Day 4

Today we had a very early start - breakfast was at the frightful time of quarter to 7 - only to discover we didn't have to get up that early at all! Thus, after a leisurely breakfast we took a taxi to meet the rest of the WISE crew at their rather more high class hotel "The Commodore." The coach then took the group of around 30 people to the first destination of many in the day's schedule, a rather appropriately named place known as Simon's Town. Here, we visited the house of a Muslim man who, along with all other blacks and 'coloureds' in the apartheid, was forcibly removed from his house and Town and made to live in a completely new place, further away from white people (in this case, the new place was called Oceanville). 15 years ago under the new governing system he was rightfully allowed back to his house, although he described how the area had changed so much it no longer felt like home. he has now turned his house into a museum and as he gave the group a tour around it, it was evident that the emotions connected to the quite obviously devastating events of the era still haunted him.
After this eye-opening trip, we briefly stopped off at a Naval museum down the road. The next stop on the schedule after this was a penguin sanctuary called Boulders where we had lunch - due to the lack of choice we ended up with Samosas and Bunny Chows (the very food mentioned in the poem about the Apartheid and Distric Six called Nothing's Changed).
A rather long coach trip and some uncomfortable nodding off later, we arrived at the Cape of Good Hope. This is where the Atlantic and Indian Oceans meet and is also the most South Westerly point of Africa. We took a Funicula (similar to a tram) up to the top of the cliff and had to walk up stairs the rest of the way. As you can imagine, the wind was strong at such a high point. In fact, we didn't stay long at the top as the wind was literally pushing us all against the wall and it was difficult to catch your breath (you can only imagine how terrifying going back down the stairs to the funicula was!) On our return journey, we made a very brief stop at a place Scarborough to take a picture of us alongside the sign - very touristy of us!
Our final destination for the day was a place called Bo Kaap which translates as "Above the Cape." Here, our tour guide showed us around the area which has a population of around 6500 people (97% of which are Muslim). We were delighted to see how brightly coloured all the houses were and learnt about the history of the area and its connection to slavery. During the tour, we visited a Mosque where it was custom to take your shoes off. Paige and Anna were asked to wear a special garment over their clothes as the shorts and t-shirts they were wearing would have been disrespectful. After this, we all were invited to a local family's house for dinner...and yes, it was all 30 of us. Sitting very close to the people either side of us in the dining room which was averagely sized, everyone tucked into a 3 course meal: starter was Samosas and spiced vegetable soup, the main course was various types of curry-based dishes and rice, and dessert was fruit salad and yoghurt and perhaps most uniquely, sweet potato with custard. All dishes were superbly prepared and most certainly delicious - one of our group even tried their hand and making a samosa with the direction of one of the hosts though unfortunately, it was substantially harder than she made it look. We then took some time to socialize whilst enjoying herbal tea and a cinnamon doughnut-type snack. Very tired after our busy day, we returned back to Villa Rosa for a good night's sleep.