Finding Dignity at Zeitz MOCAA

Finding Kindness

Having done some shopping at Woolworths in the V&A Waterfront, I walked to Silo District past the Nelson Mandela Gateway to Robben Island to hail an Uber back home. The Friday evening rush hour, combined with the impending weekend, meant it was quite busy. However, leaving from this end of the V&A Waterfront cuts out a good deal of the traffic involved in exiting Cape Town.

I did not get an Uber for eight minutes, and when a driver was found, he was ten minutes away. Then he cancelled three minutes into my waiting time. Uber began looking for another driver, just as I realised, I had chosen this location to get me home on time, before getting caught in the traffic I might encounter if I had hailed a cab from the Breakwater end of the V&A Waterfront.

A Pressing Dilemma

It became a battle in my mind: should I wait for a cab or seek the use of facilities? The nearest one was about 250 metres away, up flights of steps that I am usually supported in navigating. But I was alone in town with two heavy bags of shopping and a walking cane I could not use if I needed to balance the load.

My better judgement intervened. I cancelled the Uber and decided to try my luck at the Zeitz MOCAA, the Museum of Contemporary Art Africa, which was behind me. As a total stranger, I would not have been able to just walk into any establishment to ask to use their toilets. Or maybe I have never really had the courage to. Besides the museum, there were two hotels nearby, but we had been fully paid-up members of the museum before COVID-19 struck, and I knew where the entrance was.

Navigating the Process

The first thing was to get my Just Can't Wait card up on my mobile phone, which was running out of battery. I had to put it on Power Saving mode to ensure I could at least call an Uber before it died. I showed the card to security at the door, requesting to use the toilets, and she directed me to reception.

At the reception desk, one of the staff took a picture of my Just Can't Wait card on the phone and then gave me directions to the toilets, which were in the basement. My explanation that I needed urgent use of a toilet because of a medical condition was sufficient.

As I walked to the lifts, another security guard stopped me. I believe he checks for entry tickets, and I did not have one. I explained my situation, and he even offered to have my shopping bags deposited at the check-in desk. But I did not have the time; I needed to be at the toilets immediately. Even the lifts were slow in arriving, but I was soon where I needed to be, as relief and gratitude welled up in me.

People Over Things

My experience with this organisation reminded me of the spirit of their Executive Director and Chief Curator, Madame Koyo Kouoh, who passed away last year after a recent cancer diagnosis, even as she was about to serve as the artistic director of the 2026 Venice Biennale. In the museum's tribute to her, she was remembered for her belief: "People are more important than things," and for quoting the African proverb, "If you want to go fast, go alone. But if you want to go far, go together."

We live in communities shaped by experiences and circumstances. Some are so fleeting and yet significant in simply having empathy and understanding for invisible yet critical human vulnerabilities and responding to such encounters without question or judgement. People do not even have to have walked a long, hard mile in another's shoes. Even in South Africa, where basically no one knows of the Just Can't Wait card, a human story becomes the willingness to help rather than the fear of losing one's job.

Not that I want to remember what happened barely a month before, when I was refused the use of facilities with all the desperation written across my face, in my own Manchester, of all places. Thank you, Zeitz MOCAA, for simply being human. It meant a lot to me.

Blog - The Just Can't Wait Card Test

Zeitz MOCAA Staff Tribute to Koyo Kouoh

A Google NotebookLM AI Audio Overview Discussion of this blog