Culture

Recent Stories

Steve KretzmannSo that was the festive season, then. Jirre! Back at work but at least a paycheque has landed and we still have weekends and a lingering sense of what might be possible. Music If you’re fast enough, you can catch local jazz maestro Hilton Schilder playing a solo gig at Natural Mystic (92 – 94 … Read more [...] Read more...

Cape Town not immune to Los Angeles type fire disaster

Steve KretzmannThe city has better preventative measures but is far less resourced than Los Angeles A devastating fire, such as the one that has raged in Los Angeles over the past two weeks, could occur in Cape Town, say experts. In Los Angeles, a hot summer and autumn combined with an unusually dry winter, led to … Read more [...] Read more...

Milnerton Lagoon still stinks

Steve KretzmannYears after the City of Cape Town was ordered to clean it up, residents say the smell is nauseating The stench of sewage from the Milnerton Lagoon in Cape Town is nothing new, but it has been nauseating over the past weeks, say residents. This is despite the provincial government having issued the City a directive to … Read more [...] Read more...

PRASA finally signs rail deal with City

GroundUpThe Service Level Plan gives the City oversight over annual performance plans, station revitalisation, and the introduction of more train sets The City of Cape Town and the Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa (PRASA) have signed a Service Level Plan (SLP) following court action, threats of an intergovernmental dispute, and more than a year of … Read more [...] Read more...

The Meat Room: Bushveldt thriller guts apartheid’s twilight

Steve KretzmannThe fourth sentence is cliched and the second sentence has a contradiction in the tenses. This is the kind of thing that happens when you have to self publish because publishing houses don’t want to put out a book that depicts a town in Limpopo circa 1990 (when it was still the northern Transvaal) too … Read more [...] Read more...

Cars with attitude show off at Capestance

Jackie CreweOn the Cape car calendar, there are a few events that stand out as representing the local car culture on an international level. Only the Fittest is certainly one of those. Hosted by automotive cultural movement Capestance, the Only the Fittest exhibitions have developed over the past decade into a must for car fans across … Read more [...] Read more...

Dec/Jan gig guide – mense raak mal

Steve KretzmannHold on to your wallets peeps, it’s December holidays. Okay, let’s be real: you’re gonna have to shell out, but try not to hand it over to those capitalist bastards who would take the last 5c out of your credit card account and then sell your kidney to a muti mafia for the interest if … Read more [...] Read more...

De Waal Park man’s struggle to keep his beloved dogs

GroundUpThe City of Cape Town has told Clayton Smith to leave De Waal Park where he has lived for 13 years. Clayton Smith has called De Waal Park in Cape Town home for more than a decade. He lives in a small storeroom with his two dogs, Peaches and Aisha. Now they face an uncertain … Read more [...] Read more...

Deafrow blows the bass

Jackie CreweThe sound-off is a lesser-known but no less exciting aspect of the Cape Town car scene. This is a subculture in which, simply put, creative car folk build as much powerful audio equipment and power supply into a car as is humanly possible, and bring that car to ‘the lanes’, where the loudness is measured … Read more [...] Read more...

Et tu, Brut: Putting the fizz into summer

Sadé AllcockI am the first to admit I have drunk rather more MCC than the average person in the past few months. This is entirely by design; I have secretly been preparing myself for the festive season. And what a lot of preparation it has been. There is the Villiera Tradition Brut / WCC Brut (extra … Read more [...] Read more...

Rail renewal: City plan unveiled

Steve KretzmannThe City of Cape Town first suggested taking over the passenger rail network in 2017, its investigation into how it would make this work is to being presented to council Passenger rail, which should be the backbone of Cape Town’s public transport system, has been in decline for a decade under PRASA’s management, losing 159-million … Read more [...] Read more...

December gig guide – get yer bums out

Steve KretzmannSummer’s here. Get yer bums out. Matric exams are done, and although the last week or two of work is dragging on, the time to jol is now, before the Christmas family obligations drag you to the salad bar. Music Salty songstresses The Fishwives bring their blues-tinged chords and funk-fringed beatsback to Cape Town to … Read more [...] Read more...

Outlaw love

Steve KretzmannThe Western is a well-trodden genre, defined as much by place and time as by character and plot. So much part of the American myth of freedom and self-sufficiency, it is arguably become part of the United States’s propaganda arsenal. Of course, we swallow it, for the most part, probably because the story of lone … Read more [...] Read more...

City’s heating up: More trees needed

Steve KretzmannAs global temperature records continue to be broken, cities need to move fast to prevent inhabitants dying from heat stress. Planting trees seems the simplest solution. As global heating takes hold, Cape Town appears to be losing trees in the urban environment faster than they are being replaced, and the City’s Urban Forest Policy target … Read more [...] Read more...

Burning rubber gets recognition

Jackie CreweThe homegrown motorsport of spinning has gained solid traction over the past decades in Cape Town. Now, although that might be a contradiction in terms (spin is about losing traction after all) it is testament to the popularity of a motorsport that started out in abandoned parking lots and has risen to being Mzansi’s fastest-growing … Read more [...] Read more...

Teacher posts: Western Cape education department quizzed in Parliament

GroundUp“We’re not retrenching teachers. We’re reducing posts,” says WCED head The Western Cape Education Department (WCED) came under fire in Parliament on Tuesday over its plan to reduce teaching posts. In August, the WCED said the number of teacher posts would be reduced by 2,407 for the 2025 school year due to a R3.8-billion budget … Read more [...] Read more...

Picket held to support genocide case against Israel

GroundUpThe SA government is submitting evidence to the International Court of Justice to prove Israel is committing genocide in Gaza. About 50 people gathered outside the Western Cape High Court on Monday morning to support South Africa’s additional submission to the International Court of Justice (ICJ) on genocide in Gaza. Protestors braved the rain to … Read more [...] Read more...

November gig guide

Steve KretzmannIt is Halloween, brethren. Now, normally we would scoff at these northern hemisphere festivities celebrating the start of winter and the night on which the veil between the living and the dead is at its thinnest. Point of Halloween was to spiritually prepare for the fact the old and sick would likely not make it … Read more [...] Read more...

Not a lot of store in Babylonstoren’s babble

Sadé AllcockBabylonstoren has arguably become one of the most well-known and well-loved South African wine farm experiences. It boasts the full package: a winery, two restaurants, a bakery, a hotel, a host of cottages, a spa, and an impressive expanse of gardens which one can peacefully meander around. Moreover, Babylonstoren has cultivated a household brand that … Read more [...] Read more...

Skylines: seriously fly

Jackie CreweThere are certain characters on the Cape car scene who could be described as larger than life. Jonathan Schaffers is one of these people. Known on the track as Johnny 2J, he is probably best known for his red Nissan Skyline powered by a Nissan VK45 turbocharged V8 powerplant. Talk to the guys at Saldanha … Read more [...] Read more...

Deadlock on old Woodstock Hospital occupation begins to crack

GroundUpAfter seven years the City of Cape Town and the hospital occupiers are beginning to find common ground, but difficulties lie ahead By Matthew Hirsch/GroundUp In 2017 a handful of housing activists organised the occupation of the old, out-of-use Woodstock Hospital. They wanted to make a public point about what they argued was the City’s failed promise … Read more [...] Read more...

October gig guide

Steve KretzmannWoordfees, out in Stellies is wragtig impressive. It’s giving the National Arts Festival a runs for its money, and is much, much closer (but tickets are much, much pricier). Check it out if you can. Theatre An unusual love story, apparently, is It Went Above Your Head at Theatre Arts on the corner of Wesley … Read more [...] Read more...

Inner-city housing: New plan in the works

Steve KretzmannMore than 70% of all accommodation in the central city is let out to tourists. A new local spatial development framework sets out how this needs to change A new plan in the works for development of Cape Town’s inner city sets out the need to accommodate about 40,000 more residents within a greener and … Read more [...] Read more...

Court asked to compel PRASA to return belongings of foreshore land occupiers

GroundUpBut Prasa denies it did anything Attorney Jonty Cogger asked the Cape High Court on Friday to instruct the Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa (PRASA) to return the building material confiscated from 38 people who had been living on land along Old Marine Drive on the Cape Town Foreshore. Cogger is with housing activist … Read more [...] Read more...

September gig guide

Steve KretzmannJirre! It’s been a kak cold winter. En allie reën? Ny! Kannie soweesie. Spring uit! Here’s some soetlekkers to get you vuurwarm. Literature The most wonderful festival of literature, Open Book, is happening this month. Taking place over three days, from 6 – 8 September, at the Homecoming Centre on Harrington Street, it’s a programme … Read more [...] Read more...

Foreshore fracas – Prasa eviction turns violent

GroundUpElderly homeless man stabbed by guard during apparent unlawful eviction Scores of homeless people who have been living next to Old Marine Drive on the Cape Town Foreshore for about a decade had their shelters destroyed by PRASA Protection Services and contracted security guards last week. During the operation a 64-year-old man was stabbed in … Read more [...] Read more...

Rail revolution: Plans chug forward

Steve KretzmannCity transport boss is hopeful the new transport minister will support plans for Metrorail to become a municipal responsibility The newly appointed Minister of Transport, Barbara Creecy, has been “incredibly responsive” to the City of Cape Town’s request to discuss shifting the management of Metrorail from PRASA to the municipality. Mayoral committee member for urban … Read more [...] Read more...

Spectre of new hotel looms over SA’s oldest mosque

GroundUpBo-Kaap residents appeal City’s decision to approve a new six-storey development in the historic suburb By Matthew Hirsch/GroundUp A new six-storey development planned for the Bo-Kaap will significantly impact the heritage of the picturesque, historic suburb in Cape Town, say local residents. The Auwal Mosque, which is the first mosque established in South Africa, is … Read more [...] Read more...

The Ugly Noo Noo: Astounding cricket capers remain contemporary

Steve KretzmannThere were probably few, if any, people who, when they stood up to give The Ugly Noo Noo a standing ovation in the late ‘80s and early ‘90s, thought it could be even more relevant in distant 2024. After all, when Andrew Buckland wrote and performed it in 1988 it was, disguised beneath the surreal … Read more [...] Read more...

Kaapzicht: Quality Chenin without the pretension

Sadé AllcockAfter an almost two-year hiatus, your sassy inner city wine column is back. In the intervening two years adventures have been had, tales have been told, and many many bottles of wine have been drunk. Not least among them is a gorgeous Chenin Blanc from Kaapzicht. Chenin Blanc is an incredibly diverse white wine cultivar … Read more [...] Read more...