Cape Town - Popular Cape Town restaurant Rafiki’s will be shutting its doors for good on Monday after the owner was unable to extend his seven-year lease which ends next year.
“It’s been an amazing 16 years. I hope Rafiki’s has enriched your lives in some small way. Thank you to our customers, you rock, you’ve been amazing,” Miki Clark, the owner of the restaurant, wrote on the restaurant’s Facebook page. “Here’s to making friends, falling in love, falling out of love, drowning our sorrows and starting again.”
Customers have been clamouring to visit their beloved bar one last time, taking advantage of its half-price pizzas on Mondays, half-price Mexican food and drinks on Wednesdays, prize nights on Thursdays and half-price cocktails on Sundays.
Rafiki’s opened in 2000 as a private dining club and eventually evolved into the laidback bar it is today. It gained a cult following over the years for its no-fuss pub grub and drinks. The relaxed atmosphere drew customers to the establishment and many friendships were forged there.
Clark even met his wife at the restaurant.
“I hope you had meaningful relationships started over a few beers on the Rafiki’s balcony like I have,” he wrote in his post.
To thank loyal customers over the last few months, it has surprised with tickets to popular Cape Town events such as Synergy and the Festival of Beer.
The restaurants will reopen in a new location – in Nkhata Bay, Malawi. A handful of staff members will be bringing pieces of memorabilia from the Cape Town location to the new restaurant to keep Rafiki’s laidback spirit alive. Other staff members will be moving on to new projects, but said they would remember Rafiki’s fondly.
“A lot of people who work here have been here for a while. It’s like a family. There’s someone who has worked here for over 14 years. We all enjoy working together,” Tapiwa Manyenga, a bartender who has worked at Rafiki’s for six years, said.
He said one of the biggest draw cards of the restaurant was its happy staff. “We manage to make the customers feel at home. They love the staff.”
Clark said he’d be around for the restaurant’s last weekend. “I’ll be sitting on the balcony for a last pint and a goodbye to to a good friend,” he wrote in his post.
Weekend Argus