District Six Museum, Cape Town is at 25A Buitenkant Street in the city centre.
WHEN 60,000 PEOPLE LOST THEIR HOMES | Sharon Henry
District Six Museum, Cape Town memorialises the unfair treatment of an eviction notice enforced on 60,000 people during the apartheid era in South Africa to vacant their homes. The eviction process took 11 years. The museum is used for community education so new generations can learn and know the truth about their ancestors.
“I think this is a very important museum,” Noor Ebraheim, tour guide of the District Six Museum in Cape Town, tells us, “especially for the children because they don’t know what happened – of what we went through during Apartheid years, so we have to tell the story.”
How Did Apartheid Affect South Africa?
Noor, 73, is a former resident of District Six and a founding member of the museum. He has told his story to many people from around the world including Michelle Obama, Morgan Freeman, Swedish and Spanish King and Queens, the great Nelson Mandela, and now us.
Noor has the ability to bring to life history, his passion has you hanging on every word, of an injustice that will bring a lump to your throat, highlighting the importance of museum education.
District Six Museum founding member, Noor Ebraheim is also a former resident and evictee. Now a tour guide, he’s seen here telling our group what it was like in 1966.
Grounds For Eviction – Skin Colour
The District 6 Museum building was once a church of a community in the city bowl of Cape Town.
Until the 1960’s, District Six was a thriving, mixed race neighbourhood close to the city centre where Jews, Muslims, Christians, Indians, Hindus, Africans, Portuguese, Chinese and Japanese lived as “one big happy family.”
The harmony was shattered in 1966 when the ruling National Party Government effectively issued an eviction order by declaring District Six was ‘for White People only.’ The reasons for eviction? Skin colour and ethnicity.
Life Is Unfair – Apartheid South Africa
Within the following 11 years, 60,000 people were forcibly removed from their homes, the buildings demolished.
The District Six community was moved miles away to the Cape Flats and further segregated into different townships for Coloureds, Indians and Blacks. Mixed race couples and even offspring were forced to live apart if skin colours differed.
A young man of 32 at the time, Noor tells us, “many people died of a broken heart,” from the forced eviction
Cultural Exhibition At District Six Museum
The District Six Museum exhibits are like time capsules, preserving its people and culture through collections of photos, stories and artefacts. It really gives you the feeling of the way it was in happier times.
Huge tapestries sewn by former residents hang from the ceiling and a tower stands tall made of the original street signage from the bulldozed neighbourhood – donated by the man who flattened it.
A large map painted on the floor shows the former street layout and the names of families are handwritten at locations where their homes once stood.
District 6 Museum, Cape Town is a cultural center to remember the forced removal of its former residents during Apartheid South Africa.
A map of District Six in Cape Town, how it was before the 1966 evictions. The map is displayed on the floor of the museum so visitors can ‘walk the streets’ as they were.
District Six Museum founder, Noor Ebraheim shows us a replica of a typical District Six home in the mid-sixties. Noor is a former resident and an evictee.
Museum collection of a typical 1966 home replica inside the District Six Museum.
A typical residential kitchen in District Six from 1966, recreated here in the museum.
Museum exhibits inside the District Six Museum.
Apartheid Era South Africa
“Everyone got on well in District Six and the reason – we never looked down on somebody else’s religion,” smiles Noor, “we all celebrated together, it was an amazing feeling.”
Although District Six was declared a whites-only area, no one moved in and today the area remains mostly vacant.
Cultural Museum Bringing History To Life
Noor and other former residents of District Six with land claims have been given the opportunity to move back through a government scheme to redevelop the area. “I want to come and live here again,” he says, “but it’s taking so long, this government is supposed to build 4,000 houses. For the last 15 years they’ve only built 159.”
The District Six Museum was set up post-Apartheid in December 1994 with Noor as a founding member. Its significance in remembering this event in history is monumental.
Truth And Reconciliation
“People can’t understand when I say, whatever the government did to us, we don’t hate them, we forgive them – because now we are free,” finishes Noor.
I stepped into this museum quite ignorant of the District Six story and leave with a heavy heart. As Noor said, it is important this story be passed on to future generations and never forgotten.
South African Apartheid Museum
Listening to his firsthand account is a moving experience and his forgiveness is extremely humbling. Reminds me of a Maya Angelou quote I like:
“History despite its wrenching pain, cannot be unlived, but if faced with courage, need not be lived again.”
For an easily accessible educational attraction, a visit of the District Six museum is strongly recommended. For a personal experience it’s definitely good value booking a guided tour with an ex District Six resident. Guided tours cost R45 (approx £2.60) per person and self-guided tours, R30 (approx £1.76.)
Many thanks to Cape Town Tourism for booking us on the District Six tour. Opinions, as always on this blog, are our own without bias – it was a truly memorable experience.
Voice of the people. Browsing the displays inside the District Six Museum, Cape Town.
Taken in 1967, this photo shows Noor’s parents surrounded by their children on the day his brother got engaged. Noor is second from the left. The family knew at the time this would be their last function in this house before eviction.
A ‘memory cloth’ hanging through the centre of the District Six Museum in Cape Town. The messages and writings were made by ex-residents and embroidered by female prisoners.
Much of the photographic displays on show in the District Six Museum is either donated or on loan from former residents.
Visitors browsing inside the District Six Museum, Cape Town.
The fresco wall of the museum was dedicated on Human Rights Day, 21 March 2006. The mural is dedicated to all those individuals who have made and continue to make the District Six Museum a living project.
Last year (2016) the museum commemorated 50 years since the evictions of District Six.
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