It’s lunchtime at Patel’s supermarket in Musina, South Africa, and a steady stream of Zimbabweans are stocking up on supplies for a country in crisis. One of the last shops before South Africa’s border with its northern neighbour, Patel’s once did a roaring trade selling everything from tomato sauce to pyjamas.

For most tourists, an African safari means up-close encounters with elephants and lions in the bush. But a group of Dutch and South African artists have pioneered a new kind of wild adventure by inviting guests to camp in the heart of Johannesburg’s city centre, where gun crime is rife and thousands of illegal immigrants cram into derelict buildings.

When Marilyn Ward was a girl, church meant starched shirts, disapproving scowls and endless repetition of prayers she didn’t understand. Now the South African spends Sunday mornings whooping it up with hundreds of ”brothers and sisters” who grind their hips to jovial Zulu songs and punctuate the preacher’s sermon with howls of ”Allelujah”.

Haute cuisine may seem a contradiction in terms on a continent where millions go hungry. But Coco Fathi Reinharz, a half-Belgian, half-Burundian chef, is at the vanguard of a new African fine dining movement that is ditching stodgy, tasteless peasant food for sophisticated dishes with an exotic twist.