Emmanuel L.:

[crosstalk 00:01:00]

With JSE is the 10th largest stock market in the world and is the biggest market in Africa. We have the other markets in countries such as Zambia, Cairo, Morocco, Nigeria, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Namibia, but they are very small in international terms and Joburg is actually the biggest stock market in Africa. And it's quite large indeed internationally too because it's the 10th largest market. Its market capitalization, the so-called total market value, is actually worth over 700 billion Rands, which is to the order of around 200 billion US dollars. Many people have been streaming into Joburg, not only from the outlying parts of our country, but from the other African countries. So I just believe that Joburg will continue to attract people.

I think that Joburg will become the so-called melting pot just the in New York or Seoul. People come here solely for the purpose of making themselves better. Making themselves get more money, to earn money. Living and mingling with the other people. If you look at the arts and all the sport and like other things, you can see that Joburg in becoming a multi-cultural society, the people of Joburg. I believe that it's going to continue and people will come in many looking for riches because this is the way if you are to make money, this is the way the money will generally be made. Then that will be that people from various cultures will actually stream in and the way of seeing more people the other African countries coming into Joburg. Our thing is going to be in the future, it's a melting pot already of cultures. It's quite good. I like it.

Speaker 2:

Ladies and gentlemen, there's only one thing better than money is more money. I love your money lady, I love your money. Johannesburg is the most important country in the entire world man. The most cosmopolitan country in the world.

Speaker 3:

[inaudible 00:03:28] cheapest shop in the world.

Speaker 4:

[inaudible 00:03:32] Buy one and get one free. Two for 25, any two for 25 [inaudible 00:03:39].

Speaker 5:

It's the biggest bargain of your whole lifetime.

Speaker 6:

Biggest bargain of your lifetime.

Speaker 5:

[inaudible 00:03:46].

Speaker 6:

[inaudible 00:03:46].

Speaker 5:

[inaudible 00:03:46].

Collin Wright:

This is a modern international metropolis, comparable with any north American city, and that really ... it's a developed environment. So, a lot of people come here with the expectation that Johannesburg is like other experiences [inaudible 00:04:02] Africa, or elsewhere where it's a third world country. It certainly isn't. There's opportunity for structure and the city itself, but it is a first world centre living within the greater southern African third world city.

Speaker 8:

Searching for a space where I'll find sanity. Give me some time or I'll be empty. Yeah. The land of plenty. In the land of plenty, plenty, plenty.

Speaker 9:

[inaudible 00:04:31] runs away from [inaudible 00:04:32] time bomb, in the streets of the golden city, like someone in a porno movie in the land of plenty.

Narrator:

Flower power music makes up a huge multicultural audience at Vance University, the largest English-speaking university in south Africa. The university of the [inaudible 00:05:07], founded in 1922 has 18,000 students.

Speaker 11:

[foreign language 00:05:34].

Narrator:

There is a tradition of street music at markets. At [inaudible 00:05:54] a Mediterranean style village and the right of street musician plays to the shoppers and the tourists.

Speaker 11:

[foreign language 00:06:16].

Speaker 13:

[foreign language 00:06:32].

Narrator:

A cue for taxis and [inaudible 00:06:46] on a crisp, cool morning. Every day, millions of people commute from [inaudible 00:06:51] to the City of Gold, and this song by [inaudible 00:06:58] is about coming to the big city. In the shanty towns, necessity is mode of invention.

Speaker 13:

[foreign langauge 00:07:14].

Speaker 8:

Plenty, plenty, land.

Narrator:

Street poets, the [inaudible 00:08:12] surprise and inspire the passersby.

Speaker 8:

And they won't be yeah, in the land of plenty, yeah. In the land they let me, yeah. In the land, don't tempt me, don't tempt me, in the land of plenty. [inaudible 00:08:33].

Narrator:

At the [inaudible 00:08:48] in Hilbrow, the Soho of Joburg, they hop and they bop.

Back in line again, the queue doesn't seem to be getting any shorter. Over two million residents travel to the City of Gold every day. Greater Joburg, the ever-expanding business centre of South Africa, generates 43% of the country's gross domestic product, and is one of the most thriving centres of the whole of Africa.

In the exclusive suburbs of Johannesburg, they shop 'til they drop. And the Joburgs sing us, "hop 'til they drop."

Back at [inaudible 00:11:17], the entertainers swing with the kids.

Speaker 17:

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Narrator:

Once a year, thousands of Germans meet for beer and frankfurters at the German school bazaar. Fifty thousand Germans live in greater Johannesburg, and the German school has 12,000 pupils.

Speaker 14:

Land of plenty.

Speaker 15:

Land, land of plenty.

Speaker 14:

Land of plenty.

Speaker 15:

[inaudible 00:13:13] age 92 says this about voting. When I applied for my dorm pass, I made a cross. When I got married, I made another cross, and today I made what would probably be my last cross in the land of plenty.

Speaker 14:

Plenty.

Election Crowd:

[foreign language 00:13:31].

Speaker 14:

[foreign language 00:13:34].

Election Crowd:

[foreign language 00:13:36].

Speaker 14:

[foreign language 00:13:36].

Narrator:

Huh. The pied piper of [inaudible 00:13:41], is a crowd puller at an election rally at the Zu Lake. Greater Johannesburg is one of the most densely populated regions, with close to five million inhabitants in an area space 150,000 hectares.

Election Crowd:

[foreign language 00:14:12].

Speaker 21:

[foreign language 00:15:20].

Narrator:

And back at the [inaudible 00:15:24], they chop their weight away.

Speaker 21:

[foreign language 00:15:44].

Speaker 14:

A trial of the silent scream when prestige is for leaders. Where blue lagoons have [inaudible 00:16:01], but the down-trodden are congested in the land of plenty.

Speaker 22:

As we proceed around the corner, on the right-hand side is the [inaudible 00:16:10] Estate, this is the home of the [inaudible 00:16:11] family. We [crosstalk 00:16:17].

Speaker 23:

[inaudible 00:16:17] is called the Golden Highway. All these mountains that you're seeing are manmade mountains. They plant the grass on them so that the wind doesn't blow away this precious mountain. [inaudible 00:16:28].

Speaker 22:

You see a stone house, this was built in 1911 by a man as a wedding present for his wife, because she had expressed admiration for Herbert Baker's own house, a stone house, and so her fiance took note of her wishes and built something similar. Big estates [crosstalk 00:16:47].

Speaker 23:

This is where in 1952 the ANC at the very same square, that was their last meeting before they were all banished and sent to prison.

Speaker 22:

1936 for one of the founding fathers was the [inaudible 00:17:03]. It's now occupied by [inaudible 00:17:06] office furniture.

Speaker 24:

Was Mandela [crosstalk 00:17:13]?

Speaker 23:

Yes, he was out, he was president, but he wasn't then, he wasn't president by then. Yeah, I think Mr. Mandela is the third leader of the ANC. The second leader was the one who the first black to be given a Nobel Prize, [inaudible 00:17:27].

Narrator:

Well, our Suwait tour guide gives his sometimes muddled interpretation of history. President Mandela is in fact the 11th leader of the ANC.

Speaker 22:

They're coming up is [inaudible 00:17:41] house, also with columns. This was at one time the home of [inaudible 00:17:46], he ran a programme on the radio, sort of an organ programme on Sunday afternoon. Some of you may remember it. When the house was sold, the organ was also sold and it is now to be found in the Witchbank Civic Centre.

Speaker 25:

Do they like being a maid or a gardener or whatever in a white ... is that a nice job, or is it not a nice job? [crosstalk 00:18:07]

Speaker 23:

Well, it depends. A nice job is a job where you are well paid.

Speaker 25:

Yeah, and treated well.

Speaker 23:

And treated well.

Speaker 22:

When the mining company, the corner house [crosstalk 00:18:18].

Narrator:

A double decker bus trip of the houses of the rich and the famous of Joburg.

Speaker 22:

Owned by Edward Lupart. Edward Lupart was man who had a knack of obtaining concession from the government of Paul Kruger. The most important of which was the dynamite concession.

Speaker 23:

We still have some ladies who still carry some stuff on their heads, but those are some of the things that are disappearing, unfortunately. Because our ladies now are straightening up their hair, they want their hair to look like yours. And then they're paying a lot of money for that, which is just unfortunate. Some of the good things will be disappearing. Good and bad. But, seemingly they are apparently well-nourished. People we see here. [crosstalk 00:19:16].

Speaker 22:

This school was built in 1905 by the sisters of the Hurley family, a catholic order. Please note the beautiful filigree cast iron [inaudible 00:19:28]. These were ordered by catalogue. They were sold to all the colonies, all the British colonies.

Speaker 23:

Where we have a lot of hostels. Because hostel are like social-

Speaker 25:

What exactly are hostels?

Speaker 23:

Hostels are [inaudible 00:19:44] residential areas. Now, those explosive areas.

Speaker 25:

I see them there.

Speaker 23:

Yeah, you see, it's like a [inaudible 00:19:56].

Speaker 27:

[foreign language 00:20:07].

Speaker 23:

Now, there wouldn't be like this in the rural areas besides who's going to buy it?

Speaker 25:

Exactly, yeah.

Speaker 23:

You see now, here they're waiting for the people off from the trains from work and everybody. This is how they manage here.

Speaker 25:

Oh, right, they come off here. Yeah.

Speaker 24:

[inaudible 00:20:22].

Speaker 23:

These are the trains [inaudible 00:20:27] from the station into the [inaudible 00:20:30]. There are those that are just going straight. Just look at sewage as far as your eyes could see.

Speaker 28:

[foreign language 00:20:42].

Narrator:

Regular tours of Suwaitu bring tourists to see how the other half lives. Enterprising store owners sell fruit and vegetables to commuters and tourists alike. A vast expanse of matchbook houses, squatter camps and upmarket homes make up this unnaturally created town.

Speaker 23:

Once again, [inaudible 00:21:08] are forced to learn everything in Africa, and it was uncomfortable for [inaudible 00:21:14]. These are there [inaudible 00:21:16]. Now, the people at places like this that were left unattended by the government, people started moving in them and staying in them.

Now all the structure that you see on the left-hand side that were left unattended, the people that are moving in them and staying in them. The green structures are the tourist. [crosstalk 00:21:33] People on the right-hand side would be putting up second-hand clothes from [inaudible 00:21:39].

Narrator:

The musical diversity. It seems that wherever you go, they sing and make merry.

Speaker 29:

[foreign language 00:22:04].

Speaker 30:

[foreign language 00:22:40], very beautiful. I think Johannesburg long, long beautiful.

Speaker 31:

Yeah, I make these things in Zimbabwe. It's my job. There's a problem of jobs cases, so I've decided to make these bicycles in Zimbabwe then bring them here to Johannesburg and sell them for 10 dollars each.

Meryl Watson:

My name is Meryl Watson, I own a gallery called In and Out of Africa. Situated it Greenside, Johannesburg. My gallery started because I was tired of thinking that art belonged exclusively to Europe. Africa, a continent that has contributed much and has never had the recognition. I have gone for things that are very practical. As we buy from Zaire, South Africa, Zimbabwe, Nigeria, Ghana, all over Africa. I've gone to the forests, and there they make bowls for me. They also do brass work. Everything is done made by somebody and by hand, so it has a very primitive but real and beautiful appeal to it.

In Malawi they make ebony spoons for me. There's a tribe in Zaire called the Kuba tribe. There, we collect the cloth, a lot of boxes, basically all over Africa. It is interesting to know that African art is actually only found within 15 degrees north and south of the equator. This is due to the rainforests availability of wood. And there, Africans settled down and they started societies. The rest of Africa were very nomadic. You have the hunters, or you have people wanting to agriculture, but art specifically belongs to, as I said, 15 degrees north and south of the equator.

Speaker 33:

Guys, this  [foreign language 00:25:03] is from Cameroon. It's made with brass and copper. And is a soldier, so when there was going into the war, you must, if you are soldiers, you have [foreign language 00:25:21], enemy, you must bring the head, you see? It's to show really you have killed. Otherwise you are telling lies.

[foreign language 00:25:31], this, this is a maternity, when a lady cannot get baby, she go to the [foreign language 00:25:39] and they will give her the medicine. That's where they will put the meds, in here. And she will be taking this medicine until she can have birth, she can get the baby.

Narrator:

Every year, the Portuguese gather to eat chicken pera perry and sardines at the Lucito festival. The Portuguese community, which numbers over 100,000 is a strong presence in Joburg.

Traditional Zulu tribal dancing has become a commercial attraction at markets and tourist centres performed here by young city dancers who are far from their rural roots.

Speaker 34:

Johannesburg's very rich in arts, and it's rich because it has many ... it has one of the biggest concentrations of people in South Africa, and it's people from all their different backgrounds that bring their heritage into what they do in the arts. And our field is dance. We see, when we go into townships with our outreach programmes, we might see groups doing all different kinds of traditional dance, from all sorts of areas right down to [inaudible 00:27:48], even coming in from countries like Mozambique. And then we'll see groups that perhaps prefer to do the township peninsula dance, or ballroom dance. There's enormous wealth of energy that people use from all the different communities in the dance field.

Narrator:

Russian dancers a the Venetian [inaudible 00:28:16] square entertain the crowds at a cultural festival. The rainbow nation of Joburg is a cocktail of many cultures, colours, sights, and sounds. Traditional Indian dancers follow with their graceful moves and exotic costumes.

Speaker 35:

[foreign language 00:29:39].

Narrator:

PJ Powers belts it out at an election rally. [foreign language  00:29:47], the Zulu word, "be happy." And they all join in and sing and sing. Music, dancing and politics go hand in hand.

Speaker 35:

[foreign language 00:30:18]. Alright, everybody, sing it! One, two, three, [foreign language 00:31:04]. The people sing it again. [foreign langauge 00:31:14]. You can sing and dance and laugh and move, [foreign language 0:31:26].

Speaker 36:

[foreign language 00:32:11].

Narrator:

The banana boys of Joburg, the security guards which protects tourists in the city centre.

Speaker 37:

[foreign language 00:32:33].

Speaker 38:

[foreign language 00:32:36].

Speaker 39:

Stand by, stand by, [inaudible 00:32:39]. I need Bravo Market Street, 88 Bravo Market Street, nearest corner Harrison. Nearest corner Harrison, received.

Narrator:

The boys in blue catch the kooks and keep the peace.

Potgieter:

Reaction plans have been recorded, yeah? And we have not yet had one reaction more than three minutes to a complaint. Now, if that is not efficient, I do not know what is efficient, and if that does not let any businessman feel safe, and know that the police is there for him, to protect him and his property and his business.

Choir:

Unto us, a son is given, unto us, a son is given. For unto us a child is born. For unto us a child is born. Unto us a child is given, unto us a child is given. Unto us a child is born. Unto us a child is born. Unto us, a son is given, unto us, a son is given. Unto us. Unto us. A son is given. A son is given.

Narrator:

A Son Is Born resounds at centre square, sung by one of the hundreds of sweet sounding and melodious choirs which populate Johannesburg. Shopping today can be a cultural and a musical experience.

Speaker 42:

[inaudible 00:35:03].

Narrator:

Horse racing is business in Joburg, with an annual ten over of over three billion grand. Here, [inaudible 00:35:17] race course, one of 16 race courses in the country. A good day sees 25,000 race-goers. Horse racing was introduced to Joburg at the turn of the century, much to the displeasure of the then president Kruger who said, "I am perfectly well aware that one horse can run faster than another and don't need to watch a race to prove it."

Speaker 42:

[foreign language 00:35:54].

Speaker 43:

[foreign language 00:36:38].

Speaker 44:

Merry Christmas!

Speaker 45:

[foreign language 00:36:53].

Speaker 44:

And the bells play on from near and far, bringing different rhythms from different corners of southern Africa.

Speaker 45:

[foreign language 00:37:03].

Narrator:

In the Kilimanjaro, the big band's jazzing out.

They twist and they turn, and there's a big selection of things to do for the young in the City of Gold. Despite the heat, the Joburg ice rink operates 12 months a year, attracting young and old from morning 'til night. They twirl and they swirl, they slip and they trip and keep cool well away from the blazing sun.

A young city founded in 1886 is just over 100 years old. Its dramatic skyline features futuristic, mirrored skyscrapers towering over old Joburg tin-roofed shops and glossy shopping malls contrast with makeshift pavement stores.

There are some 22 museums, 30 art galleries, over 20 markets, and four million trees, many of which are in the exclusive living northern suburbs.

Miles and miles of walls with electrified fences protect lavish properties. Architecture varies from Mediterranean to cape Dutch, to colonial, to classic.

The city buzzes with a variety of African and European languages, and exudes a heavy aroma of spices and fast food, and the band plays on. [inaudible 00:43:48] jazz pioneers.

Speaker 46:

Yeah, Joburg is the land of the beautiful, but now it's not nice now, because you see, even the window reflect, people there, hanging their washing in balconies.

Speaker 47:

[foreign language 00:44:54].

Speaker 48:

No, no, no.