Freedom in the air on Athlone’s liberation route
A tour of the suburb’s political and cultural sites provides a view of SA’s divided and violent past
As I unpack a dusty storage box of bulky video cassettes shot by former news cameraman Jimi Matthews, memories of Cape Flats youngsters fighting street battles with apartheid police in the 1980s spill out — along with a scuttling spider and evidence of a gecko inhabitation.
Two decades of Matthews’ footage pass through my hands after overseas documentary filmmakers ask me to catalogue his work. Months later the job is done but the adrenaline of that highly politicised era lingers in my memory like dynamite residue. That’s why, when a notification from Culture Connect pops up on my screen advertising a tour of Athlone’s political and cultural sites, I am in the mood to attend. ..
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