SOWETO, South Africa â Tumelo Mabitle shifted his weight from foot to foot and took a few sturdy jabs at the heavy bag.  Yes, said Mr. Mabitle, 20, he was aware that it was in this very Soweto gym that Nelson Mandela had once trained as a boxer in the 1950s. An amateur boxer himself, Mr. Mabitle said knowing that Mr. Mandela had worked out in the same room gave him âgreat confidence,â though he had also wished for something more from the anti-apartheid leader, who died on Thursday.  âI wish he could come here,â said Mr. Mabitle, an unemployed recent high school graduate, speaking before Mr. Mandelaâs death. âAnd to tell him how we need more jobs and more housing for the people â and more places like this to keep the people occupied and give them something to do.â  When Mr. Mandela trained here â something he said he did to keep in shape and take his mind off the seemingly endless struggle for liberation â the building was known as the Donaldson Orlando Community Center, after Lt. Col. James Donaldson, who in 1936 established the first private trust for black social development in South Africa. Today, it is also known as the Soweto YMCA, stretching along dusty Rathebe Street from the Pick & Save Butchery to the police station in the Orlando East section of Soweto, about a mile from where Mr. Mandela lived at the time.  Mr. Mabitle said that he hoped, someday, to work in a health club or as a trainer for a sports team, but that such jobs were hard to come by in South Africa these days.  Not far away, Siyabulela Mbongwana, 33, was spotting a friend who was doing shoulder lifts. Mr. Mbongwana said he came to the gym to keep in shape and to fill his days. He said he had no idea when he started coming that Mr. Mandela had once trained here.  âYou go to all these Mandela museums in Soweto and learn all about him,â he said, wondering why there was no photograph of Mr. Mandela at the gym at the time.  He paused before turning back to his training. âDo you know anyone who needs bouncers?â he asked. âI am looking for work.â  The gym was renovated last year, said Musa Mbatha, 22, an engineering student who said he visited a few times a week to keep in shape. Four swivel fans rested on shelves above the workout room, swirling the dusty air in the light from hanging lamps. The new equipment was gleaming, and a new rubber floor helped absorb the punishment of a long workout.  Pounding percussion â the house music that was wildly popular in South Africa â poured from a small pair of speakers in one corner. âNo eating at the gym please,â read a sign on one wall. At the gymâs entrance, another sign explained the due date for the monthly fee â just under $10.  The truth is, Mr. Mbatha said, this is no longer a hard-core boxing gym. Mostly, it is used by those, like him, who simply wanted to keep in shape. But everyone is proud that when it was a boxing gym, Mr. Mandela was its most famous member.  Mr. Mbatha walked outside and into a dirt courtyard, where a line of old exercise equipment rusted in the midday sun, its padding frayed to almost nothing.  âThis is the old equipment that Mandela would have used in his day,â Mr. Mbatha said. âWe moved it out here when the new equipment arrived last year. I wish Mandela could come and see how nicely we are keeping the place.â
The Soweto gym where Nelson Mandela trained in the 1950s is now a YMCA that has been newly renovated and is a haven for some men who are struggling to find work.