This Saturday, we went on a field trip to the Lwandle Migrant Labour Museum. Lwandle was supposed to be a hostel that accommodated 500 males who migrated to this area to get jobs. Gradually, more and more women and children began living there, but police raids were brutal in removing them. Eventually the hostels were taken down, save for one, and the area turned into low income housing.
A museum was erected in the old town hall; it is very unusual to have a museum in the middle of a township. Lwandle now has a library and schools, but the area is visibly very poor. Seeing pictures of places like this is nothing compared to walking around in it. The devastation and frustration that conditions have not changed much since apartheid were evident.
