For urban South Africans – now 70 per cent of the country’s population – there’s much to celebrate this Easter because, in addition to the four-day weekend, there are two more breaks within a fortnight. On Monday 28 April, we remember the first democratic election in 1994, and in the same week is International Labour Day on 1 May, marking the strike of 1886 that shut America in a quest for better pay and conditions.
How does it make Easter special? Because in South Africa, urban growth is recent, and the bonds to rural family are strong. In black culture, the children of anyone with blood-links to your parents’ generation are thought of as siblings. Tourists making small-talk with a safari guide are surprised when asking, ‘Do you have brothers and sisters?’ and he replies, ’37’.
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