Fat Oscar
Proof positive. You know you've died and landed up in tourist heaven when you find Oscar awaiting you outside something resembling the progeny of the Glass Cathedral and your local Holiday Inn. Oscar's plinth bears the following inscription:
Nouveau Kitsch
Opened by former President Mandela, The Table Bay is obtrusive; to say the least. Blocking the Cape Town skyline from the Waterfront, it lends the lie to any notion of a working harbour. Wendy and I stared at this monument to bad taste. I giggled. "They probably fired their PR person," I commented.
"They probably didn't," she retorted. "Look at the plinth."
Much like a high school trophy, it's festooned with myriad mini-plaques boasting guests from Nelson Mandela to Quincy Jones.
We headed off, to find the original Fat Oscar lying around with his mates under the bow of the aptly named Cape Endurance. He stinks and he barks. And he wears no bling.
