We live in the city of Durban on the east coast of South Africa. It is our nation's second largest metropolis (after Johannesburg) and is the largest port on the African continent, and the 9th busiest in the world. Wandering nomads have lived in the region since 100,000BC, but the modern city was founded in 1824 by a group of 125 British soldiers and adventurers who travelled up from the Cape colony and established a settlement here. Today, Durban has a population around 3,2-million. The city takes its name from Sir Bejamin d'Urban, who was British governor of the Cape when Durban was founded. Durban is your classic "melting-pot" and its population is made up of descendents of the early white settlers (English and Dutch - the latter are known as Afrikaners), Portuguese, Germans, Scots and people of other European descent. There is also a huge Indian population here - all descendents of indentured labourers who were brought here in the mid-1860s to work on the region's greatest agricultural asset - its colossal tracts of sugar cane fields. But far and away the most promiment population group here are the Zulus, a proud warrior nation who now count as SA's largest ethnic group (around 11-million people). The Zulu have a great tradition as fighting men (at the Battle of Isandhlwana in 1879, Zulu impis inflicted on the British redcoats the greatest single defeat in English military history). Durban is in the province of KwaZulu-Natal ("KwaZulu" means "place of the Zulu") and KZN is the Zulus' ancestral home. Evidence of their art and culture is everywhere - most typically in the marine park-#####-entertainment- centre known as "uShaka" on the Indian Ocean beachfront. The park is named after the legendary Zulu king Shaka - and the pictures in this album are a random sampling of what you can see there.

said DaveMullany 2008.01.27 at 02:45:01 PST