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There are a couple of animals you are unlikely to ever see in the wild, no matter how hot-shot your safari guide is. Close to the top of the list are wild dogs and cheetahs, both of which are fascinating in quite different ways. But just about an hour from either Johannesburg or Pretoria you can get the next best thing: a close encounter with each of these species, albeit in captivity.

De Wildt is a private research and breeding centre with, as the name would suggest, a strong focus on the fastest mammal. It also has a large number of wild dogs and assorted other strays, including a couple of cute honey badgers and some African wild cats. The latter aren’t in need of increased numbers, but there are concerns about maintaining the purity of the bloodline thanks to cross-breeding with feral domestic cats.

You won’t see a cheetah running at full tilt at De Wildt, but that’s what nature documentaries on television are for. You will get the chance to get really, really close to one of the trained “ambassador” cheetahs the centre keeps as part of its outreach. Close enough to hear it purr like the biggest kitty cat you’ve ever seen, close enough to feel its rough skin, and close enough to get a really awesome picture taken with it. The best of the ambassadors are even trained to smile for the camera. You won’t be able to buy a better souvenir anywhere, and you’ll be supporting a good cause at the same time.

Besides the close encounter session you’ll also get to take your ease on the back of the tourist snack cart (as we call the open-sided and soft-roofed vehicles used for safari tours, because of the easy access for determined predators) while seeing the rest of the inmates. The exceedingly rare king cheetah alone is worth the trip, but be sure to ask about the Anatolian guard dogs.

The whole thing, including travel from Joburg or Pretoria, will take around five hours. Just keep in mind that booking is essential because group size is strictly controlled.

De Wildt Cheetah Project
Tel: +27 12 504 1921
Cel: +27 83 675 5668
cheetah@dewildt.org.za
The centre is just outside the town of Brits, on the far side of the Hartebeespoort dam. It’s well sign-posted.
GPS co-ordinates: 25°40′39.07”S, 27°55′32.01”E

On the whole us South Africans are a broad-minded bunch, easy to talk to and slow to anger. But if you have any intention of engaging in politically-themed small talk – especially in a pub, bar, or other environment rich in alcohol – there are a couple of subjects you should be leery of. They’re not taboo, not as such. They could just earn you an unexpected punch in the face.

For starters, don’t try to argue that Apartheid was a good idea, had positive consequences or was in any other way laudable. Not even to make a point, not even as a joke, and certainly not to try and stimulate conversation. White people will become sullenly unhappy with you in embarrassment, and no court in the land wouldn’t accept the excuse of undue provocation should a black man lift a hand to you.

Speaking of men, you insult women at your peril. Do not belittle their intelligence, their physical abilities or their bravery. We have our fair share of misogynists, like any other place on earth, but they gather in small, secret groups and keep their voices low. The average South African woman can, and will, beat you up. Depending on culture and weight class the attack may range from the business end of a stiletto wedged in your ear to an open-handed slap that could break your neck, but it will be unpleasant regardless.

Another topic to avoid is government corruption, especially when the company is overwhelmingly white and/or middle class. The danger here is that, once you get them started, these people will never, ever shut up. Resentment of the incompetence and malfeasance of public servants is limitless. Tap into this reservoir or bile and anger at your peril.

On the sporting front you are relatively safe. We are tolerant of those who do not support our own provincial or club teams, and gently amused rather than angry when foreigners fail to see the clear superiority of our imaginatively-named national soccer, cricket and rugby teams. Just do not, under any circumstances, cheer an Australian sporting squad. Down that road only severe physical mutilation awaits you.

South Africa has a force of dedicated traffic-law enforcers. We don’t hold with the model of the American sheriff, who can go straight from arresting armed robbers to writing out parking tickets. Around here a real cop is unlikely to pull you over for a traffic offence, unless you are wildly firing an automatic weapon into the air at the same time.

As for the traffic specialist, we not entirely sure what they do all day long, but here’s a hint: an ancient Afrikaans radio drama featured a character who would refer to traffic officers exclusively as “die Ridders van die Skadubome, which translates as “the (knightly) Order of the Shady Trees”. Most South Africans just refer to them as “speedcops”, because when ever so rarely spotted in the wild they are invariably manning radar speed traps. Mundane tasks, such as directing traffic when traffic lights fail at a major intersection during rush hour, are apparently beneath their dignity. And the danger of enforcing such silly rules as driving on the right side of the road (which, like all civilised countries, is the the left side of the road) among the drivers of minibus taxis, that is clearly beyond their pay grade.

So basically, don’t fret. You can do just about anything you like in your hot rented wheels. “No U-Turn” signs are for decorative purposes only, you can overtake wherever you see fit and posted speed limits are more of a suggestion than a rule. There are certain places infected with fixed-position speed traps, such as the stretch of highway between Cape Town city and the Cape Town International Airport. However, these will only get you slapped with a fine of a couple of hundred rand, which your rental company will happily settle on your behalf in return for a small handling fee.

This also holds for street parking. Especially in Cape Town and Johannesburg you will find that some popular restaurant-rich areas have inadequate parking. At night, in these areas, little things like no-parking signs and yellow lines are casually ignored, and nobody cares. As long as you aren’t actually blocking traffic from flowing at all, and you aren’t preventing another car from exiting, you can park pretty much where you please. The odds that you’ll get busted are miniscule.

Seeing this kind of behaviour by the locals often leads to over-confidence among first-time visitors – and that can be a fatal mistake. If you take this casual attitude within the walls of a private parkade at a mall, airport or stadium, you will very soon pay the price.

Just about all of the parking you use in South Africa will be private, even though the outdoor areas at shopping malls can often be free. By stark contrast to government traffic enforcers, the guardians of these private patches are a fierce, watchful and vengeful race. They glory in your anguish, and their favourite instrument of pain is the wheel clamp. Park anywhere outside of a designated parking spot, or dare to enter the hallowed ground of a parking bay reserved for the disabled, and brightly-coloured jaws of immobility will swiftly be attached to your rental.

That kind of thing can seriously ruin your day. The whole point of the wheel clamp is that its wielder need not hang around to await your return. You could well spend hours tracking down the correct official and negotiating your vehicle’s release. This will entail grovelling and the payment of a fine considerably more steep than that for breaking the speed limit on a national highway. Try to remove the clamp yourself instead and you face arrest for damage to property.

Take our word for it; you are better off spending the time to find a legitimate parking bay. The guardians of parking do not mess about.

It’s as fake as a very fake thing indeed, but that is the perverse charm of the Mama Tembos restaurant – and the whole reason why we point photo-hungry tourists there.

See, not everybody is cut out for a real township tour. And that’s okay, really. Most of us don’t go to Europe and then seek out the poor and dirty neighbourhoods either. Many of us don’t even visit the site of a former Nazi concentration camp, because on some holidays you don’t want to be weighed down with the miseries of the past. You just want Disney World: sanitised, mindless, and ever-so-superficially happy.

That just about sums up Mama Tembos. It’s right in the heart of Linden, an upper middle-class suburb where the cars are shiny and the gardens filled with trees. It’s actually right across the road from a small television production facility. But it pretends really hard to be straight from the township, at least in terms of decor.

The decor is, of course, fake. So is the the menu, which features items with names that reference popular soccer teams and not-so-popular politicians, except the average township tavern has never heard of prawns (and doesn’t sell a lot of premium steak either).

All of which is just perfect. There isn’t a single thing on the menu that is even exotic, never mind gross. The service is good, and in English, and the kitchen is free of gut-rotting bacteria and the stench of the final bowel movements of freshly slaughtered animals. The bathrooms have running water. And you know what? Your friends back home will never be able to spot the fake decor in the background to your awesome pictures. To all intents and purposes you’d have been on that mandatory township tour, at least as far as any of them will ever know. It can be our little secret, promise.

Think of it this way: when you go to the medieval-themed castle in Disney World you don’t have skewered heads on display or diseased men pissing in the corners. Sometimes sanitised is good.

Mama Tembos
Cnr 4th avenue and 7th street, Linden
Johannesburg
Tel: 011 912 7770
www.mamatembo.co.za