Khayelitsha, in the southeast of Cape Town, is one of the largest and most culturally vibrant townships in all of South Africa. Many visitors are unsure how best to discover this kind of community, but you haven’t truly explored the Rainbow Nation without getting to grips with a place like Khayelitsha. Juma is a larger-than-life local who runs an amazing set of tours around town, so we caught up with him to find out more about tourism, the local community and barbecue, of course.
Meet Juma
Our South African Local Insider
Tell us about yourself and what it was like growing up in South Africa?
Juma: I moved into the Woodstock Exchange, a creative business hub in Khayelitsha, back in 2009. It has been a great journey being welcomed into this beautiful community, working together with amazing people and it’s where I created Juma Art Tours, Storyroom Creatives, Khaltsha Cycles and Khaltsha Cycling Academy.
I love that I get to be creative every day here. I connect locals and tourists and, by doing so, create unique, unforgettable experiences for visitors, while getting to put a lot back into these communities. We wanted to share the story of the township and the community through street art, but most of the artwork around here back then was graffiti, so it took some time for people to understand the aims of the project. Most people would ask why we wanted to paint their houses and didn’t get what we were trying to do. At this time, this was a neighborhood that no one wanted to visit, there were a lot of gangs, but for us bringing street art to the community and telling our stories in that way has brought hope and a future into this community. Now we have a lot of people coming here and it’s one of the highlights of their visit to South Africa.
How has it changed since then?
Juma: Around 70 per cent of people agreed for us to paint their houses in the first year eventually, but the challenge for us was: what do we paint? We started with flowers, geometric shapes, wildlife and from there, it started to evolve. It took a while for people to understand the difference between graffiti and murals.
Graffiti is something that gangs used and we wanted to get away from that image, so we had to paint other things – people in particular loved animals, like lions and giraffes. In 2009, Woodstock had a lot of artists using the hub as studios, but in 2012 the building was sold. Most of the artists left the building and had nowhere to go. I was the only person left in the studios, but it gave me the opportunity to get into tourism and start the street art walking tours.
Every person who travels has a need to meet the locals to appreciate their stories and community, so I started using art to connect visitors and locals and now we’re thriving. Tourists come from all over to meet the people here, hear their stories and experience this really beautiful and unique place. Most people are surprised when they see these happy smiling faces in underprivileged communities, but it’s those happy people who we connect them with and those visitors get an authentic taste of what it’s like for them here. A lot of them come back frequently and even make friends with the families they visit.
What’s the thing you like most about your job?
Juma: Connecting tourists to this beautiful place and these amazing people, it’s amazing. It’s not just art tours we do with tourists either. The townships have enough space to create garden spaces, whereas there are no spaces to do that in city centres. We introduced home gardens in 2014, where visitors come and can help make a garden with those communities, and people can share their stories with one another.
From then on, we now have lots of gardens – I can’t count them because there’s so many. They’re amazing because it connects visitors and locals who can get engaged together, share stories and even food. Some local people cook with their visitors and then they eat together, and those are very memorable experiences. The locals will frequently reminisce about some of the visitors, while a lot of people return to enjoy those experiences again, even coming back to visit the same families they saw the first time around – they bond and create lasting friendships.
How does the project and tourism in general support the local community?
Juma: We run a responsible and sustainable tourism company, so we nurture the artists who we work with. Some of the art we show on the tours is commissioned, while other pieces we can quickly create together with the guests and the artists they work with will be paid for that. At the end of the tours, the artists’ work is sold as well – if they have spent two hours with guests, it’s very easy for them to sell some of their pieces because the visitors spend time with those artists, learn their stories and want to bring back a physical reminder of their tour.
In 2022, I started the Khaltsha Cycling Academy. Now we’ve got street art, gardens and a bike club where we teach people in the community how to ride. Young girls will come after school and they will get a good education while learning to ride bicycles. At first, parents were worried that learning to ride the bikes would affect their education. But we bought 12 computers last year and we also help them with their homework. We now have girls applying to universities after passing schools with our help and when visitors come, they can learn about what they’re contributing to when signing up for one of our tours.
What does the future hold for you and the tours?
Juma: I’ve passed down my skills and we have created job opportunities for locals, so even if tomorrow I’m gone, this will continue. There are people who can carry it on. Now I don’t do all the tours. I sometimes just meet the guests, but there is a very good team that takes care of it.
For example, today we had four tours. I can’t do four, but because of me creating the team, we can split the work and make sure everyone enjoys their experience. My daughter is 22 and she leads some of the tours, she shares her story and my story and the story of how the company began.
What do you like to do in your spare time away from work?
Juma: I’m a wine lover, so mostly on Sundays or sometimes Saturday, I like to explore new wines and vineyards. I love red and I love white in good weather. There are some incredible vineyards in the township, a lot of them with nice gardens, so I like to go and get a bottle and forget about the stress of work. However, if I’m looking for a night out, there’s a few places in the township where I can go and have a really good time with the locals. One place in particular that I like is called Rand’s Lifestyle. It’s massive, the music is amazing and it’s a fantastic place where everyone is dancing.
I love meat too and they have really good barbecue food there. You can get lamb chops or beef chops or sausages and get yourself some beers. I like to be outdoors so I can see the stars at night while I’m relaxing and unwinding. The views are amazing, there’s nowhere quite like it.
What do you think surprises people the most when they visit South Africa for the first time?
Juma: Just how easily they get on with the people here. We insist on people walking or cycling on our tours so that they can get that first-hand experience of being in the community because it’s definitely the best way to explore.
We don’t want to take people around in a bus, we want them to see just how amazing it is and to interact with the locals, so they get an appreciation of everything we have here. It’s a different tourism experience, but I think is an important one for travellers looking to make a real genuine connection with South Africa as a destination.
What’s your favourite local dish?
Juma My favourite is braai, which is a special South African barbecue, with meat cooked over fire – it’s great and there’s loads of places around here that serve amazing barbecue food. That meat will come with dishes like pap, a kind of porridge made from maize, and chakalaka, a spicy relish. Put it all together and it’s perfect.
What is your one top tip for people coming here on a break?
Juma: Travel like a local and visit the communities like Khayelitsha because it will make your visit so much better. You’ll hear amazing stories from great people and make lasting memories and friendships that you wouldn’t if you just stuck to the same old tourist trails.
