Getting to Know Jozzi

Rudy’s house was a mansion!

Well technically it was not a mansion, but it was twice as big as anything I had ever lived in and gigantic compared to any house I’d stepped foot into in Africa.

The first morning when I woke up in the spare bedroom at Rudy’s (who I’d just met) house I couldn’t stop giggling. I had been staying at a backpackers in a dorm room of ten beds, where the mattress was so bad my back was bruised from the wooden base, I would sink into the middle with either side of the mattress springing up vertically beside me. Now, I was in a king sized bed, in my own room, with its own TV, with my own bathroom, in a two story house with a private bar, a private swimming pool, a cleaner and a security guard asleep at the entrance. I couldn’t believe my luck.

Over the next few days I settled right in to Jo’burg and entertained the idea of moving in permanently. My instant liking to the place came as a bit of a surprise. Jo’Burg was only ever meant to be a stop-over, it was a launching pad for Kruger and Lesotho, but I had never planned to spend more than a night or two at a time there. It isn’t exactly a pretty city, the public transport is horrendous and the crime rate reputedly very high (apparently there are an average of 1500 murders in Jo’Burg every year; Sydney by comparison has an average of 40). But I never felt threatened there. Even in the central bus station, where all the locals warned me not to go, I didn’t encounter any problems. I ended up in that bus station nearly everyday, and not once did I ever see another white person. I fast made friends with a man there who helped me on the right bus on the first day, after my third visit we were greeting each other with the local hand shake: you shake hands, hook fingers, and slide your thumb against theirs like your clicking fingers. I adopted an ‘I’m a local don’t mess with me’ stance and walked with a long confident stride and a direct gaze that I had hoped masked the ‘I’m really a lost and vulnerable tourist’ truth. I also always made sure my tattoos were visible – a fairly universal guarantee of some degree of street cred.

After a boozy night at Xai Xai one Friday I walked back to Rudi’s home at midnight on my own. When I had told my new friends about it the next day they were horrified. I was reprimanded and warned not to ever do it again. It was interesting that when I had mentioned crime rates and safety in the city before they had all agreed that they felt safe, but they lived behind electric fences, paid for private security and NEVER walked after dark. Many public buildings had ‘no guns allowed’ signs on the entrance which I had thought was an overreaction until a group of guys tried to chat me up one night by flashing me the pistols they had tucked in their jackets.

Jo’burg intrigued me and every person I met was barraged with questions about their views of the place. When I met a girl named Liezel, I said that South Africa seemed a world apart from the rest of Africa, she replied: “On the surface it is, but when you look at the politics, the corruption and the education system it is not so advanced… people are not taught to think critically here… this is Africa and things just go around in circles”.

A man named Eddie told me that two things were important for black and white people here. For white people first it is what car you drive and second it is where you live. For black people first it is what car you drive, second it is what clothes you wear.

I had found the people in J’Burg to be more ‘real’ than that. At least the ones I met anyway. A couple of them seemed hyper aware of the racial inequality and obviously made an effort to pay the black guys who took it upon themselves to watch their parked car for them, even though it was obviously a pointless job.

I asked Liezel why she stayed in South Africa and her reply was “because change is happening and revolution is in the air”.

There was one day in particular when I spent the morning at a local organic growers markets buying overpriced cheese and then doing the rounds of local artists studio/gallery space. After that Ange (one of Chuck’s friends I met at Xai Xai) picked me up in her new red Dodge and we went to a francophone music festival. The crowd there was a good mix of black and white, gay and straight, male and female, it was trendy yet simultaneously relaxed.  After that we met up with Ange’s girlfriend Lyn and we saw a lesbian film at the Out in Africa festival.

On another occasion Ange, Lyn and another girl Lisa took me to the Rosebank markets selling everything from ancient African carvings to modern designer cuff-links. We then went on to possibly the coolest spot in town which is an old warehouse complex converted into food markets, cafes a bar and artist spaces. We ate veggie burgers and drank specialty beers and I felt like I was back in London or Berlin. That was one of my favourite days of the whole trip, the girls made me laugh and I felt like my soul was re-nourished after a frustrating month in West Africa.

Some days it felt like I could have been home in Sydney, I was often doing exactly what I would have been doing at the same time at home. It was a bitter-sweet feeling, I had gotten the holiday-in-my-holiday I was seeking when I flew from Ghana to J’Burg. I was happy and relaxed, yet on the flip-side feeling like I was at home made me miss my girlfriend and my family even more, I was no longer distracted by concerns over where I would sleep and what I could eat. I was also starting to worry that I had gotten too comfortable here, that I was no longer embarking on the adventurous journey I had set out to do. And so I told myself that I had to keep moving, I had to keep exploring and I had to keep challenging myself.