The day in 1990 that Nelson Mandela walked to freedom, I waited hours in the hot sun outside city hall in downtown Cape Town, in a crowd of thousands of blacks and mixed-race coloreds dying to glimpse their hoped-for savior.
Mandela, who died last week at 95, had been locked away in prison for more than 27 years. As it happened, the excitement of witnessing history that day was tarnished by mishaps.
The mood grew ugly because of a five-hour delay in his scheduled arrival, partly due to his wife, Winnie, who had failed to show up on time at the Victor Verster Prison, 45 minutes outside Cape Town, where Mandela was last held.