Soulparking

Saturday, 15 April 2006

In everyone’ life there are little joys that only make you smile.  Little things that are inside jokes to you and to you alone.  One of my little pleasures which culminates multiple little joys together on one path is walking from my flat to Kloof Street.

I have stayed and lived near the coolest main streets on the planet.  Manhattan definitely has some of the best.  And the Latin Quarter in Paris (where Hemingway used to write) is also pretty incredible.  I cannot forget Las Ramblas in Barcelona.  Nor Orchard Road in Singapore.  Or the Haupstrasse in Heidelberg that I lived near for six months.  Maybe even walking in and around Glenwood or NC State or checking out the women doctor and nurses in training at University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill.

Kloof would not strike you as any fantastic road as a tourist.  Places around Camps Bay and Clifton Beach usually get the attention of the tourists.  But Kloof is filled with Capetonians – true Capetonians – and shows the potential of South Africa and its place in the world. 

On this one road there are about 20 to 30 modeling and casting agencies.  There is always a commercial, a feature film, or a model shoot happening.  The little Seattle Coffee Company I sit and write in has posed as a coffee house in Sweden, New York City, and some city in Asia.   My usual table sits opposite the road from the television station. I am even not in the elite crowd.  The elite crowd sits and slurps coffee for hours at the vida e caffe’  across the street.  Vida is where all the famous people hang out.  Most of them are local celebrities – actors, comedians, and musicians.

This is the new main street of the world.  Muslim, Jew, Catholic, Protestant, and Atheist sharing coffee and discussing everything going on on the north side of the planet.  A street of young adults who share the idea of working together.  Some of these young adults never mixed or even talked to people of other races when they were children (because they were disallowed).  Now they are best friends and the ones they love are of every different skin color.  Forgetting the hatred of the past.  Planning optimistically that the national government will get their shit together – to make this place the new social, economic, creative Mecca of the world. 

Living on the tip of Africa, surrounded by two oceans – Atlantic and the Indian – and the wind is always blowing – bringing in new ideas, new passions, and always renewed hope.

But we down here are opposite to the rest of the world.  We are moving into winter.  Everybody above the equator is moving into summer. 

The rest of the world burns.  Hates.  Kills.

We in South Africa are trying to learn how to tell stories.  We are learning how to love each other even though we are so different.  We are going forward.   Xhosa and Zulu.  Jew and Muslim.  European and Asian. Hell even the Australians and New Zealanders feel at home – even though the All Blacks and the Aussies hate us during the Super 14 Rugby.

The oldest human being’s fossils were found very near to Cape Town.  Wouldn’t it be ironic that it would be our human destiny to come back to the paradise and purpose we abandoned.  In our path to scatter around the globe, kill each other, and find other uncharted lands to horde and exploit.  We return back to the tip of Africa to remember God’s purpose for us: to love Him and love each other.

So I turn the corner to start down Kloof and the vinyl LP store is pumping out the tunes with its stereo record player.  The 7/11 is busy as people are lining up to buy cigarettes and lottery tickets.  The second hand shop is like a pop icon museum with relics from the 70s, 80s, and the 90s for cheap.  There are multiple new clothing designers opening up their first shops – Religious, Scar, etc.  All designers you could find in the Young Designers Emporium at any local mall here in South Africa.

The people that pass you on the street often are the same ones that are plastered on building size billboards on the skyscrapers advertising Motorola Razor mobile phones or the new Audi.  Or my personal favorites are the Axe fragrance ads.  Or perhaps KGB the liver protection pill. Beautiful people that occasionally you might run into at other places on the planet.  But here, its every five minutes you meet another beautiful person.

As you walk, you hear the people behind you conversing in Xhosa.  Or Zulu.  Or as you walk past outside cafes, hear people laughing and talking in German, Finnish, Russian, and/or Japanese.  

And past my university, past the independent movie theatre Labia that has the Latin American Film Festival going on – until I am greeted once I step inside the Seattle. 

“The usual, Gary?” they say soon as they see me.  Even if there are customers in front of me they start making my Iced Mocha right away.

I setup my laptop in the corner and start to type.  They walk over to my table and bring me my drink.

“Hey man you don’t have to do that!” I say smiling.  “How much do I owe you?”

The guy laughs.  “Hey you are family.” And walks away.

I get up at once and leave a R20 tip in their tip dish.  Then I return to take my taste of South Africa happiness and swallow it down.