South Africa’s Big Three Cities
byDavid Cogswell/
随着旅行者对文化的沉浸感越来越感兴趣,许多南非的游客正在超越荒野的五大游客到南非丰富的城市文化中的三大:开普敦,约翰内斯堡和德班。
南非标准的介绍性游览包是开普/克鲁格行程,该行程在一周内提供了南非体验的快照横截面。它包括在开普敦的四个晚上,在克鲁格国家公园的一个野生动物园旅馆或另一场比赛预备役中进行了两个晚上。它在一个为期一周的假期的逻辑中提供了这个国家的味道。但是一个星期真的太短了,甚至无法获得最少的南非体验。
Tour operators offer the one-week packages to hook clients on South Africa, knowing that most travelers who experience a taste of it will want to come back. “The first time they come for the animals,” they say. “Then they come back for the people.”
开普敦is South Africa's most international city. Photo: Shutterstock.com.
开普敦
开普敦is so popular, it almost needs no introduction. South Africa’s most international city often tops lists of hot international destinations. Photographs of Cape Town show the picturesque port city at the foot of the staggering landscape of Table Mountain, which looms over the city and dwarfs it.
似乎几乎每个人都喜欢开普敦。它有海滩,近400年的殖民历史和建筑,以及活泼的城市文化。在一个小时左右的时间内,世界上最伟大的酒庄之一。开普敦为游客提供了光荣的维多利亚和阿尔弗雷德海滨,并及其众多商店,餐馆和酒店。在短暂的渡轮中,罗本岛监狱的严峻遗址,纳尔逊·曼德拉(Nelson Mandela)被监禁了27年中的18年。
The city’s cuisine is as rich and various as its overall culture, which has marinated over centuries with a blend of cultures from all over Africa, Europe, Asia and even America. Cape Town was founded by the Dutch East India company in 1652 as a stopover point for traders traveling between the Atlantic and Indian Oceans. It is known as the Mother City because it was the beginning of South Africa as a European colony.
荷兰建立了殖民地后不久,around 1652, they started bringing people from Southeast Asia for labor, and the descendants of those people still form one of the strongest cultural presences in Cape Town. They join with indigenous Africans and Europeans to form the diverse multicultural tapestry of Cape Town.
The Afrikaans language, considered one of the newest distinct languages, grew from the mixture of people of different languages and cultures trying to communicate. The language derives from Dutch, Portuguese, native San and Khoi, English, German, French and others.
The glorious cultural blend expresses itself in all aspects of culture in Cape Town, including architecture, cuisine, fashion, visual and plastic arts, and music and the performing arts, which appear in a rich panorama to the visitor to Cape Town.
约翰内斯堡的天际线。照片:Wesley Lazarus / Shutterstock.com.
约翰内斯堡
While no one can say that Cape Town is not deserving of its star status, it is true that Johannesburg is often overlooked because it stands in Cape Town’s shadow. But Joburg, or Josie, is worthy of a great deal of attention in its own right.
In the 1880s, gold was discovered in the Witwatersrand Basin, and a mining camp was set up to accommodate miners during the ensuing gold rush. It turned out to be one of the wildest gold rushes in history, with 40 percent of the gold mined in the history of the earth coming out of what became known as the Rand.
Much of the story of modern South Africa grows out of that gold rush, with people converging from all over the world to try to get a piece of the action and become gold magnates. The mines produced unprecedented wealth, but required hard labor, and the efforts of the mining companies to recruit labor from the native populations laid the groundwork for the economic and class struggles that characterized the strife-ridden evolution of Johannesburg from a mining camp to a vast, powerful metropolis in a century of meteoric growth.
约翰内斯堡的历史比开普敦的历史要短得多,而且它不能与开普敦无与伦比的风景优美的美景相匹配,但乔布尔(Joburg)提供了很多东西。约翰内斯堡是南部非洲的商业中心。它是许多国际公司的非洲总部,作为强大的经济引擎和建立在纳尔逊·曼德拉(Nelson Mandela)的彩虹民族理想中的充满活力的新民主的首都,它吸引了来自广阔大陆的非洲人,他们都成为了他们的一部分它的文化景观。
尽管纳尔逊·曼德拉(Nelson Mandela)出生于东开普省,在罗本岛(Robben Island)被监禁,并在他在开普敦(Cape Town)获释后发表了第一场演讲,但他的大部分历史和职业都以约翰内斯堡及其周围的身份为中心。那是他与奥利弗·坦博(Oliver Tambo)合作建立律师事务所的地方,以及他的大部分政治活动。
Today, Johannesburg is a vital center of Pan African communities who have migrated from elsewhere in Africa and become part of its diverse international culture. After South Africa has been through difficult economic struggles, parts of Johannesburg that were in decline are now going through a period of rejuvenation. Notable among these is the Maboneng Precinct, which has become a vibrant tourist attraction, with street markets, shops, restaurants, galleries and performing art venues.
From Johannesburg, you can visit Soweto, the Southwestern Township where Nobel Prize winners Mandela and Archbishop Desmond Tutu both lived. You can even go into Mandela’s modest former home, furnished somewhat as it was when he lived there. You can tour the historic points that marked Mandela’s life and the history of the anti-apartheid movement. At the Apartheid Museum, you can take a trip through that history with large and vivid presentations of documents, artifacts and videos that bring that complex and grim history to life.
Durban, South Africa's vibrant, often overlooked city. Photo:Timothy Hodgkinson / Shutterstock.com.
Durban
如果约翰内斯堡站在开普敦的阴影下,南非的第三个主要城市必须将两者退到两者。南非在印度洋上充满活力的城市经常被忽视,这真是可惜,因为它值得站在南非城市万神殿的姊妹城市旁边。
像开普敦一样,德班拥有丰富的多元文化历史,可以追溯到非洲殖民时代的初期。葡萄牙探险家瓦斯科·达·加马(Vasco da Gama)在1497年圣诞节发现了自然港口,并将其命名为里约热内塔(Rio de Natal)或“圣诞节河”。“纳塔尔”这个名字仍然是现在被称为夸祖鲁·纳塔尔省的南非省份的一部分。德班现在是南部非洲最大,最繁忙的港口。
The city at the harbor was named Durban by the English in 1835 during their reign there. Between 1860 and 1911, many Indians were brought from India as indentured labor, creating an Indian cultural identity that remains a strong cultural component today in Durban, with the largest Indian population of any city outside of India itself.
德班的文化融合与开普敦和约伯格的文化融合不同,但同样丰富而充满活力。德班提供温暖,闷热的气候以及印度洋的许多长滩,比开普敦大西洋海滩温暖得多。它的街头市场,例如维多利亚街市场,无论是购物还是文化博物馆,都无价。
The surrounding province of KwaZulu-Natal is a richly green and fertile landscape of mountains and valleys. It has many Big Five game reserves offering safari experiences and the glorious Drakensburg Mountains for adventure. It is the historic homeland of the Zulus and offers rich historical and cultural experiences to visitors.
德班是甘地声名鹊起。他spent 20 years there and many of the historical sites of his legacy can be found in theGandhi Trail Through Durban.
Durban too often gets the short shrift, but deserves equal billing with the other two of South Africa’s urban triumvirate. It ought to be included in an exploration of the country’s urban culture.