South Africa III - Robben Island

Robben Island is named for the Dutch word for seal. It is about 12km off the harbour in Table bay and has a long history as both prison and leper colony. It was closed in 1996 and turned into a museum. To get there requires a choppy ride in mid sized ferry, followed by a bus tour of the village and grounds surrounding the prison grounds and the quarry where prisoners worked. There is also a walking tour of the prison grounds. Both are led by tour guides who were former inmates of the prison.

The grounds are desolate with little vegetation. The tour guide mentioned that this was not the case during his term of imprisonment, he said that after the prison closed in '96 some of the guards set their rabbits lose and they have since done what rabbits are good at and now the grounds are littered with rabbit warrens. (All of the tour guides were former political prisoners, they were mixed at first with the "conventional" prisoners and suffered abuse both physical and sexual abuse often at the direction of the guards. However, the political prisoners soon began to increase their influence over the other prisoners as educators and were separated).

This is the only shelter in the quarry where earlier prisoners were forced to work. The cave was their only shelter and the tour guide dubbed it the first campus of the African National Congress. It was here that Mandela and others gathered and educated each other and laid the groundwork for the leadership that would assume control of South Africa after the fall of Apartheid.

This were the beds the prisoners were afforded after the Red Cross was given access to the prison.

These were the beds the prisoners were afforded before.

This was the cell were Mandela spent most of his 27 years of imprisonment.

When the tour ended, we had about twenty minutes to wait until the ferry left. So I went back through the prison grounds on my own. It was practically deserted being between tours and I was shocked at how small it was. I came across this painted on the back of one of the prisoner's quarters, I found it strikingly ironic...on too many levels to mention here.