Cape Town and an episode of street crime
I got up in Cape Town on the morning after my wine tour and (after finding out where exactly in the city I was since the night before it was dark and things were somewhat hazy) I headed out to see the main centre of the city and do some shopping. Unfortunately since it was a Sunday, almost no shops were open so once I’d explored the main drag of Long street and surrounds.
The french open final was on in the afternoon and there was no way I was going to miss that with this years scenario, I stopped at the first pub on Long St not exclusively showing springbok rugby and they had it on and guinness for accompaniment.
After that thoroughly enjoyable experience I headed back towards my hostel when I had a thoroughly unenjoyable experience. Two guys walked up behind me, and started asking for money. I thought they were beggers until they got more aggressive… nope, just street robbers. At least one of them had a knife, albeit a small one and they were demanding my money. I didn’t have a backpack or any valuables with me, I haven’t carried that stuff with me anywhere in public here, so after I handed over all the cash in my wallet (luckily only about 200 rand [$25usd] ) they walked off, didn’t take my wallet which had a credit card in it also.
I’ve been aware of the crime in this country, I was just struck by the fact that this didn’t happen after dark in some remote area or poor area. This was about 4:30pm on Kloof St, a major road about a block from some trendy restaurants and some nice apartments. People frequent this street and that didn’t detour them, it’s also the route I was told by the hostel staff was safe, even after dark. Following the standard advice not to resist was damn hard, especially since they didn’t seem like tough guys and the knife was barely big enough to have done much of anything with and I still remember some of my self defense from a few years back. I guess you never know what else they have under their clothes though, the first instinct was to kick the guy with the knife somewhere very painful and run, but since I didn’t have much cash there was less of a need to risk anything. I now completely understand why I’ve seen stands with electric tasers for sale at market stalls here. I wish I would’ve had one with me to zap the bastards with. Tasers, mace, hand guns. These are all carried daily by South African people, along with surrounding their homes with barbed electric wire and 6ft brick walls to avoid becoming a victim in this high crime society. After being here for 3 1/2 weeks, and not just due to being robbed, I’m sold on these being a necessity here, not an over reaction like I first thought. It’s sad and a statement on the state of the country here, but if I was living here I’d be doing exactly the same.
Tags: South Africa, Travel
Adam
I’m glad you didn’t do anything because even if you had tased the guy with the knife, the other one could have caused just as much damage, or even worse while you were distracted. The only safety is in numbers, and not just 3 or 4.
I hope this doesn’t deter Zoots, although you should definitely recommend the taser to him when he gets there!
happiness is a warm taser?
Pft, what you need is a pocket ninja!
I’m glad nothing too valuable was stolen. And I suppose you can just consider a component of a complete SA experience? huzzah