Last weekend we traveled to !Khwa ttu, a San cultural heritage center about an hour north of Cape Town on the coast of the western Cape. The center is dedicated to teaching visitors about the culture and history of the San people, ongoing cultural preservation initiatives, language preservation projects, and sustainable tourism. The San are one of the last remaining hunter-gatherer tribes on the planet and have been marginalized throughout history as colonialism took hold in southern Africa. The San have been exoticized by Western visitors and are ironically the most documented indigenous peoples in history, yet don’t have access to the research done on their own peoples since it has never been published in their own language. The center gives San people an opportunity to tell their story in their own words for the first time, and is intentionally not a museum but a living cultural center to represent that the San are still very much a part of the cultural fabric of southern Africa.
We spent the morning learning the clicks in the San language, going on a mini game drive with a guide to see their herds of eland, springbok, and zebra on campus, and visited a reconstructed San village to learn about traditional crafts and ways of life in more traditional villages that still exist around the continent. For lunch we sat down to eland burgers and rooibos tea in front of the fire. We tried medicinal tea that they source from the garden on campus before heading down for a chilly and rainy braai prepared by our hosts.
It was an adventure in the chilly weather but we spent the night in safari-style tents and woke to a clear, dewy morning.
From !Khwa ttu we drove south to Muizenberg, a small beach town south of Cape Town known for its calm water and continuous waves. We donned wet suits and went out for a surfing lesson with professional guides and are proud to say that by the end of the hour everyone was able to hop up and ride in!
Now we’re heading out on safari, so stay tuned for more on our return!
— Anna & Peter
