Homeless Not Hopeless - HEI Cafe, Braamfontein

HEI - The Hillbrow Entrepreneurship Initiative - is a student driven NGO which helps empower the disadvantaged youth and the homeless of one of Johannesburg's toughest neighbourhoods, Hillbrow. HEI helps potential entrepreneurs find their way out of poverty by helping them to get relevant business skills, work experience and network with the wider community to find the support to initiate their business dreams. It's a new organisation (launched 2012), powered by the spirit and determination of its student volunteers. Some of the student volunteers are also from very poor backgrounds, or are even homeless themselves and the whole organisation is imbued with the powerful belief that no matter your background, everyone deserves the chance to succeed and rise above adversity.

Here's a promo video showing the team in action: 

HEI recently opened a 'social cafe' in the heart of Braamfontein which acts as a place to promote the business efforts of its partners as well as providing a meeting space for the NGO and much more besides. They try to keep everything as affordable as possible so all drinks are 10Rand (although you are encouraged to donate more if you can - all the money goes straight to the NGO). In addition everything is for sale - once a month they sell off all the second-hand furniture in the cafe as well as the artworks on display which are produced by the homeless and maginalised of Hillbrow.

HEI was founded by French MBA student Barbara and the the cafe serves French crepes made according to her Grandmother's recipe, as well as a changing series of other comfort food. When I dropped by I also bumped into Tania who is one of the guides at PastExperiences and a very skilled sketcher, amongst many other talents. Tania (who also volunteers here) told me how they plan to run arts and crafts classes (with all materials provided) where local artists will share their skills, as well as other hands-on workshops.

In the coming weeks the cafe will also be opening a courtyard space and although a liquor licence looks unlikely (this is an NGO after all), they do let people BYOB on Friday evenings (from 17:30) when they have a marimba band play live in the cafe. Unfortunately I couldn't stay to see the band, I had to run off to another event, but I have heard the band are really good.

With its free wifi, free library, record player, charming young clientele and volunteer staff and the fresh inspiring air of community action, HEI Cafe has to be one of the most heart-warming and inviting social spaces in Braamfontein. I know I'm going to be spending a lot more time here.

Courtyard cafe space soon to be revealed

Open: 07:00 - 17:30, Sat, Sun 14:00 - 17:00.

How I got there: It is a little tricky to find HEI Cafe but well worth persevering. It is located at 87 De Korte Street (the building opposite the Easy Hotel), to find the entrance you need to go up the alleyway at the side of the building (on Melle Street or Reserve Street) and you will soon spot the tables spilling out of the courtyard. This alleyway is not dodgy so do not be afraid! 

https://www.facebook.com/HEISOCIALCAFE
https://twitter.com/HEI_world

Joburg City Festival 2013

(Click on photos to view gallery)

The JCTA is a voluntary organisation representing businesses and organisations who have a stake in tourism in downtown Joburg. The organisation aims to promote the many attractions of the Joburg inner-city to residents and visitors, who still don't quite get what newbies in town like me are already so excited about. To get the ball moving, in the last week of August the JCTA organised the first ever Joburg City Festival. It was a week full of special events and parties, walking tours, concerts and exhibits, street football and ballet, poetry, fashion, cookery lessons and much more.

The JCTA headquarters are in the random turret building on the right of this picture

I certainly didn't get to as many of the events as I wanted to, but what I did do was discover a lot more about the inner-city and its different areas. After all this exploration of the CBD's various 'hoods I am starting to feel like quite the confident downtown Joburger...even if I am really just an expat who lives in the Northern Suburbs.

The Fashion District

One of the coolest venues during the week was the Fashion Kapitol which is located deep in the 26 block expanse of the 'fashion district'. The Fashion Kapitol is an initiative by a local fashion institute to inject new life into this historic fabrics and clothing area. They have an open-air runway where they stage fashion shows, retail space for cool little boutiques and a nice cafe called The Fashion Shack located inside one of the oldest surviving buildings in the area.

There were lots of tuk tuks about to take festival goers to the different venues

I kept turning up here intent on catching one of the fashion shows which had names like Freaky Friday, Trendy Thursday and Magical Monday, but somehow I kept missing them. Even though I never saw one of the big fashion events, I did still get to pretend I was The Satorialist wandering around and assessing the local style. Personally I think it's not always what people here are wearing, more how they are wearing it - Joburgers have real poise and tons of attitude, they can make a lot of getups look very sharp and cool. I love the colours of the shops around this area too. 

Kerk Street Market

The Kerk Street Market is one of my favourite markets in the CBD. It has great fruit and veggies, as well as the usual football shirts, trainers, gadgets etc. There are many more hectic markets in the city, yet somehow Kerk Street manages to remain simultaneously calm but also full of life. Apparently the hair braiders at the Kerk Street Market are some of the best on the whole continent. They don't have fancy salons, just chairs on the street and they are never short of custom.

On the last day of the festival in Kerk Street there was an event called 'Claim Your City'. A sound system was set-up and local musicians played throughout the day. I dropped by and caught a male soul group giving it everything - they were brilliant.

Gandhi Square Street Football

On Gandhi Square, the transport hub for those using the Metro Bus, there was a 'street football' championship going on all week. Street Football here meant five-a-side and the teams were impressively well organised and played really high standard football. The eventual winners were the Penthouse Scorpions who quite simply outclassed everyone else. They won a new matching team kit and kit bags, as well as 5,000 Rand - not bad for a bit of street footie!

Braamfontein and Critical Mass

Braamfontein is one of the most fashionable parts of downtown Joburg. Full of students there's no shortage of creative ideas, pumping bars and cool coffee shops. I spent quite a lot of the week here, sipping my way through a list of the area's top cafes (more on that later), making my first trip out to the fascinating Constitution Hill and enjoying my first meet up with the fun crowd known as the Jozi Bloggers (also more on that later).

I sadly did not take part (this time) in the mass cycling event Critical Mass which left from Braamfontein on Friday night to zoom around the city centre. I did however hover around and do that blogger thing of taking pictures of the dudes while they were preparing to leave. There were all kinds of people at this event, hipsters, old folks, serious cyclists, young kids, yuppies, students, bloggers (probably)...it's pretty cool how the love of travelling on two wheels unites different folks and I think the whole Critical Mass ethos really matches well with the mission of the Joburg City Festival. Really looking forward to the next edition.

The Old Prison at Constitution Hill

August is Women's Month in South Africa and throughout the month one of Joburg's most interesting historical sites - the prison on Constitution Hill - have been offering free entrance for women and you can get a free guided tour too!

It seemed like a great deal and with little thought as to what this place actually was I ambled along for some Wednesday afternoon sightseeing. Little did I know what I was letting myself in for. This museum offers up a no-holds-barred, dark and disturbing glimpse into the depths of South Africa's recent history. In parts it is a harrowing experience. But also one I cannot recommend highly enough. Constitution Hill is a fantastic museum and all the people who work there are wonderful. It is disturbing, powerful, historical, educational, frightening in some places and beautiful in others. Very well worth visiting.

Please note: The Constitutional Court is also based here. This is an inspirational piece of modern architecture that enshrines all of modern South Africa's freedoms. Built from the rubble of former prison blocks it is designed to be open, accessible and transparent. I had just missed the last guided tour of the day by the time I got round to this bit, so I didn't get to enjoy what I am sure would have been a very uplifting end to my visit. Hopefully I'll get  to see inside next time.

Number Four

Number Four was the name given to the prison block set over for 'native men' (essentially all non-white males). It was built between 1902 and 1904 and almost from its very beginning was overcrowded and insanitary.

One of the first famous people to be imprisoned here was Mahatma Gandhi who was jailed for violating pass laws and for leading the satyagraha movement in Johannesburg. There is a nice exhibit which explains Gandhi's work in Johannesburg and details how he spent his time in the prison. This is the only museum I know of in Johannesburg that really looks at one of the city's most incredible former residents (there's also an exhibit in Museum Africa, but in my opinion it is not nearly as good).

Gandhi made these sandals in prison and gave them to General Smuts before he left for India. 25 years later Smuts returned them saying "I have worn these sandals for many a summer, even though I may feel that I am not worthy to stand in the shoes of so great a man"

After the Gandhi rooms the prison yard slopes down hill with the surrounding cells left almost exactly as they were when people were last prisoners here. The paint is peeling, the creaky thick steel doors are left ajar, there are blankets on the floor, rusty, dirt filled toilets sit in the corner of the rooms. Videos are also projected onto the walls of former prisoners giving first hand testimony of what it was like to be incarcerated here.

Prisoners at Number Four were not separated according to their crimes and each prisoner received the same inhumane treatment. Political prisoners, murderers, communists, shoplifters, rapists, gangsters and those who had infringed the absurd 'pass laws' (forbidding non-white people to travel into white areas without a special 'pass') all shared the same huge cells.

Prisoners were routinely strip searched in the most humiliating ways and starved for days as punishment. There was torture, beatings, hard labour, rape and gang violence. Number Four was a place of indescribable cruelty.

At the bottom of the prison yard you reach a watch tower which hangs over the entrance to the 'isolation cells'. To the left is a room which shows how prisoners attempted to find beauty and humanity during their imprisonment by making artworks out of their prison blankets and creating trinkets from butt ends and pieces of scrap paper.

To the right is a room which details the methods used to torture prisoners. The weapons are kept in a large metal case which has little windows which you can glimpse through to see pieces of whips, batons, cuffs, metal rods...There's also a horrible device on display which the prisoners would be tied to. It was last used in 1983. There was a video testimony projected on the back wall, but I have to be honest, I chickened out. I couldn't take any more of that room, it was terrifying, I had to get out.

I then walked down to the 'isolation cells'. These are tiny cupboard like cells where prisoners would be kept for days at a time and left to survive on only rice water. It is said that these cells are haunted. Now, I am not trying to joke around here, I am convinced that there are bad spirits here. I was the only one down there at the time and I swear I could not go through those doors - it just felt like an evil place, there was something horrible about the air. I walked down to get near them, heard a door bang somewhere and decided to get the hell out of there.

The netting on top is rusty barbed wire

The Women's Gaol

Women were also held prisoner at Constitution Hill, in segregated areas for whites and non-whites. The conditions in the white cells were considerably better than elsewhere, although the white women were also made to perform hard labour, were beaten and subjected to extended periods in solitary confinement -  sometimes for months at a time.

The majority of female non-white prisoners during apartheid were locked up here for not carrying their passbooks. Often it was a simple case of a woman from a township coming to shop at a cheaper city centre supermarket and not having her documents with her when approached by the police. In the last years of apartheid when black people began to live in previously fancy all-white areas such as Hillbrow, black women were put in prison here for 'crimes' such as; holding hands with a white man (the white man was not prosecuted) and for being a suspected prostitute (which in the case detailed at the museum meant walking through Hillbrow in high fashion designer clothes).

Pregnant women and those with babies were not given preferential treatment and over the years hundreds of children were born and spent the first years of their lives inside these walls. As a particularly cruel and unnecessary rule women were stripped of their shoes and underwear on arrival. They were given one sanitary pad which they had to tie to the tops of their legs for the week when they had their period. They even had to show the warders that they were bleeding to get one. Female campaigners in the 1970s successfully forced the prison to provide underwear and suitable sanitary protection for the women of Constitution Hill.

The Old Fort

After all that misery I didn't really feel like taking in another prison exhibit and was seriously feeling the need to see sunshine, breathe the fresh air of freedom and see people happily going about their day (I saw only one other visitor during my whole time in Number Four). A walk along the fort ramparts was the perfect thing to do.

The Old Fort at the centre of the Constitution Hill complex was originally built under Paul Kruger as a defensive fortress to protect against the British during the Anglo-Boer war. Following the war it was turned into a prison for white men. One notable exception to that rule is Nelson Mandela who was held here during the Rivonia Trial.

The ramparts provide a fantastic view over the skyscrapers of the CBD and a tantalising glimpse into the tower blocks and bustling streets of Hillbrow. As I've mentioned before Hillbrow was once a fancy white suburb. Nowadays it strikes fear into the hearts of many Joburgers and is often declared a bit of a no-go zone. It has many run-down or derelict buildings, is desperately overcrowded and has problems with drugs and crime. That said, I know that Hillbrow is also probably amongst the most vibrant and interesting parts of this city. I pass through there all the time on the bus and the streets exude a special kind of enticing warmth and inimitable African urbanity.

Now, I'm not about to go on a sightseeing stroll by myself on a Wednesday afternoon through Hillbrow – definitely don't have the cojones to do that any time soon. But I will find my way into happening Hillbrow somehow (most likely with one of the awesome local tour guides). Just watch this space!

And finally...The Two Talking Yonis #1

In the women's jail, as part of Women's Month, there was a special art installation by Reshma Chhiba. As the blurb had it: “it appeals to spiritual power and defiance”. 
Maybe I had to see a man walk awkwardly through this to get the full experience... ;)

The Talking Yoni is a giant, soft and squidgy, walk-in vagina.

How I got there: It is really easy to get to Constitution Hill. Just walk straight up the hill from Park Station and follow the signs (about a 10-15min walk). 
Open: 09:00 - 17:00, Sat, Sun 10:00 - 15:00. Make sure you arrive early, there's lots to see.

Fordsburg Night Market

One of the things which makes Johannesburg a really exciting city to relocate to is its genuinely rainbow-like abundance of different cultural groups. Much like London or New York, this city has attracted immigrants from across the globe and they've all developed their own little corners, incorporating their indigenous styles and cultural identities into the fabric of the city.

The ethnic group most identifiable in the area where I live (Melrose/Illovo) is the Jewish community. On the floor of my apartment block, ten out of the 15 flats are Jewish. Some of the apartment blocks here even have their own temples! The Chinese community has their own Chinatown in Cyrildene, the Congolese are well set up in Yeoville's Rocky Road and Joburg's vibrant Indian/Pakistani/Bengali community is largely based in colourful Fordsburg, just west of the CBD.

During apartheid the government forced the "coloured" community to move out of Fordsburg, where they had established their own community, and made them relocate to the far off township of Lenasia (past Soweto). They did however let Asian business owners keep their shops - on the condition that they remain within the specially designated Asia Mall. Despite being forced to live several miles from their stores, the community's businesses continued to thrive through the difficulties of apartheid. Now that apartheid has long since passed the Asian community has reclaimed the streets of Fordsburg and the area is now bursting with a new generation of immigrants from the Indian sub-continent, further adding to the vibrant street life. 21^st Century Fordsburg is a fantastic place to shop, eat, get a haircut, visit a tailor…you name it, you can find it here.

The most fun time to come to Fordsburg is Saturday evening when the night market is in full swing. During the night market the area around the main thoroughfare Mint Street fills with stalls selling clothes, jewellery, DVDs, Bollywood films, spices, sparkly shoes and lots and lots of street food. The predominantly Muslim community turn out in their finest clothes to wander the streets, shop, eat, get beauty treatments, gossip and meet with friends.

We parked up a few blocks from Mint Street with empty stomachs and went in search of some top quality Indian food. Following our noses we quickly found ourselves drawn to the smoking street-side grill of the Tikka House where at least 20 tandoori chickens were being grilled over an open fire. With our stomachs happily filled we then went looking for stuff to buy. Like all good Asian markets you arrive in search of food and then decide you want to buy 10 of the latest blockbusters on pirate DVD, a handful of jewellery, a bucket-load of spices and maybe some incense to top it off. Incidentally if you are looking for variations on the traditional long black Muslim abaya…there are at least 50 shops to choose from.

Our next task was to find the Juice Den which Heather Mason of 2summers.net had highly recommended to me. Here they grind up fresh sugar cane and mix it up with freshly squeezed juices and ice into a very satisfying drink. I had orange and cane juice, although there were more exciting options like guava, carrot and avocado to choose from too.

My husband wasn't going to leave Fordsburg without getting a 30 Rand haircut at the Asian barbers and I certainly wasn't going to walk past the Sweetmeats bakery without getting some sticky treats to take home. I have no idea exactly what it was I bought - but what the hey, it was nyom!

How we got there: Fordsburg is located to the west of Newtown which is easily accessed on the Rea Vaya. It is not at all recommended to walk here from Newtown after dark though - the industrial wasteland in between is dark, creepy and super sketchy. Essentially the night market is best reached by car. Park where you can and you will find there's no shortage of car guards around to watch your wheels.