Old Town House and Slave Lodge

I had a meeting at the Department of Sports, whose offices are located at Greenmarket Square. From my past experiences with trying to get parking in that area (and with the free concert taking place tonight) I decided to rather use the Jammie shuttle. Public transport can be remarkably efficient, and I had about 15 minutes to kill before my appointment. Thus, I took the opportunity to have a look at the Old Town House, which is on Greenmarket Square, and referred to as the centre of Cape Town (unlike the City Hall, which is usually the centre of town). As one of the oldest buildings in Cape Town, it is interesting in itself, but the exhibitions were being changed, and thus there wasn't much to see really.

After my meeting, I did not feel like coming back to UCT, and thus decided to continue my cultural exploration of Cape Town and visit Slave Lodge on Adderley Street.

Slave Lodge is a remarkable social history museum, in three parts. The most interesting is definitely the history of Slavery in South Africa; an often overlooked part of our history. Slave Lodge was originally the "storage and processing" centre for slaves, and thus an appropriate location to explore this part of our history. Of the South African museums and galleries I have visited, this was by far the most interesting and well presented exhibition. There is also some history of Afrikaans, a language that was born out of the slave trade by the slaves (through the amalgamation of different languages). It is most ironic that the language of the slaves became the tool to oppress others, 100 plus years after the abolition of slavery.

The other parts of the museum - a cultural history, through music, weapons, silverware, pottery and a small section on Egypt, seem a bit disjointed really and seemed to be largely ignored by the other visitors. The third part looks even more out of space, with an exploration of segregation in the USA, but parallels are drawn with Apartheid, and in that context it sort of "makes sense".