Cape Town lost the bid to Athens, leaving behind this reminder of a dream that didn't come true. I hope one day I'll make millions. With his undefeated record in seven bouts, Kibiti plans to secure a better life for his family. I want to take my family to the suburbs. An overcrowded township, Khayelitsha is one of Cape Town's most poverty-stricken neighborhoods.
Kids loiter at stop signs, harassing drivers of passing cars for food and money.
Most of its half-million residents live in shacks constructed with sheets of iron and pieces of collected wood. Some of Khayelitsha's young men come to the Oliver R. Tambo Centre, named after the former African National Congress leader, to escape the crime that surrounds them. Inside the boxing ring, engaging in one of the world's most dangerous sports, they feel safer than at home. The 10,000-seat arena may never be filled with fans, but it stands as a refuge, a place to sidestep the pitfalls of a township where gangs are plentiful and jobs are scarce. Many young people idolize Nelson Mandela, who took up boxing to keep fit while living underground in the 1960s, when he was organizing the armed struggle against apartheid.