Searching for the real thing

This piece first appeared in The Herald on 10 April 2013.

It was a particularly miserable Wednesday evening on Stanley Street. The Easter Weekend rain that had washed away the Splash festival had left behind a cold, damp windy drizzle in its wake. But still, the street pavements were full of people; students, yuppies, car guards, artists, hippies, wanabee’s and buskers. It was a week night. It was a wet night. It was a cold night, but still we struggled to get an inside table at a restaurant or find a parking spot.

So, as we sipped our wine outside, on the pavement, huddled in our jackets against the wind, I could not help but wonder a little about why Stanley Street, in Richmond Hill, has become such a popular place to be. I mean, it’s nice, there are people walking up and down, quaint shops and restaurants, trees planted down each side of the street, but no evidence of any flamboyant spending. No dancing fountains, no Zara super store, no four storey high ice-rinked  atrium with glass lifts whizzing silently up and down. Why then, were my wife and I, like so many others, rather, instead, not enjoying climate controlled, 24 hour security, undercover parking,  porcelain tiled comfort of any number of malls, shopping centres or franchise eateries available for us to choose from on any given evening. Why were we abandoning comfort and security for this wobbly table on a windy sidewalk in an ageing part of town.  I am sure some would argue that Stanley Street’s popularity has to with the quality of its restaurants. Some would talk about accessibility; others still would guess that about the particular entrepreneurial vision of a key initial property investor.

But I don’t think the success and popularity can necessarily be ascribed to any one of those factors in isolation. In fact, I am trying here to convince you, that what we see in Stanley Street is evidence of a far greater global movement and mind shift. And, of course, it’s not just Stanley Street. We see this re-awakening in Central, we have seen it in the Cape Town inner-city. All through the UK, US and Australia inner-city neighborhoods have become re-invigorated filled with new life, new energy and new business. So, what’s this all about? I am arguing that this phenomenon,  is evidence of the beginning of a wider shift in consciousness which includes the wholesale rejection of all that is fake, a rejection falsehood, pretense and scam.  As mass manufacture, mass media and massive institutions private and public seek do dominate and control, we see beginnings of a backlash and a resistance.

Being continually bombarded by commercial messages and plots to extract money from us has left many cynical and jaded. Growing numbers of people no longer trust big business, big money and big institutions. These powerful “machines” make us stand in queues, they make us talk to their call centres, they keep making us change our passwords, they anger and frustrate us. This new cynicism has led to rush for antiques and collectables instead of cheap Chinese imports  and a rush to social media instead of American TV channels.  Those that still watch TV, watch “reality” TV choosing rather to watch the boring authentic lives of Big Brother housemates over the fake interesting lives of The A Team, Knightrider or the Brady Bunch. More and more people reject branded goods for the hand made alternative. Artisan breads, micro-breweries and a Barista crafting your Cappuccino just the way you like it.

Grassfed beef, whole milk, free range chicken and genuine leather are all part of this movement toward authenticity. Less and less do we tolerate artificial flavouring, dubbed movies or plastic Christmas trees. They are just not the real thing and are not good enough.

A growing number of people are searching for authenticity. People are searching for what is real, sincere and meaningful. For our cities, that means more and more people will come to reject remote suburban malls. More and more people will reject the franchise steakhouse with is standardised happy birthday clap along song and dance. The taste for the authentic drives these people away from the remote, sterile, cookie cutter secure complexes in Lorraine. This movement drives people away from insanely clean, manicured office parks where people live out their days in insanely sterile manicured office jobs. 

In growing numbers, people choose Stanley Street and other inner city environs like it, not because they are cleaner, not because it is dryer or less windy, not because the pick pockets and drug dealers are banished, but because these environments feel real, they feel sincere and they feel authentic. These environments exhibit less evidence of heavy handed government planning controls that seek to sterilise and segregate. Houses in a houses zone. Shops in a shops zone and restaurants in a restaurant zone. Buildings neatly spaced out with nice lawn between them. No messy parking in the street. No people cluttering up the pavement. All very clean, but oh so boring and oh so fake.

Perhaps, what we see starting in Stanley Street and in Central can be the beginning of that “special something”  that Port Elizabeth and the Nelson Mandela Bay has to offer the world. PE can’t be more Joburg than Joburg. PE can’t be more Hollywood than Hollywood. PE can’t be more Vegas than Vegas, but PE can be the best in the world at being sincerely, authentically PE, the real thing!

Tim Hewitt-Coleman