apartheid museum • 10 comments • Before coming to South Africa, we always tended to associate the country with the apartheid system. Although we were aware of the history of apartheid, the museums we visited really opened our eyes to the full story. No museum explained it better than the Apartheid Museum in Johannesburg. The immersive experience of the museum starts right at the main gate where you are randomly assigned as "white" or "non-white" on your ticket. Separate doors for each ticket class lead visitors through the first exhibit, which displays identification papers that "non-whites" were required to carry in pre-1990's South Africa. The museum is cleverly designed to both engage the visitor and provide them with ample content. A slalom course of modern-art inspired mirrors introduces visitors to relatives of apartheid victims and proud Johannesburgians (or Johannesburgers? Johannesburgeous?). Photography isn't allowed on the inside the museum so, unless you've been there, you'll have to take our word for it that the museum delivers a powerfully descriptive documentation of the history of not only apartheid, but also South Africa.
