly, in my view” (—my comment, above)

Let me add: I think, analogously to Roe v. Wade, that Brown v. Board of Education was wrongly decided and this is best seen in

the way the courts have built on that decision

ever since. I feel the way D.C. forced Dixie to end segregation was wrong. I also feel segregation was wrong and needed to be brought to an end but there were other, better ways of doing it, ways that wouldn’t have involved turning Southern whites into an oppressed group, which is what certain forces tried and still try to turn them into. I could be wrong in thinking segregation was best done away with—I grew up in the North, not in Dixie where, for all I know, things had to be done differently. But at present my view is that segregation was wrong, morally unjustifiable, and had to be done away with—but there were other, better ways of doing it, ways that would not have forced whites down there into ways of living they preferred not to be forced into.

Posted by Matra on June 05, 2005, 08:45 PM | #

Fred Scrooby - “the city of Durban apparently no longer even exists as a recognizable city—it’s gone in terms of being a First-World entity, vanished”

Looks like they’re trying to change that image by bringing Formula One, the world’s most high-tech sport, there. A firm called African Renaissance Holdings is trying to set up an annual race. As the link below points out this firm is dedicated to black empowerment.

http://www.grandprix.com/ns/ns14942.html

Posted by jonjayray on June 05, 2005, 09:22 PM | #

Matra
The Indian government was in fact very hostile to Rabuka and co

Posted by jonjayray on June 05, 2005, 09:25 PM | #

Scroob

Yes. The Afrikaners accepted apartheid but the other whites were critical of it

I HAVE been back since—as you say, much decay

Posted by Fred Scrooby on June 05, 2005, 09:38 PM | #

“Looks like they’re trying to change that image” (—Matra)

They can try to change the image. They won’t succeed in changing the fact. The image will be determined accordingly (after all the contrived hype will have settled down). All that’s happening in that article is a bunch of local South African non-whites and their behind-the-scenes white middlemen and string-pullers there and in the white world are trying to arrange certain loans “for development projects” which are almost routinely made available to Third-World countries by institutions in the developed world and backed by guarantees borne ultimately by First-World middle-class tax payers. Such projects are simply part of the day-to-day process by means of which the next group of up-and-coming thieves in this or that Third-World country line their pockets and the pockets of the whites who tell them what they have to do to get the loan approved (everyone involved taking his “cut” of course when the multi-million-dollar loan package wins approval, all too often an automatic process where guaranteed loans for Third World “development” are concerned). That article is just a press-release put out by the syndicate involved, the purpose of which is to officially engage in requisite hype aimed at showing the bankers who are to approve the loan that there’s actually “a serious project” being proposed, rather than literally just transferring tens of millions of dollars from a First-World bank directly into the pockets of a dozen or so specific non-white individuals over there and their white partners over here—which is just a “cover,” because everyone involved knows what’s actually going on is in fact more or less just a transfer of millions into certain pockets and Durban will remain every bit the basket case it is right now regardless of what kind of “development” show these crooks put on. Sorry to be blunt about it, but the only thing that can “develop” Durban right now is changing its race.

Posted by Fred Scrooby on June 05, 2005, 09:39 PM | #

Thnx, John—just as I thought.

Posted by Fred Scrooby on June 05, 2005, 09:50 PM | #

The city of Detroit in the U.S. has undergone—how to put it?—“Durbanization,” shall we say? You won’t see that stark fact mentioned in polite publications, but at MR.com we have an opportunity to place truth above politeness in cases where that’s called for, from what I understand ...

Posted by Braveheart on June 06, 2005, 03:27 AM | #

I am surprised that when speaking about South Africa, no one else on this blog has yet written about the local genocide in slow motion against white Afrikaner farmers, the so-called “plaasmoorde”. Is it because the victims are Afrikaner-speaking? Now I am too busy in the run-up to my long vacation, but if nobody else does it, I will look what I can do in autumn. BTW, as a native Dutch speaker, I fully understand Afrikaans, so I can look up something if necessary.

Flanders,

Posted by Guessedworker on June 06, 2005, 05:41 AM | #

I’ll look forward to, Johan. The story of South Africa needs to be told from the Afrikaaner side. I have tried to find an Afrikaaner blogger to post here but, obviously, haven’t succeeded yet. If anyone knows a likely candidate please consider letting me know who he or she is.

Posted by jonjayray on June 06, 2005, 06:22 AM | #

The frequent murder of white farmers going on there now would be called a holocaust if the races were reversed

Posted by Fred Scrooby on June 06, 2005, 06:44 AM | #

Braveheart I would be extremely interested in hearing about that genocide of Afrikaners. Please do post something on it when you get a chance.

Posted by Jerry Abbott on July 08, 2005, 09:39 PM | #

The American (Jewish owned) press and TV media do not permit information about the decline of South Africa to become a prominent part of the political consciousness of the people.

There are liberals here who will tell you that Black rule has been good for the country, that South Africa is more “first world” than it ever was before, and that progress in development increases every day in SA.

South Africa’s problem is that it failed to keep out the FIRST immigrant Black. Had they made of their country a “White Zion,” no darkies allowed under any circumstances, and fought off anybody who tried to make them live differently, then SA would indeed still be prosperous today.

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