The Elders of Zion, Opus Dei, The Paul is Dead-ers, the list of supposed shadow organizations that are controlling goes on and on, with special thanks due to crappy episodes of the X-files, Dan Brown, and general ignorance so thick you can spread it on toast.

Now I have no real understanding of your average Afrikaner and his/her culture (which I’m using here as a synonym for white South Africans - which will probably offend about 2 million people) and their particular beliefs regarding other cultures, but I have had an exposure to an obviously unscientific sample of interesting behavior here.

As an American Jew who is more Jew-ish than Jewish (the holidays mean seeing the family instead of trying not to sleep through the entire boring service), I am pretty used to all sorts of responses from those who rarely interact with Members Of the Tribe - (i.e. picture a bunch of Borats in better suits.)

Three times in South Africa I have been asked about silly conspiracies - two involving Jews controlling the world (which I guess is true if we restrict it to certain Wall Street firms, the NY Times, a bunch of media companies that owe hip-hop for their wealth, and well never mind), and once about the Illumnati, a supposed shadow organization that controls the media, Wall Street, etc. (sound familiar?).

All these people are bright, middle-class normal workin’ folk, but I sense this certain undercurrent of distance from the rest of the world that naturally feeds the flames of curiosity and conspiracy. South Africa was so isolated for so long for the rest of world, both physically (which it still is), economically (due the apartheid-era embargoes), and digitally (a culture that is slowly getting wired but still loads Internet pages at teeth-grinding speeds by Asian, European, or American standards.)

Whether this is a proxy for this type of isolation is only a guess, but with the 2010 World Cup right around the corner, South Africa is going to find the rest of world looking in its windows for once - we’ll see who’s wearing the tinfoil hats looking back out.

-Matt