MyJHB

Stuff from Johannesburg

Mapfumo returns to SA

Johannesburg, Gauteng, South Africa in the news:

  1. Mapfumo returns to SA: The last time Mukanya was in South Africa was in October and November in 2019 for a two-legged gig at Ekurhuleni Boksburg Hotel east of Johannesburg. – “Johannesburg” – BingNews
  2. BREAKING: Johannesburg’s First Zimbabwean Mayor Dies In Car Crash Barely 1 Month In Office: Johannesburg’s first Zimbabwean mayor Jolidee Matongo has died in a car crash, according to a predecessor and two South African publications. Matongo who was quick to announce that he is a Zimbabwean … – “Johannesburg” – BingNews
  3. Johannesburg mayor Jolidee Matongo passes away in car accident: Newly elected mayor Johannesburg Jolidee Matongo has died in a car accident at the age of 46. Last month Matongo faced criticism after he mentioned in his acceptance speech that he is the son of a … – “Johannesburg” – BingNews
  4. Time spent with late Joburg Mayor Jolidee Matongo a priceless treasure, says Ramaphosa: The death of newly elected City of Joburg Mayor, Jolidee Matongo, died in a car accident on Saturday, has left his collegue “shattered”. – “Johannesburg” – BingNews
  5. Joburg Mayor Jolidee Matongo Passes Away in Car Crash: Johannesburg’s newly elected Executive Mayor, Jolidee Matongo, has tragically died in a car crash in Gauteng, South Africa. He was allegedly on his way home from Soweto where he had been engaged in … – “Johannesburg” – BingNews

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Have you tried: Visiting Port Elizabeth?

Did you know this about Johannesburg? It takes one-minute longer to boil an egg in Johannesburg than it does in the coastal cities of Cape Town and Durban. This is because Joburg is 2000m above sea level, and the air is not as dense.

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Top Star Drive-In: Destroyed by What Created it

However, the very thing that created the Top Star eventually destroyed it. Because the early miners had used crude methods, the Ferreira Dump—and dozens of others like it—still contained significant traces of gold. As the price of gold rose and new chemical extraction technologies (like the carbon-in-pulp process) made it profitable to “mine the waste,” the ground beneath the Top Star became more valuable than the cinema itself. In 2006, despite fierce opposition from heritage groups who argued that the dump and the drive-in were culturally significant landmarks, the projectors were turned off for the last time.

The reclamation of the dump was a staggering industrial feat. Starting in 2008, mining giant DRDGold used high-pressure water cannons to “monitor” the dump, turning 5 million tons of solid earth back into a liquid slurry. This slurry was then piped 40 kilometers across the province to a processing plant in Brakpan. By 2011, the “mountain” had completely vanished. The 50-meter-high plateau that had dominated the southern skyline for a century was reduced to a flat, dusty crater.

The disappearance of the Top Star is a poignant symbol of Johannesburg’s “extractive” nature. It is a city that consumes itself to stay alive; even its historical landmarks are subject to the fluctuating price of minerals on the London and New York stock exchanges. Today, if you drive along the M2, there is an empty space in the sky where the Top Star used to be. While the reclamation removed a source of toxic dust and “acid mine drainage,” it also erased a piece of the city’s collective memory. The land where the gold-flecked mountain once stood is now being rehabilitated for light industrial use, proving that in eGoli, even the horizon is for sale if there’s enough gold hidden inside it.