Zinto: Navigating Cape Identities is inspired by South Africa s constitutional commitment to Unity in Diversity . Plurality of identity is explored using the author's own journey, to open discourse on identity that departs from the paradigm of race and ethnicity. Six lenses explore collective heritage; genealogy: history; life experience; genetic ancestry; and national group cultures. Exploration of identity in South Africa has been stymied by Apartheid ideology which forced the population into race silos - white, black, coloured and Indian, amplifying ethnicity as identity. Particularly for those classified as 'Coloured', identity was totally warped by ideology. This distorted legacy still haunts the post-Apartheid era. A fresh approach, illustrated by personal experience, emphasises the ties that bind people and provides perspective particularly for 'Coloured' or Cape Creole people, often misrepresented as a mixed-race product of miscegenation. Six journeys proceed from the seven enmeshed tributaries to Cape identities - Indigene, Slave, Free Black, European, Maroon, Exiled Resisters and Refugees, and Indentures and Migrants.