Michael decides to retrace their township sojourns. It is an impulse, sentimental, bizarre. It is the kind of thing Silas would do, or Uncle Alec. Michael hates dwelling on the past, looking back is such a fruitless exercise, he says. It is one thing to study history, quite another to go and search for ‘meaning’ in the petty annals of dusty streets. Yet he feels it is something he must do, perhaps to get away from the claustrophobic fervour of the ‘new South Africa’. The new South Africa. It is a phrase his father uses, and Kate, and Julian, and, of course, Vinu's parents. Politicians of all persuasions use it whenever they feel the need to sound idealistic, whether to celebrate or to lament the way the country has changed. Michael is always amazed by the sudden drama in their voices, the way even the dullest orator takes on the tone of an actor in one of those science-fiction films about distant galaxies, and exotic and hybrid beings. This new South Africa can be as strange as Ouma Angel's Charlton Terrace, just before she died.

For once, Michael does not plan; he simply takes a Kombi-taxi into the city centre, walks to the West Street taxi rank and searches for signs reading ‘Noordgesig’. He sees people queuing, wearily patient, like experienced commuters anywhere in the world. But there are no timetables or maps, and to the uninformed traveller, the constant movement of people and vehicles seems chaotic. Michael is wary of asking for help: he has heard that anyone who betrays ignorance about the rituals of the Kombi-taxi is marked as a ‘moegoe’ and becomes ready prey for the thieves who frequent the taxi ranks. The image of sly vultures comes to mind, their smiles fixed and deceivingly benevolent. He pauses, amused by this grotesque conception of the dangers of township travel, mythologized at dinner parties by those who have moved out of the townships and now seek justification for their migration.

In the end, he asks for directions, and is told where to wait. Soon he is in a Kombi, sitting quietly as the driver waits for the seats to fill up. The journey itself is unremarkable, frantic bursts of speed, sudden stops, people getting off and on with remarkable rapidity, destinations confirmed and fares exchanged with quiet efficiency. It is as if unseen hands direct everything, some intelligence out there, controlling this world without fuss or fanfare. Later, he will admit that this is a romantic view of the struggles these commuters face every day, that their lives are in constant danger, that there is nothing wonderful about being crammed together, breathing in each other's nervous sweat. For now, he is transported into a forgotten world, one that he suspects Silas rarely sees these days.