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World's most beautiful city still haunted by apartheid ghosts

"Look! There it is! Table Mountain! Cape Town! The most beautiful city in the best country in the world." The faint profile of Table Mountain is barely visible against the distant horizon but Odie is elated.
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"...as I listened to his tale of frustration and bitterness it was obvious the social wounds inflicted by apartheid have still not healed."

"Look! There it is! Table Mountain! Cape Town! The most beautiful city in the best country in the world." The faint profile of Table Mountain is barely visible against the distant horizon but Odie is elated. After more than two months on the road she is almost home and clearly looking forward to seeing family and friends. But it will be a bittersweet reunion. Like many of her countrymen who love their work and their country Odie is making plans to leave South Africa.

It's 600 kilometres from the Namibian border south to Cape Town – the last leg of our long African safari. The two-day drive takes us across the flat highveld of Northern Cape Province where dusty red earth supports only a smattering of low shrubs and virtually no habitation. Farther south, in the transition country between interior plateau and coastal plain, the road winds through a landscape of harsh, rocky hills and narrow valleys. A few farmsteads with shade trees and small, irrigated fields add a touch of green to the drab countryside. At Springbok, once a copper mining town, we pause briefly for diesel and a snack before dropping down onto the coastal plain of the Western Cape with its great vineyards and orchards. It is already dark when we arrive at Citrusdal Hot Springs for the night – just a 90-minute drive from Cape Town – and for Odie just 150k from home.

The next morning, about an hour after Odie first spotted Table Mountain in the distance, we arrived at Bloubergstrand, a small shopping district on the Atlantic Coast across from Robben Island. Armed with hot meat pies and a cool drink from a waterfront delicatessen we walked down to the seawall and watched the surf roll in from Table Bay and crash against offshore rocks just beyond the sandy beach. Across the Bay, reflecting the morning light from millions of windows, the city of Cape Town sparkles against the massive backdrop of Lion’s Head and Table Mountain. It's a dramatic setting for a city and as we shared our last meal together with Odie I questioned why she had chosen to leave. She is young, well educated, a superb driver and tour leader with an encyclopedic knowledge of African history and culture. She speaks fluent English and Afrikaans, has a network of friends scattered across southern Africa, is passionate about her country, and eager to share it with visitors. So why is she planning to leave?

"I grew up and went to school in Cape Town," she tells me. "My dad was an executive with the National Railway – secure job, good income until a few years ago when he was retrenched." Retrenched is the official euphemism for "fired". Like many other white South African professionals her dad was a casualty of affirmative action in a black majority country. And Odie adds, "It’s just a matter of time before jobs for whites in the tourist industry go the same way." Later that day she dropped us at our hotel and headed off to an uncertain future. Whether or not her fears are founded, they are shared by many of her countrymen. We heard the same concerns over and over again during our stay in Cape Town.

Planet Africa is a small hotel that caters to backpackers. Located near Sea Point, only two blocks from the waterfront, it's a convenient and inexpensive base. We began our exploration of Cape Town with a four km walk along the seawall to Victoria and Albert Waterfront. The promenade winds through well tended gardens, past busy playgrounds, fast food kiosks, and swimming pools. On one side the sand reaches out to surf breaking against offshore rocks, and on the other low-rise apartment buildings and lavish private homes climb up the lower slopes of Lion’s Head. Outdoor cafes are crowded with a well-dressed mix of black and white diners.

The Victoria and Albert Waterfront is a busy working dock that provides service for yachts, charter vessels, and fishing boats. It is also one of the city's main tourist attractions. Encompassing a glittering mall, an aquarium with a huge shark exhibit, a sprawling craft market, and a multitude of shops, bars, and cafes the place is constantly a buzz of activity – at one place a brass band belts out jazz music, at another chanting dancers perform to the beat of a drum.

We order a cool drink at one of the waterfront cafes and the waiter, who spotted the small Canadian flag-pin on my hat, asks to join us. "My best friend emigrated to Canada," he tells us. He is the only white waiter and, like Odie's father, both he and his friend had recently been "retrenched." Before losing his job to a black replacement and becoming a part-time waiter he had been a manager in a large retail company. "But I'm staying here," he says defiantly "this is my country too." He talked of government corruption, of arrogant and incompetent people replacing well-trained experienced workers, and of illegal immigrants skimming off jobs and paying no taxes. And as I listened to his tale of frustration and bitterness it was obvious the social wounds inflicted by apartheid have still not healed.

In Green Square Market, a claustrophobic maze of tiny craft stalls crowded between towering glass skyscrapers in the downtown core, we got a different perspective from one of those immigrants. After selling us a small souvenir Toko was anxious to tell us her story. "We come from Zimbabwe," she says, and introduces her two sons, who are carvers, and her sister, who does beadwork. It took them most of a year to walk to Cape Town but now they are settled in the township and their craft stall provides a living. "No one comes to Zimbabwe anymore," says Toko, "but here there are many tourists. It is better."

Greater Cape Town is built on a peninsula. The downtown core and prosperous inner city suburbs like Sea Point occupy the north side and face Table Bay. Khayelitsha, the township where Toko and her family live, is built on the Cape Flats, which face False Bay on the south side. We drove through Khayelitsha several times and never ceased to be appalled at its size – mile after mile of makeshift shacks are home to approximately 1.5 million people. Most of them, like Toko, have migrated here in search of work. I asked our driver if the place had any services and he told me the story of a Khayelitsha resident who had acquired electricity and saved enough money to buy a television. But his new TV kept turning itself on and off. After repeated complaints the store sent out a technician to trace the problem and found that the fellow's electrical supply was a long wire tapped into a stoplight on the highway. It may be an urban legend but it makes a valid point.

The deficit in housing and education that are the legacy of apartheid are compounded by the instability in other parts of Africa. South Africa, and particularly its cities, has become a magnet for desperate people seeking a safe destination and a decent livelihood. As the country struggles to find a balance between atoning for the injustices of the past and providing a stable transition into the future some people, both black and white, feel abandoned and betrayed by their government. People are surprisingly eager to talk and the more I listened the more I came to realize how complex the problem is. As a visitor, a mere transient observer, I don't presume to understand it or fathom how the economic gulf that still divides the races will ever be bridged. But most people who live here are optimistic. Some are very rich and others tragically poor but at least there is no overt discrimination based on race and that in its self is a huge stride forward.

The circular cabin of the Table Mountain cable car rotates on the way up giving riders spectacular views south to the towering cliffs of the Twelve Apostles, west across Lion’s Head to the ocean, and north to the glistening white towers of the downtown core. We spent most of a day exploring the myriad trails that wind among flowering native shrubs on its flat rocky surface. Looking out across Cape Town, a thousand metres below us, I understand why Odie calls it "the most beautiful city in the world." And far in the distance, surrounded by foaming surf, Robben Island, the notorious apartheid prison is a symbol of how very far South Africa has come along the road to racial equality.

Next week a closer look at the World Heritage site that Robben Island has become.