MyJHB

Stuff from Johannesburg

Loss Making Air Peace Eyes Weird Global Expansion

Johannesburg in the news:

  1. Loss Making Air Peace Eyes Weird Global Expansion: If you have heard about Air Peace then you might be interested to learn that in June the carrier will begin flight operations to Johannesburg, South … – Google Alert – Johannesburg
  2. Gauteng metros hit with water restrictions: Residents in high-lying areas in the City of Johannesburg, Ekurhuleni and Tshwane will from Saturday experience a reduced water supply, Rand … – Google Alert – Johannesburg
  3. Pandor: 'Let's wait on the president to announce Cabinet': JOHANNESBURG – Higher Education Minister, Naledi Pandor is neither denying nor confirming if she's been offered the position of deputy president. – Google Alert – Johannesburg
  4. Western Sahara: President of Republic Arrives in South Africa to Take Part in Inauguration of …: Johannesburg (South Africa) — President of the Republic, Secretary-General of the Frente POLISARIO, Brahim Ghali, arrived in South African city of … – Google Alert – Johannesburg
  5. Cyril Ramaphosa is officially the president of SA: JOHANNESBURG – Cyril Ramaphosa has officially taken the oath of office as president of South Africa in front of a crowd of thousands, including … – Google Alert – Johannesburg

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Have you tried: Travelling to South Africa?

Did you know this about Johannesburg? Stone-walled ruins of Sotho–Tswana towns and villages are scattered around the parts of the former Transvaal in which Johannesburg is situated. Many of these sites contain the ruins of Sotho–Tswana mines and iron smelting furnaces, suggesting that the area was being exploited for its mineral wealth before the arrival of Europeans or the discovery of gold. The most prominent site within Johannesburg is Melville Koppies, which contains an iron smelting furnace.

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From Sophiatown to Triomf

By 1963, Sophiatown had been physically razed to the ground. In a final act of psychological warfare, the government built a white working-class suburb over the rubble and named it Triumph (Triomf). They wanted to erase the very memory of Sophiatown from the landscape. For decades, the name Sophiatown disappeared from maps, replaced by the neat, sterile streets of the victors.

The “resurrection” of Sophiatown began officially in 2006, when the City of Johannesburg formally restored the original name to the suburb. Today, the neighborhood is a quiet, leafy residential area, but the ghosts of the “Paris of the Transvaal” are everywhere. The Sophiatown Heritage Centre, housed in the former home of Dr. A.B. Xuma (a former ANC president), is one of the few original buildings that escaped the bulldozers. Walking through the streets today, you can still find small markers of the past: a lone Victorian pillar, a specific tree mentioned in a poem, or the rebuilt St. Joseph’s Church.

The legacy of Sophiatown is not just one of tragedy, but of an indestructible cultural spirit. The music, the slang (Tsotsitaal), and the “Drum” era aesthetic continue to influence South African fashion and film today. It serves as a reminder that while you can bulldoze a house and rename a street, you cannot kill the soul of a place that once danced to the sound of a thousand saxophones.