A large, green moving truck is parked at the MTN Sciencentre in Canal Walk shopping centre in Cape Town. The movers’ mission: science on the move. Their destination: the yearly Sasol SciFest in Grahamstown in the Eastern Cape.
But they need to be careful: a glider first built more than a thousand years ago, a chariot, and superbly crafted astronomical and surgical instruments are on the payload.
The extraordinary Sultans of Science exhibit on Islamic inventions dating from the golden age of discovery in the Muslim world, which kept ancient knowledge alive and encouraged exploration while medieval Europe shivered through the dark ages, is on its way to the science festival in Grahamstown.
The popular exhibit will be carefully transported unpacked to dominate the ground floor of the massive 1820 Settler’s Monument overlooking the town.
Show time
It will be accompanied by resident MTN Sciencentre artist and actor David Muller, who will be performing his one-man show Travelling Tales of Ibn Battuta — about the ever-curious medieval scholar from North Africa who out-travelled Marco Polo — every morning of the festival.
”One of the tragedies of history is that people — whether Muslim, Christian, atheist or whatever — have absolutely no idea how much of a contribution has been made to humanity by Islamic scholars, explorers and inventors,” says Sasol SciFest manager Anja Fourie.
”It’s rare to have an exhibit of this calibre and we urge South Africans — particularly those from the Muslim community — to take ownership of Sultans of Science. SciFest only lasts for a week and then the exhibit heads out of South Africa to New York, which gives you an idea of how world-class it really is.”
Also in the moving van will be the vats of chemicals and other props required by the MTN Sciencentre’s performing Professor Detlef Basel, who, along with colleague Ruby Frans, has been given the task of filling the gigantic, 900-seat Guy Butler Theatre in the monument building for their daily SciFest science shows.
At 4pm every day of the week-long festival, Detlef plays Captain Detlefium, with Frans as his loyal sidekick, RubyDuby — aliens who have crash-landed on Earth and are trying to understand its physics.
Basel will also be conducting daily lunchtime workshops in the ground-floor arena at the 1820 Settlers Monument to show students how to raid their kitchen cupboards and create their own cool science shows.
Sciencemobile
Meanwhile, the new ”mellow yellow” sciencemobile, which takes science to schools without laboratories or with a shortage of science teachers, will be driven from Cape Town to Grahamstown by MTN Sciencentre exhibits manager Charles Phillips.
On Sunday, he will complete the nine-hour drive up the south coast to Port Elizabeth and then inland to Grahamstown in one day. ”It’s all part of show business,” he says cheerfully.
At the crack of dawn the next day, both vans have to be unpacked to get everything ready for the estimated 40 000 people due to visit SciFest, which opens on Human Rights Day, March 21.
The MTN Sciencentre is positioned this year in the ”winner’s gallery” in the Thomas Pringle hall on the second floor of the 1820 Settlers Monument after being awarded three titles of best exhibit, best science show and best overall contribution at last year’s SciFest.
”MTN Sciencentre wiped the boards at SciFest last year, winning three awards out of a competition involving some 600 events, which gives you an idea of how good they are,” says SciFest manager Fourie.
”We are delighted to have so many people from one of Cape Town’s favourite places uproot themselves and return to Grahamstown for a week. We promise to return them — and the sciencemobile — to the Mother City in good condition to continue popularising science.”