Undaunted by our racist German companions, we drove on through the Eastern Cape. The infamous Trankei was one of the notorious homelands under apartheid, and where activists were exiled to die. It is also one of the places were Xhosa society is still strong. Along the road we saw a group of boys whose bodies were covered in the white powder of a rites of passage ritual and women wearing the skirts with classic Xhosa geometrical designs.
The land of the villages is held in common, and unlike other towns we had seen, there were few fences. The beloved Ngungi cattle were everywhere grazing freely, and they had the right of way. I quickly learned that if one cow bounded across the road in front of the car, the rest of its herd was sure ot follow, moving more quickly than their sedate appearance would lead you to expect.
The roads were not that different than the southern roads, and as we got closer to the north, we saw another rarity in the south: black people actually driving cars.
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