Backstory: In South Africa, home sweet fortress

Another, a Western journalist whose home was robbed twice, showed us the accordion-style gate she used to lock herself in the bedroom at night, in case she got robbed again. "This," she said, sliding the gate across to demonstrate, "is my rape gate."

Charming name, no? The rape gate became a feature in many South African homes in the early 1990s, in anticipation of lawlessness in a post-apartheid regime. The theory is that thieves can take whatever they want in the living room, but won't be able to go into the bedrooms. The rape gate fad has diminished over the years: It turned out thieves were more interested in electronics.

Today, specialized relocation firms, who help newcomers settle into South Africa, tell clients to focus on the essentials, and peddle easy-to-remember acronyms on protecting themselves.

My favorite is B-SAFE, courtesy of Xpatria Relocation Services.

Bars – iron bars on all windows that open.

Staff – preferably live-in housekeepers who are always present, even when you are at work.

Alarms – best bet is a motion-sensor system that alerts an armed-response team which arrives in three minutes or less.

Fido – dogs provide a deterrent, both through noise and through their incisors.

Electric fencing – preferably 220 volts, which can cause severe injury or death.

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With all this talk of crime, it's a wonder anyone comes to South Africa at all. But as the continent opens up politically and economically, many businesses find the market too lucrative to pass up. And compared with other African cities, Johannesburg is seen as a dream post. In Lagos or Nairobi or Dar-es Salaam, the crime may not be as bad, but the roads and electricity and Internet access are decidedly worse.

Government officials, tasked with reducing crime by 2010 when South Africa will host the World Cup soccer tournament, have been appealing for a lot more patience and a little less griping. One South African official famously told those who constantly carp on the crime problem that they were welcome to leave. (He later recanted.)

Many black South Africans see the current white South African fascination with crime as veiled criticism of black majority rule. Crime always existed in the townships, where police visited only to break up demonstrations, not to protect citizens. Now, whites are just getting a taste of what blacks have been victims of for decades. Black taxi drivers blame crime on African immigrants from other countries, such as Zimbabwe and Nigeria.

Outside the house, I meet with the security guard who came to my rescue. He's wearing a black bulletproof vest, with a 9-mm pistol tucked in front. I thank him for coming, offer him some water, and ask if South Africa is really as dangerous as people say. "It's happening every day," he says. "These robbers are very well armed. You have to be careful."

Later in the week, during a pink and orange sunset, I take a dog named Lampo out for his evening constitutional. He belongs to some friends, who found him as a puppy at a local pound. I've agreed to housesit, in part because I want to find out if I'm still a dog person, and in part because of one of the letters in my security checklist: F for Fido. My friends tell me the dog is fine around children, but is skittish around men, especially black men. The people at the dog pound told them it had probably been abused.

As we walk past house after house, with barking dog after barking dog, I notice Lampo pays no attention. Instead, he's watching the stream of housekeepers and gardeners heading home from work. They eye the dog nervously back.

Great, I think, I'm walking a racist dog.

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