BO-KAAP

Description

Essentials about Bo-Kaap in brief

With its garishly painted house fronts and narrow cobblestone streets, the Bo-Kaap district is one of the most frequently used postcard motifs of Cape Town, along with Table Mountain and the Victoria & Alfred Waterfront. And indeed, the district rising from the city center to Signal Hill is one of the most worth seeing in Cape Town and should definitely be on the visitor’s list during a trip to the Cape. Bo-Kaap still exudes the charm of times long past, when freed slaves from the former Cape Dutch colonies settled on the slopes of Signal Hill in the 17th and 18th centuries. Today Bo-Kaap presents itself as the best preserved historic district of Cape Town.

The history of Bo-Kaap

Bo-Kaap is often referred to as “Malay Quarter” or “Slamsebuurt”. The background for this is that the quarter was settled in the 18th century by so-called Cape Malays after they were released from slavery. The Cape Malay were mostly Muslim slaves abducted from Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India and Malaysia by the Dutch East India Trading Company in the 17th and 18th centuries. Today, over 90 percent of the population in Bo-Kaap is still Muslim and there are a total of ten mosques in the district.

The Bo-Kaap Museum

The oldest house preserved in its original state, dating from the 1760s, now houses the Bo-Kaap Museum. Established in 1978, the museum is a furnished house that shows the life of a 19th century Muslim family, bringing the history of Bo-Kaap to life. Guided tours of the neighborhood can also be booked at the Bo-Kaap Museum.

The Cape Mala cuisine of Bo-Kaap

After the end of apartheid and the repeal of the Group Areas Act, most of the buildings in Bo-Kaap were redeveloped. Due to the attractive location and the special building fabric of the neighborhood, an increasing gentrification started, which threatens to change the traditionally very close-knit resident community of Bo-Kaap. In any case, while walking through Bo-Kaap, one should take the opportunity to try Cape Malay cuisine. The descendants of the Cape Malay have preserved the excellent culinary art of their ancestors and in probably no other district of Cape Town you can eat as delicious Indian-Asian food as in Bo-Kaap.