backtosa.com

12.35 22 April 2009
I am in queue to vote.
It's overcast and muggy here in Cape Town. The elderly lady behind me said she hadn't voted for a long time and only seemed mildly phased at the long queue. Someone walking by said it took 1.30 hours and just then a election official came and escorted the elderly people to the front of the queue.

It's not who to vote for, but who to vote against;
So how should a good democrat, of whatever political persuasion, vote in this coming election? The choice that lies before us is not to find the right person, isolate the set of policies we support, identify the political party to vote for. That is what we usually think of at election time.
This article is from the CAPE TIMES Friday 17th April 2009

by Mike Morris Professor, School of Economics, University of Cape Town, and School of Development Studies, University of KwaZulu-Natal.

Issued by the Cape Town Municipality Communication Department, 31 March 2009.

When in Johannesburg recently for a night I was dragged, just about kicking and screaming, to Moyo in the Market Theatre Complex in Newtown.

What an eye opener! No more kicking and screaming from me. I kicked and screamed (almost) because I had not been in Newtown for years and years and in my head it was still such a scary part of town.

I have been asked so may times what I miss about London. After nine and half years there I know I must miss some things but I just couldn

There Was A Goat
Coming soon: Review of this powerful exploration of the backstory of the confusing and devastating testimony of one bereaved mother at the Truth Commission

Please write and let us know about your favourite African book
Some of our favourites African books are:

The Scramble for Africa
by Thomas Pakenham

Balkanology, a Cape Town-based collective bringing the madness of Balkan Gypsy music to Africa.

Massive, manic parties where DJ's and musicians perform a remixed fusion of Gypsy, Serbian, Macedonian, Bulgarian and Romanian melodies. It's the biggest Balkan party in South Africa ... It's the only Balkan party in South Africa.

Bettina (

(Repeat) from the beginning

Finding order in chaos, now that is something I relate to.
Living in South Africa, one is never really sure how long we can hope to find order in the chaos. That the order exists at all seems miraculous and it can be beautiful and astonishing ... at times a revelation. This experience is so poignantly reflected in the Kentridge exhibition at the Goodman Gallery in Woodstock.