Throughout the 1980s and 90s events at home ranging from student and faculty led protests on college campuses like Vassar and Amherst and the divestment movement, to the shout outs to freedom fighters like Steven Biko and Winnie Mandela — as well as the name of Nelson Mandela’s South African township, Soweto, in hip-hop songs, left an indelible sense of solidarity with many generations of Americans.
Visiting South Africa now is particularly thrilling as the country just celebrated Nelson Mandela’s centenary. Widely referred to by his tribal honor title of Madiba, Mandela, the nation’s first black president, passed away in 2013 at the age of 95. He would have turned 100 in December 2018.
In the early 1990s, the African National Congress (ANC), with the aid of international solidarity movements, was successful in overturning the apartheid government of South Africa. Mandela, whose freedom had long been sought by African Americans and others, was triumphantly welcomed in the United States.
The South African government took this opportunity to commemorate Mandela’s life and legacy with a series of events, exhibitions, and performances designed to foster a more inclusive society that promotes diversity and social justice. There’s something incredibly powerful about visiting these locations in real life.
Stop at Apartheid Museum (below) in Johannesburg to learn more about that era of South African history.
There are few world leaders as revered as the late Mandela, who served as president from 1994-1999 after being imprisoned for nearly 30 years and spending much of his life as an enemy of the state for his efforts against apartheid. Mandela’s legacy informs the nation’s modern identity, indeed even their current constitution (which enshrines LGBTQ equality, including the right of marriage) was adopted during his administration.
Children perform traditional Zulu dances in the township of Soweto outside of Johannesburg (above).
Johannesburg (below) with its post industrial buildings, popular markets, and art and fashion scenes has a very western Williamsburg Brooklyn feel to it.
South Africa is also currently reaping the benefits of the “Wakanda Effect,” via the popularity of the Marvel Studio hit Black Panther.
The Real South Africais a (U.S.-based) tour operator that has begun using 844-WAK-ANDA as its contact number to capitalize on the connections between the film and the nation.
Although very little of the footage was shot in South Africa, much of the film’s fictional country of Wakanda borrows from South Africa’s history.
The hero’s journey of King T’Challa (played by actor Chadwick Boseman) parallels that of Shaka kaSenzangakhona (known in the west as Shaka Zulu) one of the most influential chieftains of the Zulu Kingdom who has achieved near mythological status.
The citizens of the fictional country of Wakanda speak the Bantu language of the Xhosa, which was Mandela’s tribe as well as that of comedian Trevor Noah host of The Daily Show.
Noah’s autobiography Born a Crime is an excellent primer for anyone visiting.
Mandela’s struggles against oppression are seen by the country’s LGBT community as paralleling their own on-going efforts for true equality and protection from discrimination.
Above: Surfer heading into the mist—Capetown, South Africa
Still, lingering stigmas, about both being gay and the African continent, persist. GayNrd journeyed to South Africa for the centenary celebrations and spoke to three individuals battling those stigmas every day: actor Given Stuurman, travel advisor Jason Fiddler, and writer Rehana Rossouw.
A YOUNG ACTOR WITH A POWERFUL PLATFORM AND VOICE
South African actor Given Stuurman played a gay teen for the the first time on the South African version of MTV Shuga.
But even as they were filming his storyline, the producers were aware that much of Stuurman’s part would end up on the cutting room floor — at least for a version distributed to many African nations — because of anti-LGBT sentiment on the continent.
“In most African countries it is illegal to be gay,” Stuurman explains. “To be safe, we produced two versions of Reggie’s story: one, the original story is Reggie’s story of coming out and being gay, and the second story is a pan-African version for all the other countries and has Reggie not coming out, but has a metaphorical feel to it.”
At 23-years-old, Stuurman is already a veteran actor of 18 years. He caught the acting bug when he was only 5 as an audience member on a youth drama kids show on television in South Africa called Yo-TV.
“One day someone came up to my mother and suggested that she should get me an acting agent because I seemed to be very comfortable in front the camera,” he recalls. His mom eventually did find him an agent, and he’s been getting gigs since. He’s appeared on TV shows like Scout’s Safari and Tshisa, and movies like Straight Outta Benoni and Invictus. A bit unknown in the U.S., he’s a bonafide star in South Africa.
On Shuga, Stuurman’s Reggie explores his masculinity and sexual identity as a young teen living in South Africa. The role gave the actor insight into perceptions around LGBT issues. As a result, Stuurman has become a thought leader and made invaluable contributions to queer issues within the country. He says South Africa’s constitution, created in 1996 after apartheid ended, is one of the best, and one of the first in the world to legalize same-sex marriage, making modern South Africa one of the world’s most progressive nations — at least on paper.
“It’s implemented, but there’s a big gap between implementing constitutions and laws and society accepting them and following them,” Stuurman says. “Yes, it’s fine for a woman to marry another woman and a man [to marry] another man, but you still must face those social stigmas. That’s another discussion we can have on the show, because the law will not be there to protect you against discrimination in public.”
He says the environment for same-sex couples varies.
“Yes, in certain places in the country people are quite liberal and even open-minded in sub-rural and suburban areas,” Stuurman admits. “But homophobia is real and alive in many parts of Africa. This external reality reflects the internal struggles that Reggie goes through in terms of coming out.”
The show’s title, Stuurman points out, is “Nigerian slang. Someone explained that ‘shuga’ represents material things, because a lot of sexual issues revolve around material needs in Africa. For instance, we have this thing called sugar daddies in places where sugar represents sex.”
Stuurman researched the role extensively, and although much of the character had been fleshed out prior to filming, it was his job to bring Reggie to life. He says he wanted to do it in a way that didn’t disrespect or offend anyone to give “a new-found light to the community.”
Like his character in Shuga, Stuurman also grew up in Johannesburg, South Africa. However, “Reggie lives in a fictional township outside of Johannesburg. The show is shot in Johannesburg and Soweto. So we created a fictional township, so we don’t get any backlash troubles about why we created this character in Soweto.”
The show has other concerns American TV shows don’t.
“One of the other issues we have had with gay characters in South African media is that they are often represented stereotypically,” Stuurman observes. “They tend to paint the community, especially men, with just one brush. For a man in the LGBTQ community, you must be flamboyant.”
Stuurman says that his generation of South Africans are known as Born Free. He describes “Born Frees” as the post-apartheid and post-Nelson Mandela generation. “[I] was born free in 1994,” Stuurman says. “Our parents literally had two options when it came to freedom: social freedom and political freedom.” Now, young people are demanding more, protesting over lingering economic disparities and racial injustices.
“We, the Born Frees, only grew up knowing this democracy. We are able to be in social environments that our parents have never been in. We have been exposed to economic things our parents have never seen. For us, we understand the importance of Mandela — he gave us our democracy. But as we look more deeply, systemically, economically, and socially — nothing has really changed for us.”
What does it really mean? Stuurman asks rhetorically. “Mostly, that politicians are propagating my phone with all these messages about this and that, but there is nothing that they are really doing in my life directly.”
Above: Street art, Johannesburg
Stuurman explains the youth in his country are discouraged by the slow pace of change, and the continued economic and social disparities facing black people.
“They know of Mandela but… they don’t know what he is doing for us now. Although they are aware Mandela is dead, they are essentially asking, ‘What has he done for us lately?’ When it comes down to it. most of the unrest among youth in the country is the realization that when you’re broke and hungry, what does that mean? You can’t eat democracy.”
Jason Fiddler who founded South Africa’s first LGBT travel agency, Pinq Travel, met me on the roof deck of the Southern Sun Elangeni & Maharani hotel (above) overlooking Durban’s beach—which had the most beautiful sunrise I have ever seen.
“Durban’s famous for its sunrises and Cape Town for the sunsets,”
What makes South Africa so wonderful to visit, he adds, is the fact that the country “has dozens and dozens of African, Asian, and European cultures that melded with the African veld, brought their cuisine and faiths and words to this tip of the continent, and fused them into a truly unique and engaging cultural identity.”
Above: Various Rand notes, South Africa’s currency
In sharp contrast to the rest of the African continent, South Africa’s constitution ensures LGBT equality. That isn’t always reflected in daily life, but Fiddler argues most tourists won’t encounter issues. He explains:
“The occurrences of LGBT discrimination in South Africa are predominantly found in the poor slums, townships, and rural villages where apartheid’s legacy of poverty and inequality remain a potent encouragement of patriarchy; a toxic masculinity that sees strong women, and lesbians especially, as a direct threat that, sadly, often leads to violent confrontation.”
After 20 years in the tourism industry, Fiddler says, “I can confidently say that very, very few instances of visitors experiencing overt homophobia have occurred in South Africa. The LGBT tourists whom I have spoken to have experienced predominantly warmth and acceptance in their travels across the countryside and in cities.”
Above: Capetown at night.
ONE OF SOUTH AFRICA’S MOST CRITICAL LGBT VOICES
Renowned South African journalist Rehana Rossouw, is a Black lesbian and author of New Times, a bestselling novel here. It takes place during the Mandela years and speaks to some of the missteps made then, that still reverberate to the present.
Rossouw agrees with newer, younger, political parties who believe that Mandela sold them out. Rossouw says Mandela shot down South Africa’s dreams for an equal society and chose policies that led to the economic disaster South Africa is mired in today.
“I was a reporter covering Parliament during his presidency and saw how Mandela dismantled his party’s Reconstruction and Development Program intended to ensure a decent life for all and replaced it with a policy that led to massive unemployment and astounding inequality. I saw how much effort he put into appeasing white South Africans; and how he largely ignored poverty, AIDS and corruption.”
However she adds: “I am married to a white woman, and we would not have been able to live together in the same house during apartheid, let alone love each other. There were laws forbidding both practices.”
Legislation forbade LGBT love under apartheid, but Rossouw knew many couples who lived openly together by the 1980s, the last decade under the segregation. There were apartheid laws that prohibited love across color and those laws applied to everybody, queer or straight.
Rossouw recalls:
“Most of my teenaged dancing and pool playing were in gay clubs in Cape Town. I was a fag hag and a Madonna whore. I didn’t dress like my idol [though], strictly jeans and T-shirt with a slogan. My fondest desire was that Madonna… adopts me!”
Photo above: A drone view of Sunday’s sunset on Clifton 4th Beach, Cape Town, South Africa.
Nowadays, the author says there are ongoing efforts to increase tolerance and acceptance of LGBT people and same-sex relationships in South Africa.
“Gay couples can marry and adopt, use sperm banks and surrogates, get paid maternity and paternity leave, and have spousal inheritance and citizenship rights. We also grant refugee status to people who have been stigmatized and persecuted because of their sexual orientation. But there is stigma, fanned by Pentecostal churches and some traditional leaders.”
Still, she has never had to disguise her love for wife Julia Grey:
“Our honeymoon was a year-long drive through Africa. We celebrated our anniversary in a lodge in Uganda, ranked as one of the most homophobic countries in the world. The staff set up a table for two above the forest and under the stars. The people we met in Uganda welcomed us, cared for us, and fretted when they waved goodbye to two women driving through Africa with no men—and without their father’s permission!”
