District Six, 51 years on
Gavin Adams shares childhood memories of growing up in a community filled with culture
MY MEMORIES of District Six about 50 years ago represent vivid pieces to a puzzle stemming from my childhood. Albeit during the grievous years of apartheid, the memories were fond ones.
My sister (Tracey) and I were born to Christian and Muslim parents in District Six, we therefore spent our childhood immersed in the rich Muslim tradition that it offered. While our parents were at work we spent much of our lives in my uncle’s (Dickie) tailor shop romping among the many rolls of suit fabric.
His wife (Farieda) was an excellent cook; she made tangy frikkadella and many other dishes on a faithful primus stove positioned on a modest kitchen table. I remember having hot condensed-milk tea with my grandmother, who spent most of the time smoking at the kitchen table.
My dad was a street-wise furniture salesman who earned a good salary and my uncle Ebrahim (also known as “Uncle Baby” because he was the youngest) was a talented photographer and artist.
So District Six did not stifle the spirit of the people; people lived their lives. District Six represented a fully-functional society – people worked, people travelled, others played sport, partied and went to the bioscope.
Dignity, sophistication and political correctness are modern-day terms; District Six housewives knew none of it; they hosted conversations from their balconies at full volume. This was part of the character of the community culture that mitigated the grievous deeds of the apartheid government.
The absence of TV and the prevalence of a state-controlled radio service meant that no politics were discussed in our homes; life as a five-year-old boy was utterly normal and it was pleasant.
The District Six Eviction: Vivid in my mind was the sombre feeling I had when I first visited the Hanover Park homes provided to my family by the apartheid government. Given the mostly derelict state of housing in District Six, Hanover Park homes at first produced a sense of pride largely because they were new.
Hanover Park in those days was quiet and safe. The old District Six culture stayed behind and was ultimately destroyed with the demolition of buildings to make way for “better aesthetics” in the Mother City.
Soon thereafter, the apartheid-style township of Hanover Park surrendered to the social ills of unemployment and gangsterism. Due to safety needs, District Six families gave up their Hanover Park homes to take up costly living arrangements elsewhere.
The former feelings of pride made way for despair and remorse.
Victims of the evictions carry a tacit sadness, too complex to articulate. Such complexity involves emotional ties that are abstract namely, the District Six community culture and the network of delicate memories grafted therein.
The pride of owning new, homes quickly soured. The evil intent of the apartheid government showed its ugly face.
Fifty-one years on, I can affirm that our government has trivialised the affliction suffered by the dispossessed families. The haphazard manner in which District Six families have been engaged has been insensitive and disingenuous. As we mark the 51st anniversary of the evictions programme, let us remember families who have taken their hopes of returning to the grave. Those who remain mourn a complex notion of what it once meant to be Capetonian.
Gavin Adams, 53, lives in Plumstead and recently completed his PhD in Human Resource Development. He shares his memories as tomorrow marks the 51st anniversary of District 6 being declared a “Whites Only” area.