South Africa

South Africa is a large country on the continent of Africa with a population of 41 million people. Fifteen hundred years ago, people from further north on the continent came to the eastern part of South Africa and set up villages and farms. Many people in South Africa today are descendants of these people. The two major religions in Africa are Hinduism and Muslim.

http://www.theodora.com/maps South Africa is located south of the equator, which is an imaginary line running around the middle of the earth that divides the planet into the Northern and Southern hemispheres. South Africa is divided into nine countries and it is on the coast of the Indian and Atlantic Oceans. Cape Town is South Africa’s oldest city. Johannesburg is the country’s largest city and business centre. The land is very dry and there is a lot of sun and little rain.

The Orange River, The Kalahari Desert, TheCango Caves and Drakensberg or Dragon Mountains are important landforms in South Africa. There are a number of reefs, or deposits of minerals which have built up in the waters around the shores of South Africa.

Used with permission
© Jason Lauré

People who live in the country live in wooden houses or huts but in most cases there is no running water or sewage disposal. City people live in brick or cement houses or apartments. Their main types of transportation are trains, taxis, and cars. African people wear normal clothes like everyone else and they wear traditional clothes like Sami and Xhosha. Sami and Xhosha clothes are very colorful and they are only worn on special occasions. In South Africa they wear copper rings for jewelry and their neck. They may wear about 55 pounds of rings around their neck and they never take them off.
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© Richard Nowitz

The African People drink wine from grapes when they celebrate Diwali and they go to international competitions for awards. The food that they like to eat is fruits, fish, and different kinds of meat like cows and ostriches and mostly one-pot dishes such as curry which is a spicy dish of meat, fish or vegetables. They make and sell wine to other countries. People in South Africa mostly buy things at the flea markets.
Used with permission
© Jason Lauré

The types of schools that they have are public and private schools, elementary, high school, and college/universities. The people there go to school at 7:30 in the morning to 2:00 in the afternoon. They are taught their ethic language until they are Grade 5, after that they are taught English and Afrikanis. Most students in South Africa speak three languages. The ages that children go to school are 7-16.

The South Africans like to do a lot of rock art, make Zulu beadwork and dolls. They like to listen to traditional music, jazz, iscatharniya and kwaito. They celebrate Easter, Diwali, which honors the goddess of wealth, beauty and happiness, High Jewish holidays, and New Year’s Day. Each South African Culture has its own set of rituals for young people to become adults. The domba, or python dance, is a Venda coming-of-age ritual for teenage girls. Some traditional weddings still include a dowry which can be in the form of money or presents.

South Africa has many important people. Nelson Mandela is a South African who was put in prison in 1963 for protesting against the government. He was released in 1990 and in 1994 became South Africa’s president. .

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