Of all the places to get a sense of deja vu, Soweto in South Africa would have been unlikely on my list. And yet the landscape here felt oddly familiar, presumably from faint memories of old news footage.

Our guide Jannie Kruger pointed out locations of significant recent history; schools where pupils were gunned down in the 1976 uprising; hostels from where the Inkatha paramilitary organisation attacked supporters of the Africa National Congress. We also passed Archbishop Desmond Tutu's church - a focal point for resistance to apartheid in the days when gatherings were otherwise banned.

The name Soweto, short for South Western Townships, was officially designated in 1963. But the initial forced relocation of black workers who worked in the gold mines of Johannesburg began in 1904. The early slum dwellers were joined by many more when apartheid was brought into being. In fact, the word ?township? barely conveys that it is home to about three million people.

Visiting Soweto is an experience beyond the usual sightseeing. There are few obvious landmarks. One you can hardly avoid seeing when driving in is the Orlando Power Station, itself a potent symbol of change.

Its now disused twin cooling towers, which once pumped pollution over the townships while supplying electricity only to white suburbs, are now decorated with huge, colourful murals.

Some historical sites form a well-established trail in the better-off Soweto suburb of Orlando West, starting with the Hector Pietersen Museum.

It is named after a 13-year-old victim of a police bullet in the 1976 schools uprising. In what became an iconic image of apartheid's repression, another pupil was photographed carrying away his body while the dead boy's sister ran alongside, wailing hysterically.

The accompanying museum is an essential place to visit for some eye-opening contemporary history. Grainy photographs and film footage show sights and sounds of the 1976 clashes between police and students. Some 600 people died as Soweto burned, fuelling the wider struggle, but neatly planted olive trees outside the museum signify that today all is calm.

From here it's a short drive to Vilakazi Street, famously home to two Nobel Prize winners. One of them, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, still lives here. The other, Nelson Mandela, spent just 11 days after his release from captivity in his small bungalow before deciding to escape the ensuing commotion.

His humble dwelling is open for tours, though it's hard to cram more than a few people in at once. Most of the walls are now given over to photos and tributes. Together with the countless honorary degrees are Sugar Ray Leonard's champion's belt (Mandela himself was a keen boxer), and a formal apology from the state of Michigan for the CIA's involvement in his persecution.

Only the bedroom still retains the look of a home, with an eye-catching bedspread made of jackal furs, as befitting a man who was born a Xhosa prince. By the window is an oddly touching line-up of footwear, the Hi-Tec trainers he padded around in, in his early days of freedom dwarfed by ex-wife Winnie's army boots.

Outside in the bright sunshine, it feels like any suburban road. Good restaurants have opened on the street - we ate excellent traditional African food at Nambitha - ground wheat bread, umgodu (tripe), umxushu (sam bean) and crushed corn.

Around the corner is a grey, two-storey house, the home of Archbishop Tutu, and up a steep slope sits Winnie Madikizela-Mandela's current abode, a red-brick mansion with bulletproof windows, security cameras and armed guards. In the early 1990s, the so-called Mother of the Nation was accused of kidnap and murder, but that seems like another era.

No trip to Soweto is complete without a visit to Regina Mundi - the name in Latin means Queen of the World - Soweto's largest Catholic Church. It played a pivotal role in the resistance against apartheid and still bears the scars from the Soweto uprisings, when police stormed through its doors, firing at fleeing students. The broken marble altar, the bullet holes in the ceilings and the damaged figure of Christ all bear testimony to that day.

Last October, Soweto celebrated its centenary with heritage tours commemorating figures from the years when Soweto was a byword for struggle against the apartheid regime. Bricks bearing the names of anti-apartheid heroes and other prominent locals pave the route taken during the 1976 student uprising - creating a Hollywood-style ?walk-of-fame? boulevard.

A decade of democracy has brought clean water, electricity and dignity to residents of Soweto. The face of the township has been transformed in the 10 years since the first free elections from a place that few outsiders would want to visit, into one of South Africa's main tourist attractions.

Photo: Arlina Arshad