Kufa Makwavarara Mashonisa (Loan Shark).
Kufa Makwavarara Mashonisa (Loan Shark).
Image: Supplied

Not too long ago Capetonians would only go to the eastern fringe of the city centre when absolutely necessary. Resolving a tax query at the previous Sars head office or inching along the pavement queue trying to get into the main branch of the department of home affairs were never agreeable tasks, and they weren’t soothed by the environs.

That’s changed. The East City precinct fringing the centre of town is now very much alive — and stimulating. One street, in particular, is a microcosm of the vibe: Buitenkant Street is well worth a stroll to discover what’s happening and to experience some of the best of everything Cape Town offers.

I’ve made an early start, so a strong brew is needed. Truth Coffee beckons.

A few years ago it was awarded the title of the world’s best coffee shop by the UK’s upmarket newspaper The Telegraph. I’m sceptical of this sort of hyperbolic acclaim. (Besides, aren’t the Brits more fond of tea?) More convincingly, I’ve heard rave reports from people whom, I know, know their brews. 

Approaching, I have a tingle of déjà vu. The sidewalk, the doorman, the dirty-chic façade: this could be Amsterdam’s red light district. Stepping inside is a throwback to a different world. The industrial premises, the décor and accoutrements, the outfits of the frantic but friendly waitrons — they scream steampunk, a retro-futuristic subculture fusing 19th century machinery, Victorian outfits and Mad Max accessories. The overall aesthetic prompts an infectious happiness, kindled by the 1930s swing era lindy hop music. I ask the maître d’ if I can take a few photographs. “Sure,” smiles Ursula, “everyone does.”

Is the coffee good? The simplest answer, and strongest compliment, is to confirm that the baristas here know what a cortado is. (Most supposedly specialist coffee shops in Cape Town do not.) Best of all, the place smells like a heavenly fusion of coffee forms: earthy raw beans, aromatic roasting, the richness of fresh brews, and the subtler wafts of filtering in process from nearby tables’ pour-over drippers.

I could linger over an espresso, then perhaps a macchiato, and chat to the Belgian and British tourists. Or watch the gig economy in operation, people staring intently at screens, wired on caffeine and wirelessly connected to their work. But I drag myself out, keen to adventure further along the street.  

District Six Museum tourist group at entrance vestibule.
District Six Museum tourist group at entrance vestibule.
Image: Supplied

Very close by is the compact State of the ART gallery. “There are some wonderful pockets of things happening in the city centre,” says the owner, Jennifer Reynolds. She’s positive despite a reduction in foot-traffic and walk-in visits since Covid-19. I’m just in time to see the current exhibition, Time and Tide (Wait for No Man), showcasing works by seven of the approximately 50 artists the gallery represents. Eastern Cape-born Sylvester Zanoxolo Mqeku’s sand-cast ceramic sculptures are extraordinary, transformative creations while Capetonian Lizette Forsyth’s mixed media canvases superimpose current realities onto old, scavenged surfaces to prompt reflection on change and time’s inexorable passing.

Reynolds lets me peek beyond the showroom, and I fall in love with Mashonisa (Loan Shark), an oil on canvas by Kufa Makwavarara. The hyperbolic rush of colour, the bling, the surrealistic symbolism combine in a powerful satire on the excesses of capitalism and power.

At the opposite end of Buitenkant, nearest the Castle, Truth to Power is the name of the exhibition at the Desmond and Leah Tutu Legacy Foundation. It’s a bleaker, less vibrant part of town, and access from the road is through an austere iron security gate. But inside, Tutu’s renowned playfulness permeates and becalms. “Look up,” says the receptionist. Flying through the air, suspended on the chandelier, is a full-regalia, life-size mannequin of the grinning Archbishop.

Lisette Forsyth, The Dawn of Womanhood.
Lisette Forsyth, The Dawn of Womanhood.
Image: Supplied

My laughter is part of a rollercoaster of emotions over the next hour. The exhibition spans six rooms, each covering various threads of resistance to, and struggle against, apartheid. It’s disquieting then shocking, appalling then moving. It’s a pleasure to meet and chat to an activist I recognise from the 1980s; we are both sad that we are two of less than a handful of visitors. This place seems like hallowed turf. It stirs the soul.

Nearby, the A4 Arts Foundation is a complete surprise. It’s a free to the public, not-for-profit laboratory for the arts, says the mission statement on the reception area wall. It, too, seems barely known, and is practically empty except for the staff and three young artists using a workspace to collaborate on a creation. The upstairs exhibition space currently features a series of installation art pieces under the banner title The Future is Behind Us. Some are weirdly wonderful, like the darkroom with Asemahle Ntlonti’s Intaba acrylic, stapled to a wall, alongside Kyle Morland’s machine-like aluminium sculpture. The merger of prehistoric and modern is animated by an eerie light- and sound-show created by Mitchell Gilbert Messina. 

The neighbouring hall is dominated by a red carpet embedded with 12 speakers emanating a sound veering from calming to cacophonous. A wall-sign has the explanation: this is James Webb’s Prayer, an ongoing project he started in Cape Town in 2000, now spanning ten cities across the world, to record and collect intonations and exhortations of the faithful. The burbling sound, and the very concept, is challenging, enlightening, enlivening. It suits Buitenkant Street to a T.

Sylvester Zanoxolo Mqeku, Mask.
Sylvester Zanoxolo Mqeku, Mask.
Image: Supplied

Next door is the District Six Museum. Inside, I eavesdrop on a wizened, white-haired guide telling a group of German tourists about her early life in the area, lost to a cruel, bygone era. I can’t work out why they’re all looking down at their feet, until I realise the floor space is a giant map of the old streets that used to buzz with life a stone’s throw from where we are. Some 60,000 people were evicted from District Six when the apartheid government declared it a whites-only area in the late-1960s. Poignantly, a sign informs that most were allowed to leave with nothing more than a suitcase.   

I’m struck by a blown-up image of what was Hanover Street, the main arterial road, which the caption describes as carrying the “pulse-beat of society, the local world of haves and have-nots, the prosperous and the poor, the struggling and the idle.” It looks a bit like Buitenkant today.

A small informational display updates visitors on the status of restitution. Nothing is annotated after 1998. “There’s no political will,” replies a staff member to my question about why a quarter century has passed without progress.  

In that context, truthfully, the museum feels inadequate — an utterly small consolation. Later, homeward bound on the Philip Kgosana highway which gives a bird’s-eye view of what used to be District Six, now there’s just a vast tract of land, vacant except for scattered rudimentary shelters of homeless people and a snaking queue of parked Golden Arrow buses.

Sylvester Zanoxolo Mqeku, Triassic Pollen (Triptych).
Sylvester Zanoxolo Mqeku, Triassic Pollen (Triptych).
Image: Supplied

Chances are the entire day has passed by the time Buitenkant has been properly explored. Do not even think of braving the city centre traffic exodus any time after 4pm. Instead, head slightly off Buitenkant for a drink and an early dinner.

If you’ve ended at the Foreshore side, round the corner into Harrington Street and choose between Dias Tavern for the best Portuguese food in the city and a place to socialise well into the night, or the quiet and intimate Le Menara for fragrant Moroccan cuisine. 

If you’ve returned to the section nearest Table Mountain, take in some comforting but innovative Japanese flavours at the affordable Ramenhead, a block away. En route, as you turn off Buitenkant, if you’ve timed it well Cape Town’s best bookstore, the legendary Book Lounge, will still be open. It’s a great place to browse, to relax and reflect on the experiences of the day. 

Truth Coffee, 36 Buitenkant Street, 021-201 7000 

State of the ART Gallery, The Square, 50 Buitenkant Street, 061 129 1899

Desmond and Leah Tutu Legacy Foundation, The Old Granary Building, 11 Buitenkant Street, District Six, 021-552 7524

A4 Arts Foundation, 23 Buitenkant Street, District Six, 010 880 2595

District Six Museum, 25A Buitenkant Street, District Six, 021 466 7200

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