Aslam Levy

District 6, the word reverberates to my core, for reasons I’m unsure myself. Its significance perhaps already lost to my generation. I have no memories of District 6 other than the glimmer in the eyes of those who tell tales of its glory. Stories of Fish Market, the seven steps and the gangsters who never really were.

The seven Steps

The last year has been an odd one for me as I have started to read up a bit about the Malay community in Cape Town, how we ended up here on the southernmost tip of Africa. District 6 become “our” home away from home. Though most of the original residents have passed away, their descendants can be found scattered across the Cape flats (That’s a whole other story, I’ll get into it sometime). Though the government is now looking to hand back the land, I don’t think it’s such a great Idea. I really feel that a portion of the land should be developed into a memorial/public space with some of it left the way it is, in rememberance of what happen here.

I start to realise that District 6 is more than just a grassy slope between the N2 and De Waal drive, a part of my heritage lays buried on that land. A piece of my heart beats under four decades of rubble.
-A-

The Wikipedia Page on District 6 can be found here.