AMG in Graffiti Paradise

If Cape Town is South Africa’s San Francisco then Johannesburg is New York. In some parts of the city you feel like you’re in Lower Manhattan. I specifically like the area around Newton, under the concrete flyovers, covered in the most beautiful graffiti art South Africa has to offer.

The magnificient sound of the E 63 AMG’s V8 reverberates off the chipped coloured-in walls, as it slowly growls past the brightly painted murals. A Chinese guy comes out of one of the shops to tell me, that nowadays there are lots of AMGs in China. He loves the car. And he tells me, that a couple of months ago he heard a loud nose outside his shop and when he came out a giant red monster car was roaring past -  and a BBC crew was filming it. So that’s where the Top Gear epsiode with the South African produced Paramount Marauder, driven by Richard Hammond, was produced – and the Chinese oke was in it (1.17 min on www.youtube.com/watch?v=cDoRmT0iRic).

Newton is one of the most exciting areas in downtown Joburg. The previously neglected suburb is getting cleaned up and slowly changing into a hip urban hub. The colourful graffiti columns could be turned into a major tourist attraction - a fantastic open air gallery in the heart of graffiti paradise. Dieter Losskarn (words and images)