Mandela House

From the museum, we drove down Vilakazi Street to visit the former home of Nelson Mandela. He lived here from 1946 to 1962. It is a typical four-room 'matchbox' house.

Mandela donated the house to the Soweto Heritage Trust in 1997 to be used as a museum. The single-story red-brick house has been extensively restored, but it still has bullet holes in the walls, and the facade has scorch marks from police attacks with Molotov cocktails. Inside, there are some original furnishings and memorabilia, including photographs, citations given to Nelson Mandela, and the world championship belt given to Mandela by Sugar Ray Leonard.

It was fascinating, and really quite moving, to be inside Nelson Mandela's home. This is the place he came to when he was released from prison in 1990, despite suggestions from government officials that he should find a safer home. At a rally welcoming him home to Soweto, his opening words were, "I have come home at last." However, after 11 days back at the house, he moved out again.

He later wrote in his autobiography:

'That night I returned with Winnie to No. 8115 in Orlando West. It was only then that I knew in my heart I had left prison. For me, no. 8115 was the centre point of my world, the place marked with an X in my mental geography.'

I feel privileged to have been in the rooms he inhabited.Read more