And indeed, beyond a couple of hungover Americans, there wasn't a white face to be seen. The church group bussed in from the Cape Flats, the families picnicking in the shade on the mountain slopes, the wedding parties rolling up in kilometers of tulle and tafetta for photographs, the children's birthday parties racing up and down the stairs... reflected a celebration of the spectrum from whipless mocha to double espresso. Not a fleck of cream, beyond the three sunburnt Americans who took their photos and then left, leaving the monument (erected in celebration of imperialism) to the colonised.
Carnivorous Cow muttered into her Gauteng earring in bemusement. Behind her the stone edifice, built to commemorate that servant of imperialism whose statue oversees the mowing of the rugby fields here, resounded with the enthusiastic harmonies of some christian church group. Before her, the neo-classical lions stretched out in feline indolence and the rider and horse twisted in erotic extension as the Cape Flats baked in the spring sunshine. Her friend asked languidly, "Do you think they'll ever rename the Hottentots Holland?" but her attention was elsewhere. "Gramsci," she chuckled, "who do you think old Cecil John had in mind as his heirs when he left his slice of empire to the citizens of Cape Town?"
And indeed, beyond a couple of hungover Americans, there wasn't a white face to be seen. The church group bussed in from the Cape Flats, the families picnicking in the shade on the mountain slopes, the wedding parties rolling up in kilometers of tulle and tafetta for photographs, the children's birthday parties racing up and down the stairs... reflected a celebration of the spectrum from whipless mocha to double espresso. Not a fleck of cream, beyond the three sunburnt Americans who took their photos and then left, leaving the monument (erected in celebration of imperialism) to the colonised.
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