Tourist Attraction in Johannesburg:
Satyagraha Museum
The Satyagraha Museum, commonly known as Gandhi House, is a museum and former guesthouse located in Johannesburg. The house belonged to Mahatma Gandhi: during his South African stay, he lived and worked between 1908 and 1909. It is registered as part of Johannesburg's historic heritage. The house was designed by architect Hermann Kallenbach for Gandhi and himself. Gandhi spent 21 years in South Africa, from 1893 until 1914, although he made visits to India and the UK during that time. It is said that Gandhi first learned racial discrimination when he was arrested at the Pietermaritzburg train station for traveling in a chariot reserved for whites. In 1904, Gandhi met Hermann Kallenbach, a German Jewish architect who had come to the country in 1896. In 1907, Kallenbach designed a house that was based on the shape of the two local huts (Rondavels) but made with European construction methods . It was called the Kraal, which means "barn" in English and Afrikaans. The house had stables and a tennis court, but both led them to a life of meditation and chastity. Gandhi slept in a mansard that had gone through a staircase, but both he and Kallenbach shared the same kitchen and entertained his guests in the living room. The houses had no connecting doors, and it was necessary to leave a house to enter the other. Kallenbach's life was transformed into their lives together and the money they spent on them was reduced to a tenth of their initial figure. They left in 1909, and the home had several owners before being bought in 2009 by the French travel company Voyageurs du Monde, the disapproval of the Indian government that it wanted to acquire as an Indian national monument. The French society was restored and opened to the public as a museum and retirement in 2011. The museum is run by Lauren Segal, who also manages other museums, including the Apartheid Museum. Satyagraha means "strength of truth", a reference to the concept of non-violent resistance developed by Gandhi when he lived in South Africa.
English
Español
Français
Italiano
Português
