Mozambique and Johannesburg

Mozambique  - September 2011

I am not sure how many times I have visited Moz. Somewhat less than ten times, somewhat more than five. About half of those have been trips to Maputo and about half have been trips through Maputo, to places further north. I find it a fascinating country, if a little depressing. My first trip was about five years ago. I went with a small team of south African academics to assist the Mozambiquean government with some short term training. We stayed at a modest hotel in downtown Maputo. It was a moderately successful trip, although the project we were training them for subsequently never happened, and I learned a few things in the process. One was about dress codes in Africa. Bottom line here is that whatever you wear will be wrong. I assumed that it being a government function, I should wear a suit. I arrived to find that everyone from their team was in jeans and tee-shirts! (I have had it the other way around as well, which is one reason I tend to err on the side of caution). The second thing I learned was how poor the country is or was. We tend to forget that our neighbor went through 16 years of brutal civil war, from which it is only now recovering. I don't pretend to know much about that war, other than what I have read and heard, but it is not difficult to see the effects of it - in short the infrastructure was (and still is) falling apart. My boss swears that when the Portuguese left in '75 or whenever, they were so pissed off that they poured concrete down the sewers. Maybe they did, maybe they didn't. It makes a good story and I guess I might have as well. Maputo certainly had and still has sewer problems...

I find that Maputo is a city of contrasts. On that first trip I remember taking a walk through the city centre and being astounded to find multimillion rand mansions belonging to some business tycoon or politician and right next to them open sewers, stinking to high heaven, or a ramshackle old house with broken windows and roof and yard rank with weeds. None of the traffic lights worked, it seemed. Major four-lane arterials intersected with other large roads and the intersection appeared to be nothing more than an elaborate stop-go system, whose rules it was almost impossible for the uninitiated to fathom. As far as I could see, the trick was to wait for a gap and then proceed slowly but purposefully as far as the first lane, wait for a gap in the second lane and so on until one had inched one's way all the way across. Even as that was happening, others were inching their way from east to west, west to east and south to north. The other remarkable thing was that I never saw an accident happen, although I don't doubt they occurred when I wasn't there.

This trip was short. we flew in on Monday and out on Thursday of the same week. All of Wednesday was taken up with a meeting and all of Tuesday with a trip to a field site some 100km to the north. So there wasn't much time for anything. We couldn't get on the direct Cape Town - Maputo flight and had to go via Johannesburg. We had one or two vaguely amusing incidents en route. I was in the company of the Handsome Masha, who is always good for a wry comment, usually socio-political in nature. There was a long queue at the passport control in Johannesburg airport - not a huge problem, as we had a fair amount of time before our connecting plane was due to leave, just mildly irritating. They had us snaking back in about five layers, for one immigration officer. That would probably have been fine but then another officer came, and the traffic director decided, in his wisdom, to re-engineer the "snake", with the result that about 20 of us were left in an island, not quite knowing where to head, and the rest in the main queue, wondering if we were about to gate crash them. Of course tempers got frayed, people argued, folks disobeyed instructions and climbed under the railing (I did) - it had the making of a good old mudsling. The turning point came when a South African white guy said rather loudly, "Well, welcome to Africa!" - an inflammatory remark at the best of time. The black guy behind him went off pop. Turned out he was Nigerian. He started screaming at him, "What gives you the right to say that? How can you say that? Nigeria is in Africa and this doesn't happen in Nigeria! We don't do things like this!!" The rest of us pretended to be British and discussed the weather or looked out the window.

Maputo has a new airport, built partly by the Chinese. Not sure how "partly". It is a modest airport by international standards, but certainly a huge amount better than the one they had before. I emerged from baggage reclaim and customs into a light, airy, spacious and surprisingly cool entrance hall and made my way to the three cash machines against the far wall. The first did not work. The second was out of money. The third had just swallowed an American gentleman's cash card. I retreated, deciding to rather wait for the hotel (which as it turned out didn't change money). There was a large and rather weird wooden sculpture in the arrivals hall which I photographed - maybe you can interpret it.

We stayed at the Hotel Avrin. It lies along the estuary, rather than the coast proper, surrounded by government ministries. As a hotel I guess it was above average - large rooms, most of the mod cons, marble everywhere, also lots of expensive looking paintings and sculptures, many of them African. The room rate was about R1000 for bed and breakfast, which always sounds like a great deal when you are having to pay it yourself, but internationally is nothing unusual. We found our rooms and agreed to meet later. Mine was on the second floor, facing the mouth of the estuary. I unpacked, showered and changed, and then went for a walk along the waterfront highway, with a friend. There was a light sea breeze, it was late afternoon and the sun was setting over the river, everywhere were sellers of cashews, crisps, cold drinks, beers (yes, on the pavement) ... young people everywhere, lots of rather lousy music blaring from parked cars' hi-fi's. But there was a festive atmosphere and we enjoyed the walk, ending at the ferry docking station.

Back at the hotel we met up with the Handsome Masha and one other colleague, and decided we would walk to the waterfront restaurant, where I had been on a previous trip and where I had had great seafood and listened to some wonderful African jazz music. The walk is about 10 minutes and we decided it would be fine. Wrong!

We had not gotten more than a block from the hotel and were just passing some or other ministry, when we were hailed by a soldier or policeman, I am not sure which. He wore a green uniform, had no name badge, but did have a large automatic weapon suspended over his shoulder. He asked to see our passports. Now I had never been told I must carry mine, and never had such problems in the past. In fact my practice is to put my passport straight into the room safe as soon as I have checked in, because the LAST thing I need when traveling is to lose my passport. So it turned out that one of us had a passport, two of use had drivers licenses and one had no identification. Three of us were South African and not required to have a visa and one was American, who had one. The soldier was not interested in the licenses - he wanted to see passports and he particularly wanted to see our American friend's visa. He would have to take us to the station, he said. We would need to pay a fine - I think he said 3000 meticals for each of us. That is about 1000 rands each - a lot of money. Well, if that was the law, then we would have to go to the station and pay up. I think we were resigned to that. And then he played his trump card - if we paid him, then it would be about half that and we wouldn't need to go to the station. Why didn't we just help each other? In other words he wanted a bribe. It is interesting to me that the three South Africans hesitated and looked like pushing back, despite the AK47. For one thing we didn't have the money on us. But on another level, I think we are just so bloody sick and tired of this sort of crap back home, that we weren't going to give in that easily, so we thought. Our American friend and colleague, on the other hand, reached into his wallet, found R500 and handed it over! The man's eyes lit up, but clearly he wanted more. He looked at me and asked why I didn't help my friend. I showed him my wallet which was genuinely empty - I intended using a credit card if I needed to pay for dinner. I don't know how long it would have gone on or where we would have ended up, had not another soldier approached from across the road. Quickly, the man's manner changed. "I am freeing you!" he said, with a certain amount of pomp and pretense at magnanimity. "My name is Rashid!" and he held out his hand to shake on it.

We were just glad to get out of there. I shook his hand and said "Thank you so much for your help, Rashid" and held off adding "You disgusting lowlife piece of shit!!", which was what I was thinking, and even managed a smile while I looked at him, all the while feeling only loathing and hate. I don't loathe and hate many people, but this man aroused in me those feelings in plenteous quantities. The others did likewise (shook hands that is) and we made our way slowly back to the hotel. I said to the American "I apologize for my continent!" "No problem," he said, "I have had far worse things happen to me in Washington, which is why I always carry enough money on me to pay a good bribe. That guy didn't know but if he had really pushed us I had 500 dollars hidden in my underpants!"

That night we ate in. We were one of only two parties in the hotel restaurant. The food was mediocre, the wine was from Chile and okay, and the prices were ridiculous. But at least we were safe. My American friend had not been to Maputo (or Lorenco Marques, as he called it), since the seventies. Mostly what he remembered were the prawns which were "as big as hot dogs!" and he was determined to find them again. That night the prawns were small - maybe an inch long. The next night we ate in the same hotel restaurant and they were maybe two inches long. It was only on the third night, when we finally succeeded in getting back to the Waterfront restaurant, that we got the real thing - three inch long tiger prawns. My friend thought he had died and gone to heaven! Had things worked out differently, that might have been truer than he wished.

I was awakened each morning by a rather tinny rendition of reveille played over the loudspeakers at the Ministry. Heaven only knew why. Presumably they were summoning the troops and running up the flag. Maybe they hadn't heard the war was over. Other than that, we didn't see the men in green again, not even on our trip up the N1, which is notorious for road blocks. I did speak to a Mozambiquean colleague, who happens to be well connected in the government, and he confirmed that no such law exists and that this fellow was simply chancing his arm. He also said that a night in a Mozambiquean jail is not something you want to court.

I don't want this to sound like a wholly negative blog about Mozambique because of one man's greed and immorality. The vast majority of my experiences in the country have been positive. Also, I know that many tourists have had far worse experiences in my own country. I have had friends and colleagues mugged in Paris, Rome ... you name it. Nowhere is immune, not even Saudi Arabia, I expect. I just mention these things because they kind of burst my bubble and altered somewhat my possibly naive, rose-tinted view of Africa. I shall be a little more careful in future, and carry my passport. I recounted this experience to my running partners yesterday, all of whom are South African, and they all said they would have called the soldier's bluff. well, they would wouldn't they - they didn't see his face or machine gun.

So that was Moz. I don't think anything else of importance happened. On Thursday we made our way back to the airport and via Joh’burg back to Cape Town. It was mildly irritating that no direct flight was available on either day and as a result our trip home took all day, whereas the direct flight takes a mere two hours.

Johannesburg – October 2011

Ten days later I was on a plane to Joh’burg for a 5 day "training" - I was being trained to train others, so called "train the trainer". The content of the course doesn't matter - it was OK, but a little tedious. It was all arranged pretty much at the last minute, I suspect because the Department suddenly discovered that it didn't have the required numbers. I flew up with some of the provincial program staff and my Cameroonian colleague, whom we affectionately refer to in the office as Lord Charles or Prince Charles, because he once let on that he has Royal Cameroonian blood. Charles is an academic physician and an accomplished researcher. He speaks not only his native Cameroonian language but English and French and something he calls "Pidgin English", which he says is spoken all over West Africa, but with regional differences. I asked him whether I, as a native English speaker, would be able to understand it and was told I would not.

We were booked into the Airport Grand Hotel, which one would think would be grand and near the airport. Well, it was not very Grand, and was near the nether end of the airport rather than the business end, if you take my meaning. The hotel is about 500 meters away from the south end of the eastern runway with some predictable and rather dramatic consequences. At peak hours, incoming planes come in low over the hotel before touching down. I found it fascinating to watch them, wheels down, listen to the engines throttling down, feel the walls and windows shake when the really big planes passed over, listen to the Doppler effect on the engine whine. I remember my Dad saying once that in London during the Second World War, they used to listen to the drone of the V2 rockets ("Doodlebugs"). As long as the engines kept whining they knew they were ok. It was when the engines stopped that they panicked. Once the rocket was overhead, they also relaxed, since even if the engines cut, it would continue going forward as it plummeted. Terrifying. But the planes, I found exciting. I even found a pub with an outside first floor deck called "High Fliers" from which one can "plane-watch" over a sundowner.

The hotel is officially in Boksburg, which is now part of the Ekurhuleni Metropole, what we used to call the East Rand in the bad old days of apartheid. I racked my brains to remember whether we had ever gone to Boksburg. I did remember that it was the site of the first Hypermarket. Imagine that - we would drive 50km to go to a Hypermarket! Nowadays I won't even drive ten. I bought my first and only Venter trailer from their depot in Boksburg. I spent an incredibly stressful and unhappy three weeks in 1989 as the medical officer assigned to the military detention barracks in Boksburg. Lastly, I do remember that when I was very young we used sometimes to drive out to the airport (called Jan Smuts Airport in those days), to watch, from the open air veranda, the planes landing and taking off. I think we saw the Concorde there when it visited, and the first Jumbo jets. Other than the above, I don't think I ever visited Boksburg. I mean why would I have? It was very Afrikaans, very flat and very ugly, in my opinion. "My" part of Johannesburg was hilly, leafy and pretty with blooming jacaranda trees and majestic old oaks.

The hotel, with the exception of the noise, was OK, as hotels go. Nothing more, nothing less. I must say the food was good and a little over the top. The only real negative was that there was no gym. There was a swimming pool in the central courtyard, but not big enough to get much exercise, and too cold anyway (I felt it). So I had a problem - the prospect of five full days of sitting listening to presentations, interspersed with meals which I really didn't need, but which I couldn't resist and which I felt morally obliged to eat since they had been paid for ... What to do? I had a look on Google maps and discovered that even though the hotel itself is on a main road and in something of a commercial and even industrial area, there is a residential suburb right behind it. I decided to throw caution tto the winds and go for a run on the first morning. At six a.m. I made my way past the security boom, clicked "start" on the Endomondo program of my Blackberry, clicked the start button on my running watch and set off at a good trot down the road, in the direction of the runway. After two blocks I turned right and ran along Viewpoint Road, which runs parallel to the R24 highway. I was surprised at the houses, several of which would not have been out of place in Houghton or Bishopscourt. The majority had, not unexpectedly, high walls or fences, topped by the ubiquitous electric wires, guarded by monstrously large dogs. But every so often, these were punctuated by old style small holdings, with low wire fences, lots of trees (plenty of syringa's in bloom, putting forth their pungent scent, but also palms and others), manor houses, some of them thatched, cheeky fox terriers poking their noses through the chicken wire... quite charming establishments in their own way, though one couldn't help wondering about security and how many times they had been burgled. Sad.
The sun was just rising. A few locals were out walking, singly or in pairs, some with dogs. Early birds were leaving for work. Diesel engines were idling at a trucking depot. The air was crisp but not cold. A peacock was calling from one of the small holdings. It was actually very pleasant and I found myself envying the worthy citizens of Boksburg their flat terrain and windless morning!
I was so happy with my run that my enthusiasm clearly affected Lord Charles. He went out that same afternoon and bought himself some running shoes at the East Rand Mall and the next morning he joined me on the run. Now His Excellency is new to running, and a little overweight, so we had to walk once or twice, but it was a good opportunity to chat and we both enjoyed it and made it a daily commitment for the rest of the week.

Other than that not a lot happened. Before we knew it, it was Friday and we were preparing to leave to return home to Cape Town. Would I go back to Boksburg if invited, or if I won a week there in a lottery - probably not, but hey, it was okay for a change.

Ezeebikes

Ezeebikes

My kids are convinced I am having a midlife crisis. Perhaps they are right. I have probably spent more money in the last year than in the previous three. On the other hand, I thought midlife crises were supposed to be about Lamborghini cars or Harley Davidson motorbikes or Caribbean cruises. Mine has so far consisted of upgrading to a 40 inch flat screen television (my excuse was that I could no longer read the cricket and rugby scores from my arm chair, even with my spectacles on), having the house repainted inside and out (it needed it: Cape Town is not kind to paintwork), fitting new security gates to the front and back doors (hey, we live in South Africa), having new blinds fitted in the lounge and granny flat (the previous ones were see through at night) and having a shelving unit fitted in the computer room (we have four computer users and two desktop computers, so the space needed some organizing). Is that a crisis - I think that most of it could be classified as running repairs or simple maintenance.

Perhaps our one indulgence has been the bikes. We realized a while ago that with three drivers and soon four drivers, each with his or her own life to live, we would need to have more than two transport options. Currently we have the "small car" (Peugeot 107) and the "big car" (Hyundai Getz). What to do? Well we could buy another car, and we almost did. We even test drove an absolutely scrumptious Hyundai i20. Somewhere inside my rational self, however, something kept saying "sooner or later oil will run out or become so expensive you won't be able to afford petrol. Why on earth are you buying another fossil fuel burner? Go green, for heaven's sake (or at least for earth's sake)." So I started researching hybrids and electric cars. All very fascinating, but the bottom line seems to be that a hybrid car will cost me three times what I paid for the Peugeot and return a consumption figure not very different, and an electric car will set me back even more, and will not be available in South Africa for about 2 or 3 years. That doesn't help us. So we made do with two cars for a while and seemed to be getting on okay. Once in a while one of us would use public transport - not the most wonderful experience in Cape Town, but certainly a whole lot better than in most other parts of the country. Even so, the trains are unreliable, unclean and sometimes unsafe. On the positive side, they are relatively inexpensive.

Then I started thinking about criterion number two - the need for exercise, the ever present battle against the expanding waistline, the prospect of one's slaved-for retirement being obliterated or at least ruined by degenerative conditions like coronary artery disease, diabetes, osteoarthritis or, perish the thought, cancer. Fitting in the runs and gym sessions never gets easier. Who wants to go and work-out after a 10 hour stint in the office? Who wants to get up early in the morning for a run when you only finished your work after midnight the night before? Not me! But how about if getting to and from work were your exercise? Could that work? Well it might, the biggest caveats being Cape Town's weather (but the Dutch manage and their weather is absolutely dreadful) and the distance (I live about 30km from the office). Maybe riding 30km over a mountain pass at 5 pm after a hard day's work might not be the most attractive option imaginable...

These were the thoughts which were swirling around in the whirlpool I call my mind when I came across the Ezeebike website. The machines looked really interesting and the prices, though a good deal more than one would pay for a banger from Makro, were nothing like what I hear serious cyclists are paying for their steeds. They featured a story about two cyclists who had taken their Ezeebikes all the way from the Caprivi strip in northern Namibia to Cape Town, a distance of perhaps 3000km. Sounded enticing. On the spur of the moment I filled in the "contact me for a test ride" section and then forgot about it. A week or so later I got an email from a fellow in Blauuwbergstrand, inviting me to come and try one. Herself and I duly made the trip one fine Saturday afternoon. We were shown how to work the bikes and allowed to take a 20 minute ride around Big Bay, which is one of the prettier parts of Cape Town's northern suburbs. We were blown away! (not literally, I am happy to say). Two weeks later we proudly took delivery of two demonstration models - a "Sprint" for herself and a "Torq" for me.

Maybe I should explain how they work. Under the seat is a large battery. It makes up about a third of the price and quite a bit of the weight. You charge it from your domestic power supply and it takes about 4 hours if the battery is totally flat. On the handle bars is a little indicator which tells you how much charge you have - no numbers, just green, yellow or red - thankfully designed for the technically challenged amongst us. The right handle grip is the "throttle". If you switch on the motor and twist the grip, the bike leaps forward - you actually have to be quite careful. The motor itself is inside the front wheel hub. Don't ask how it works - it was explained to me and I think I understood at the time, but I have forgotten the details. I do know that it delivers a maximum of 250 watts which is enough to propel you at around 25kph on the flat if you don't pedal at all, but small enough that it doesn't need to be licensed as a motor vehicle. The range is said to be around 30km, but it obviously depends on the number of hills, how much you weigh, how much you pedal, the wind speed and direction, etc. All fairly simple and straightforward. Ezeebike are made in and imported from China, but are sold in Europe and the USA as well, as far as I understand.

My biggest frustration was that, having taken delivery of the bikes, we did not get a chance to ride them for at least a week. There was too much else going on, much of it rather tedious stuff. Eventually we decided that we would ride to Simonstown and back, a round trip of about 16km, on Saturday morning - we needed to be there for a soccer tournament which the princesses were playing in. Saturday dawned bright and reasonably fair. The forecast was for intermittent showers and a fresh westerly wind - the end of a cold front which had just passed through. We packed a bag with warm tops, apples, juices and the like, and set off. Central Fish Hoek is not terribly hilly, but there are some fairly challenging little slopes which can make for uncomfortable moments in the saddle. So imagine coming to one of them, and instead of having to change down to first gear and pedal hard, even stand on your pedals, you just carry on pedaling in the gear you are in, and turn the throttle far enough to allow you to do so. You hear a faint whine from the motor, you feel a surge of power like your father is pushing you on your first bike, and you smile beatifically as you whizz up the hill. Bliss! This is how cycling was supposed to be. No pain!

I won't bore you with a blow by blow account of every kilometer and gear change - it just got better and better. After the soccer, on the way home, we decided to ride over the Glen Cairn Expressway instead of just taking the coastal road straight back to Sunny Cove and Fish Hoek. I have both ridden and run up that hill. It is about 3km long and I guess you rise about 120m, (according to the trusty Endomondo, from 39m to 166m) so an average gradient of about 1:25, which may not sound like much but it is tough. Add to that a headwind. The long and short of it is at it was an absolute pleasure. I managed to maintain a speed of 20kph going up, with a fair bit of throttle, I admit, and felt exercised but not sore or exhausted when I arrived at the top. From there we had a gentle ride down into the Valley and so on to our home.

The next challenge is Boyes Drive and after that the ride to work and back. But one step at a time. For now I am happy to be an Ezeebiker and optimistic that I may have found a mode of transport which is green, healthy, cheap (relatively) and fun. I expect there may be a few more blogs on the subject coming ...

Another trip to the land of the brave and the free

Sunday

I was almost forty years old before I left the African continent for the first time. It was a huge deal for me. I remember getting off the plane that first trip to Austria and walking out of Vienna airport, half expecting the ground below my feet would somehow feel different to what I was used to in good old South Africa. Of course it didn't.

Since then I have had the good or bad fortune to travel quite frequently and widely for business and occasionally leisure, including a good number of trips to the United States. So it is getting a little familiar now, though not too familiar - I still worry about their rather intimidating immigration control processes, wondering whether I will be the unlucky one to get on the wrong side of the officials and be selected out for an “interview”. It is getting easier, however, and I do genuinely enjoy visiting the US, Washington particularly, which almost feels like a second home to me now. I can negotiate the Metro, the Ride On bus system; even drive the beltway on the "wrong" side of the road if I have to.

This particular trip I had to attend a full-day meeting on a Wednesday, so decided to leave on a Sunday and return on a Saturday, giving me 3 full days there to do other things. So it was that herself dropped me off at Cape Town International Airport on a really foul Sunday afternoon, early enough that she would be able to get home and still have an afternoon nap before church. I checked my baggage and made my way through security. Instead of heading for the business lounge, my usual haunt, I went to Exclusive Books, since I had been sent a R15 voucher in the post which I was keen to redeem. I picked up a copy of Nelson Mandela's "Long Walk to Freedom", which I have for some reason never got around to reading, despite the fact that I greatly admire Mandela and the book has been around for over 15 years. It is a thick book, over 700 pages I think, which I thought wryly would stand (literally!) me in good stead for the queues I expected at Dulles airport.

I usually fly via Europe when I travel to the US but this time I decided to take the direct flight from Johannesburg to Washington. It isn't entirely correct to call it direct since it stops in Dakar, Senegal for a variable time, but at least one doesn't have to get off. In Johannesburg I spent a productive 30 minutes in the newly opened business lounge, which has been designed to be very African - I think it works quite well. The main thing is it is quiet and smoke free and has free wifi and fee wine and beer. I don't really care about the rest. We boarded rather early, but left on time. I found my window seat and got quite excited because when they closed the doors the seat next to me was still vacant, raising the possibility of a more comfortable trip. Alas, the occupant was chatting to a friend a few rows back and appeared in due course. Once we were airborne I ordered a Windhoek light and got stuck into my book - "Franny and Zooey" by JD Salinger - very interesting, but that is probably for another blog. Then dinner arrived - chicken or beef, or was it mutton or fish, I forget - whatever it was, it wasn't terribly palatable nor was that terribly unusual. One gets used to airline food, which I guess is bad. Dinner eaten and cleared away, I devoted myself to the iPad, first to write an email and then to read (Salinger finished) "Room with a view", by EM Forster, on the eBook reader I had downloaded, nice experience - just makes reading that much easier. And of course some nice music on the iPod program of the iPad. Really good - I like this toy.

 

The Johannesburg Washington flight is legendary - or should I say notorious? I expect there are longer flights or flight combinations but they cannot be much longer - not flights where one is confined to one aircraft continuously for a set amount of time, which in this case is anything from 18 to 19 hours, depending on how long they stop for in Dakar. In business class that may be survivable - in economy it is brutal. Add to that the fact that our aircraft was one of those old ones with just one TV screen for the whole cabin and one movie playing on it - you get my drift - not a terribly enjoyable experience. I think I'll go back to flying via Europe.

I should make mention of the Dakar stop because it really is rather odd. A few passengers get off and a few get on. That is not odd. What is odd is the security check. One is asked to remove one's baggage from the overhead locker and sit with it on one's lap. Not terribly comfortable but okay. Then these Senegalese guys come on and search the empty lockers. Wherever they find a vacant seat they also search the magazine rack and take up both cushions to look underneath. I guess they know what they are doing, just seems odd. You half expect them to bring on the sniffer dogs. Then the cleaners come on, and the new aircrews, and then you get underway again. Presumably they also refuel.

Monday

Eventually we arrived at Dulles. The last few hundred km were quite pleasant as we came in over Chesapeake Bay and made a wide arc over Maryland north of DC before crossing the Potomac just downriver of Point of Rocks and making our final approach to Dulles. It was exciting to pick out a few landmarks - I felt like I was in familiar territory. The cabin attendants had brought around a number of forms - green forms, white forms, blue forms. I showed my passport and was given a green form plus a blue customs form, both of which I dutifully filled in. We touched down around 11 a.m. in sunny, clear weather with little fuss and taxied to our bay - it seemed fairly quiet. We alighted, or "deplaned" as the Americans love to say (they also say "detrained" on the Amtrak, which had amused us) and made our way along passages and up and down escalators, rode in a mobile lounge and finally arrived in passport control. Now last time I was here the queues were about 10 "layers" deep on the "non US citizen" side and it literally took me 2 hours to get through, so that was what I was expecting. I was delighted and somewhat flabbergasted to find, therefore, only about 12 people ahead of me in the queue. An officer checked my passport and asked me whether I had completed an ESTA application electronically (which I had) - "Then you don't need the green form" he said. Okay - live and learn. It would be nice if they all sang from the same hymnbook. The officer at the booth was an attractive women in her twenties, I would say, who asked me a few questions and let me through - what a pleasure, and what a difference. Someone must have given them all a public relations course since I last visited. Maybe I was just in a better frame of mind.

I found my baggage, cleared customs (again, a casual wave of the official's hand) and exited to the departure hall. I found the Supershuttle desk and got a ticket from a young man who couldn't have looked less interested or more bored if his life had depended on it. "Where'r ya goin'?" he drawled. "Hilton Garden Inn Shady Grove Road Rockville - Gaithersburg" I read from my cell phone calendar. He punched something into his computer and informed me that I owed him $30. I gave him my credit card to swipe. He told me I needed to find van 139 which would be outside and to the right. I lugged my bags outside into the blistering midday sun and found the van, but there was no driver. I looked at my ticket. "Hilton, Rockville". Now if you know Rockville you will know that the two are about 5km apart, too far to walk and inconvenient to take the bus with baggage. Besides I had paid. By this stage the driver had appeared: a short, squat guy who looked Chinese, or at any rate Oriental. I explained the situation. "Gaithersburg more money," he said, "you need to change". So I lugged my stuff back in the heat to the disinterested young man who was unrepentant and unapologetic, averring that it all cost the same anyway. Back to the driver who received the news badly and looked like he was about to have a fit or a stroke or both. But by this stage I was gatvol, to use a good Afrikaans word. I gave him the ticket and told him to go and sort it out, which I am glad to say he did. Five baking minutes later he re-appeared and said it was ok, he would take me, no extra charge. I climbed into the air-conditioned van thankfully. A few minutes later we were on the highway heading for the beltway and Washington. We crossed the Potomac, made a stop on Wisconsin Avenue near Pook’s Hill, a name which always amused us when we lived there, and then headed up the I-270 towards Rockville. He found the hotel without much trouble. I asked him to wait while I went in and drew some dollars so that I could give him a tip. $40 including the tip is pretty good, considering it must be about 40km from the airport to the hotel. I have paid a lot more than that in New York and elsewhere. Even in Cape Town it would cost more than that I suspect. Supershuttle offers a good service even if some of their more junior staff members do need a stick of dynamite up their backsides.

My room was on the 6th floor, facing Shady Grove Road, looking north I guess. I settled in, figured out the Internet, caught up some emails, spoke to herself on Skype and had a shower. The temptation was to sleep, but I wanted to try a new jetlag strategy so I resisted it and instead took a walk down to Research Boulevard where I knew there is a Citibank branch - I needed to see them about getting a new card. Of course, I had forgotten it was a holiday (Memorial Day) and so the bank was closed, but it was a pleasant, if rather hot, walk, part of it along the Rockville Millennium Trail with its notice to "Beware of coyotes", which I remembered from before - not entirely sure whether to be alarmed or amused by it. On the banks of a small dam I passed, I saw an animal about the size of a small dog swimming, then clambering out onto the bank and running through the long grass and undergrowth - I assumed it must have been an otter.

Bank being closed and it being only about 3 pm I decided to walk up Research Boulevard to Washingtonian Boulevard where I knew there were some restaurants and shops. It was seriously hot and humid and I was wearing jeans, but it wasn't unpleasant and I needed the exercise after the long flight anyway. I took a slight detour at the top of Research Boulevard which took me around a dam where I encountered a flock of Canadian geese with goslings. Someone had warned me that they can be aggressive when with young so I kept my distance and just took a couple of pictures. Even that occasioned a few hisses. I also had to negotiate a large open field, which struck me as odd in the middle of suburbia but it was evident that they are in the process of turning it into more townhouses anyway. Pity - it was rather nice.

Washingtonian Boulevard is essentially a string of hotels and shops which runs parallel to the I-270 freeway. Between the two they have created a lake and boardwalk which is quite pleasant. I visited a few shops - Dick's sports I remembered from our time there, a huge sports shop where you can get just about anything. They had a lot of Redskins gear on sale (the local football team), but being proprietary branded stuff it was still expensive - $60 for a shirt, etc. I passed. I stopped by Barnes and Noble books, which is a great US institution, and picked up a gift for some American friends who have just had a baby and whose parents I would be seeing the next day. Then I wandered down to the Californian Pizza Kitchen and found myself a table on the verandah overlooking the lake and boardwalk. I ordered a Sam Adams beer and a mushroom pizza, and settled back to watch the crowds. People drifted past. I must say that most of them appeared to be overweight, some morbidly so, but every so often there was one in trainers and gym gear who looked like he wasn't about to have a coronary. They have a little train and carriages which trundles past every few minutes with its cargo of young kids and their parents, driven by a very bored looking guy. Well, I would be too, but I guess it is a job. On the lake, pedal-powered duck-shaped boats moved slowly back and forward, generally with Mom and Dad pedaling and the kids telling them to pedal faster or go this way or chase that goose. It was a nice picture of family life, blissful or otherwise. Washington is extremely cosmopolitan, and I saw what seemed like the United Nations pass before me in one afternoon, an aspect of the city which I always enjoy - we never felt out of place there, because there were so many others who like us we not native Americans. I suspect it might not have quite been the case if we had been in a city in the mid-West, say.

By the time my pizza arrived I had finished my beer, so I ordered another one - in retrospect probably not a great idea given that I was sleep deprived and a little dehydrated, possibly hypoglycemic but there you are - I was thirsty and the beer was good. By the time I left I was full - it was a good pizza - and a little light headed. I paid the bill ($25) and walked slowly back to the hotel. By this stage it was getting on for evening and though still very warm, it was no longer oppressive and I enjoyed the walk, which took me about half an hour, more. I discovered that right next to my hotel was a small shopping centre which sported a Starbucks, a Panera's and a Chipotle's as well as a few other outlets. I picked up half a dozen bagels and headed for my room. I took a short swim in the hotel's heated pool (would actually have appreciated it more if it had not been heated) and Jacuzzi, then did a bit more work, but by 9 pm could no longer keep my eyes open so turned in. I did wake at 12, and every hour thereafter till I finally got up at 6 but the difference was that I went back to sleep and didn't lie in bed for hours feeling like I had just had 3 double espresso's. I think my plan worked.

Tuesday

Breakfast was a fairly conventional affair. The hotel dining room had the grand name of The Great American Grill, but was really just a breakfast nook with a kitchen. I avoided the cooked menu and had some fruit, cereal, a bagel with Philadelphia cream cheese and a cup of coffee, which was more than enough for me. Then I retired to my room to catch up on a truckload of work, emerging around noon. I had a meeting at George Washington University at 3 and still needed to get to the bank so I repeated the walk of the day before. This time the bank was open and they were able to sort out my card issue. I must comment that my experience of US banks is very positive. Compared to their counterparts in SA, they are highly efficient, customer friendly and cheap. I was told that I could pick up my card the next day after noon. Now that is good service, I think. Also they routinely stay open till 5 pm. I then took the 54 Ride on bus to Rockville station. I wasn't sure what the fare was but imagined it would still be less than $2 - the driver said $1.70 I think. The machine swallowed my bills and didn't give me change. OK. No problem - I can spare 30 cents for Montgomery County. I had a smart card for the metro but it didn't have any money on it. I had to top it up at Rockville station. The metro trip would cost $3, as it was off-peak. That is quite a bit more than one would pay in Cape Town (about $1) but the service is better - cleaner, faster, safer, more comfortable, more convenient. I love the Washington metro - I can see that riding it every day, one might become blasé about it, but as with flying, I am amazed afresh every time I take it at the engineering masterpiece that it is.

I had a bit of time to kill so instead of going straight to Foggy Bottom / GWU, I got off at Metro Centre and took the Orange Line to Smithsonian, the exit of which is in the National Mall, between the Capitol Building and the Washington Monument, right next to the Smithsonian Castle. For some reason I took the wrong exit (most metro stations have 2 which are sometimes quite far apart) and came out a little way from the mall. Making my way back to the mall, I passed through an attractive garden, named after someone whose name I forget, but right next to it I noticed the rather modest, unobtrusive Museum of African Art and decided to have a look. Most of Washington's (very fine) museums are free to visit, as was this one. I am not sure what I expected but the exhibits were delightful and I spent a happy hour learning about African art, mainly West African I must say. At the museum shop, I bought myself a rather gaudy bag which came from Rwanda, from some AIDS orphans project there. Then it was time to go, so I made my way back down to the metro station and caught the orange line train to Vienna, getting off at Foggy Bottom, which is right at GWU.

After our meetings we went for dinner at a restaurant in Bethesda. I forget the name of the place, but it was on Wisconsin Avenue. I ordered scallops, more because I had never had them than for any other reason. They were ... umm ... chewy. Not unpleasant, but I don't think I'd go for them again. The calamari starter was good though. Our waiter was a large fellow who had altogether too much to say and not a lot of etiquette. The final straw was when he came by with the dirty dishes from another table in his right hand. Properly wishing to avoid talking to us while holding dirty dishes under our noses, he held the plates aloft while he prattled on about the qualities of the crème brûlée or whatever, but the result was that we had a conversation with his sweaty right armpit for a few excruciating minutes. Strike three. Don't think he got much of a tip (I didn't pay).

After dinner I took the metro back to Rockville station, the 54 bus back up to Shady Grove Road and walked the short distance back to my hotel. Everything worked like clockwork, which is how America generally is, in my experience. It is a welcome change to be able to take public transport at night and walk in the streets without much concern about being mugged, gang raped or murdered.

The whole of Wednesday was taken up by a meeting which was, well ... a meeting. A necessary evil I guess. Afterwards, I went home with a friend who lives in Virginia, about 30 km from my hotel. The original plan had been just to go for dinner, but it seemed to make sense to stay over and come in with him the next day. My friend is in his 60's and the last of his 7 kids has just graduated from college, so he is having, by his own admission, a delayed midlife crisis. His cars have always been what could best be described as functional - four wheel drive Subaru's and the like, usually unwashed and definitely unpolished, which he needed for getting up and down the very long unpaved driveway at his semi rural estate. His midlife crisis car, on the other hand, is far more than functional - he bought himself a top of the range 5 liter Mercedes 2-door convertible which is just ... beautiful, raw power, driving pleasure. We headed out along route 28 towards Point of Rocks and Virginia, and I could see that this was something he enjoyed. The one hour each way commute was far more than a tedious daily necessity: in this car it was an adventure. He showed me some of the features - the radar which keeps you a set distance from the car ahead, the roll bar which pops up should the wheels leave the ground. Just amazing.

We didn't go straight to his home - he took me over some back roads and showed me the abodes of some of his neighbors - worthy Virginian law-abiding folks, if wealthy ones. Loudon County is the wealthiest of Virginia's more than 50 counties, I was told.

We arrived at his house and were met by his lovely wife and the one daughter who still currently lives at home. I was shown my room, dumped my stuff, and we then headed off to dinner, which was to be in Lovettsville, a nearby village with 2 restaurants, of which we chose one. I forget the name but it was in a converted one storey house. I ordered a mushroom pasta dish, which was excellent, and we washed down our food with a great local Chardonnay called Chrysalis. I had chocolate crème brûlée for desert which was also excellent. We drove back through another village and over some different untarred roads - all very pretty and I found myself thinking that I could be happy here. It had wholesomeness to it, if a rather expensive feeling wholesomeness. Some of the estates are horse breeding estates. My friend assured me that one of them even has its own race track. I decided to have a lie down when we got back and basically passed out for the night, getting up in the small hours to get out of my work clothes and into my pajamas. Must have been really tired, and the wine no doubt helped.

Thursday

Next morning I was up early and showered. The sun wasn't up yet, but it was light so I took a walk up the drive and along one or two of the roads. There was a cool predawn wind blowing in, the birds were calling and it was really pretty. American flags flapped lazily in every second garden - a habit I still can't quite get used to. The sun rose over a low ridge, lighting up the houses and trees. Just lovely. My friend called me on my mobile to tell me that breakfast was ready. I don't normally eat much breakfast but he had prepared it specially. We sat on his patio and ate what he called a traditional Southern breakfast. It consisted of Quaker grits (like what we call mielie pap), Smithfield ham (the pigs are evidently fed on peanuts and this gives the ham a certain flavor) and "red eye gravy". Of course I asked about the origin of the name. He said it is disputed. Some say it is because one makes it with coffee which contains caffeine and keeps you awake, thus the red eye. The other theory is that if you put it in an oval gravy boat and leave it to cool, the way the fatty and watery layers separate characteristically has the appearance of a reddish eye. Whatever. It was pleasant. Again, not sure I would go out of my way to source it, order or eat it again, but it is always nice, I think, to experience local cuisine, local wines and local beers, and learn something about them, rather than just eating and drinking the expected. I enjoyed it.

Then it was another adventurous ride back to the hotel in the "beast". We stopped off at a small general dealer and gas station where the beast consumed $64 of gas. That is 16 gallons/ 64 liters at current prices, almost twice the capacity of the tank of my little Peugeot 107, and he told me a full tank is 20 gallons. I could see this was not a cheap car to run. The tyres looked like they cost a good few hundred dollars each and we won't talk about repairs and insurance. But hey, he loves it and he has worked long and hard to get it.

Back at the hotel, I used the few free hours to catch up on emails, then met another friend for lunch at one of the local restaurants. I hadn't seen him for a few years and it was good to catch up. I had a swordfish kebab and he had the beef, with a pita bread and hummus starter and diet Pepsi to wash it down. He dropped me off at Shady Grove station and I caught the metro through to Dupont Circle in DC, where my next meeting was. This is the older part of DC and there are some very beautiful colonial style houses in the area, also so called "embassy row" quite nearby, which is largely same olde houses converted into embassies, South Africa's amongst them. I had an hour to kill before my meeting at 4 so walked down "P" Street (sic), to what I thought was Rock Creek Park, but turned out to be Rock Creek Parkway - they have built the arterial road right up the creek, so to speak - well I guess they had to put it somewhere. So no park. I found a bottle store and picked up a bottle of Nederburg Pinotage for $12.95, the only bottle of South African wine in the shop - at least it is a halfway decent example of what we are capable of producing. That is also not a bad price - we wouldn't pay much less for it in Cape Town or even at the Nederburg estate, I don't think. I also popped into CVS pharmacy for some odds and ends, and Panera's for 2 chocolate brownies. I found the building where I had a meeting scheduled with (another) friend and colleague and managed to get past their rather overzealous security. My friend duly appeared and I presented her with the brownies - she had just come off her third teleconference for the day and I thought she needed resuscitation. She gratefully accepted and we made for the office kitchen where we brewed some fresh coffee and ate our brownies, while she caught me up on her job and we discussed possible areas of overlap and opportunities for working together. Then we got in her car and headed for her place in Falls Church, Virginia.

We stopped off at a deli near her house. "Do you eat Lebanese?" she asked. "I eat just about anything except Brussels sprouts," I assured her, which is true. Okay, I don't do brains or eyes or tripe, but I have eaten Mopani worms, which is more than most umlungu's can say, and liked them. She asked me if I would like to choose from what they had on offer. It all looked good, but unfamiliar, so I said I would trust her judgment and asked her to choose.

We got to her house, a modest double storey semi-detached in a quiet cul de sac, opened a bottle of Virginia white (it was still quite hot outside), sat out on the patio and chatted while we waited for her husband to arrive home. He is a physicist who does work for the CIA or FBI or something, so that was one avenue of polite conversation which wasn't going to be open. Fortunately he is a really easy going guy and he has also just acquired an iPad, so there was lots else to talk about. The food was excellent - will certainly do Lebanese again if I get the chance. My friend, who has lived in Saudi Arabia, tells me that Lebanese is by far the best cuisine in the Middle East. Before we knew it, it was 9.30. My friend was kind enough to drive me back to my hotel, saving me a long metro trip (orange line then red line) and bus trip (if the buses were still running, otherwise a very long walk from Rockville Station). It had been a long day, and I was grateful to flop down on my bed in front of the TV and drift off.

Friday

I had arranged to be picked up from my hotel at 7.30 so was up at 5 getting my stuff together. By 7 I was downstairs for my last hotel breakfast and by 7.30 I was outside waiting. The temperature had dropped a good few degrees and it was really pleasant - very slight breeze, lovely and mild. My friend and his wife (different friend) arrived and I got into his Mercedes 4 by 4 amidst lots of "How ARE you's". Our experience when we lived in the US was that "How ARE you?" generally means "Hello" rather than actually being a question about your wellbeing. With these particularly friends, however, it really did mean "How are you?" and not only how are you but how is herself and princess firstborn and princess second-born, all of whom they had known and come to like. It was a joyful reunion.

The rest of the morning was filled with a number of similar reunions, people I had worked with and become friends with, who for one reason or another have ended up working for one particular company. One of them was kind enough to take me down to the mall, where I bought the required 2 boxes of chocolate brownie premix and some t-shirts for the princesses. We lunched at Panera's, which still makes an excellent ham sandwich, I am happy to report. I bought a baker’s dozen assorted bagels for herself. Then one of them drove me to Dulles - not a small favor, I should add, given that it is about 40 km on busy freeways and he would need to come back to the office before going home. They really are incredibly hospitable people.

So it was that I ended up back at Dulles. Before I checked in I had to buy another suitcase - what with the bagels and all, I couldn't fit everything in the bag I had brought. Never learn! I found one and also bought myself a neck support for the plane. I suspect that I didn't get the greatest deal on the suitcase, but they didn't have a huge selection of shops, or of goods within the shops. In fact I got the impression that all the shops were one chain, since the cases and prices were identical. Closed shop, so to speak - I thought such practices would be illegal in the US, of all places. Whatever. Bought one and stuffed everything in it, including the bagels, then checked it in, to be told that my cabin luggage weighed 10kg and should only be 8kg, but that it was ok. Well if it is ok, why bother telling me? Passport control and security were tedious, but no more tedious than at other large international airports, and the staff were friendly enough, even if they were quite obviously deadly serious about their jobs.

I took the connecting underground train to terminal A and found gate A15. There were already passengers waiting, despite the fact that it was a good hour before boarding time. I wandered up the terminal's central passage looking at the shops. There was a memorabilia shop called America or Americana or something. Some of it was fairly inflammatory and I couldn't see myself wearing it in Cape Town - t-shirts reading "justice done!" and something about the Navy seals who killed bin Laden. That would go down really well in the bo-Kaap, I don't think! But there was good stuff as well. I settled on two metal name plates for the princesses made to look like US number plates (which are far more interesting than South African ones). Then I bought a bagel and jelly for $1.99, finishing my US currency, and went and sat at the gate, reading my "Long Walk". It had been a long walk, but not as long as his!

We boarded early and took off on time - there was a queue of seven aircraft waiting to take off. Finally it was our turn. One thing about big airliners is that they seem to be able to get airborne without it feeling as though they are about to fall to pieces. We just effortlessly glided down the runway and eased up into the airspace over Virginia, then out over Maryland and Delaware and soon there was just the blue expanse of the Atlantic below. Goodbye America, for now anyway. Stay well. Salani kahle.

Saturday

Of course one doesn't just leave the US - it takes a while to get back to Africa - a long while if you're talking about South Africa. Seventeen hours and counting, I am still confined in seat number 37K, but the view from the window has admittedly changed some. Now it is the dry expanses of Namibia which grace my portal. I cannot see well enough to distinguish vacant land from settled land at this altitude, but it wouldn't really surprise me if there are no settlements at all in the expanse of Africa I am looking at and therein lies the difference. You would struggle to find a vista like this in the US, certainly on the East coast. Soon we shall touchdown in Johannesburg, then I shall fly on to Cape Town, my lovely family, and our own wonderful bed, which has served us well these many years and still beats any hotel bed that I have ever slept on. Enough for now - adventures are fine but should be rationed. A bit of normality every now and then will be welcome.

A site familiar to any Washingtonian ... the Metro.

The Capitol building and the National Mall

A rather fine horse and rider in the Museum of African Art, 

from Mali, I think they said 16th Century

Rural Virginian sunrise

It certainly looks peaceful ...

Local Elections 2011

Between 22 April and 18 May 2011 we had four public holidays. This sort of thing makes my US colleagues very envious, a little angry and most of all, somewhat suspicious - like we're pulling the wool or taking the piss. But we aren't - they just happened. And the last was the best because it was a Wednesday - I love Wednesday holidays because you can get a lot done on Monday and Tuesday, have a good break on Wednesday and then put in a good spurt again before the weekend. I think there is a good case for making them a permanent feature of our monthly calendar. Down with 5 day weeks, say !. Of course we all work through our holidays and weekends anyway, but that is beside the point - at least we can do it from the comfort of our bedrooms.

Wednesday was Local Elections 2011 voting day. I have lost track of elections but I guess there was one in 2006, 2001 and 1996. I don't remember 1996 - we must have been in KZN. Maybe we voted. The princesses would have been very young. One of the others I missed because my ID document had gone missing, presumed stolen (actually turned out I had misplaced it). 17 years after the advent of democracy in SA we still get sufficiently excited about voting to at least make it down to the Civic Centre to make our crosses. Well, I do anyway. And two thirds of Cape Town did this year as well. Political talk dominated our  coffee machine social circle and the airwaves for a couple of weeks before the big day, so we were well primed. I was disappointed that no-one phoned or came round to ask me to vote for their party. Maybe they did and we just weren't in.

The day before the elections I went onto the IEC website to check that I was registered. I was, as was herself. I also downloaded and printed the list of candidates for the ward vote and the list of parties for the proportional representation vote. That was a shock. I had never heard of any of the candidates and I had never heard of at least half the parties. My fault I guess - should have attended those meetings, read those articles and listened to those programs. The result was that by the time I got to the polling station I hadn't altogether made up my mind whom to vote for.

The morning dawned bright and beautiful. We took full advantage and got in a lie-in, and a morning gym session before heading for the booths along with Princess Firstborn - her first vote. There was a fairly lengthy queue of people but it appeared to be moving and everyone seemed to be in a tolerably good mood with one or two noticeable exceptions - the tall fellow with dreadlocks who was manning one of the party tables looked like he had dropped a 100 rand note and picked up half a cent, and a lady who had failed to register and was now trying to make it the problem of the electoral officer.

We shuffled forward slowly, enjoying the sunshine and the vibe. A very old lady came out, helped by a nurse and we moved aside to let her through. "Thank you", she said. "Thank you", I returned, "for taking the trouble to come out and vote". "Young man", she said, "at my age, my vote is worth a million rands!" Couldn't quite follow the logic of that but I said "Good for you!" anyway.

A car drew up with an elderly couple in the back seat. The driver got out and opened the door - he was presumably a younger friend or relative. Mr Dreadlocks immediately sprang into action and started moving them towards the front of the queue. The driver said something about "You'll have to fight to get them to the front" to which he replied loudly "No problem, I've been fighting for liberation my whole bloody life". He looked about 25! And the point was that noone there would so much as thought of not letting them jump the queue. Idiot. Well that made my mind up - I voted for the other party.

The princess was a little overawed by the occasion. Not sure what she expected - tick the wrong box and the men in masks spring out and carry you away? The staff were all very friendly and helpful and very soon we were in the booths and making our marks, placing our papers in the boxes and leaving the station. My vote was one in a million cast in the province, I believe. So you could say it didn't matter. It certainly wouldn't have mattered in my ward, where the winning candidate got 92% of the vote, if I had stayed in bed. In a way, one votes mainly for one's own benefit - one gives oneself the right to crticise the government of the day, if one has participated in the election. If one hasn't, one should shut up. At least, that is my view.

Civic duty done for another 3 years - I went back to bed. When the results came out I emailed the Handsome Masha to ask how his "Trotskyist End Necrophilia Party" had done - he said they had been too poor to stand, but next time ...

Safari 2011

Normally the 2 Oceans and the Safari are about 4 weeks apart - the former is always on Easter Saturday and the latter on the Workers' Day (1st May) weekend Saturday. This year Easter Saturday fell on April 23rd and this meant that there were just 9 days between the two races, since they shifted the Safari to the 2nd May, which was a public holiday. No problem I thought. Silly me.

I arranged to collect the Handsome Masha at 5 since it was a good hour's drive to Wellington, where the race was being held. I got lost trying to find his house in Plumstead - the street names are small and illegible, and I didn't have my glasses on. Finally found it a little after five, which meant that by the time he got into the car I had heard the 5 a.m. news bulletin - Osama bin Laden had been killed by US forces. I guess it is one of those things one will always remember - I remember exactly where I was (driving back from Worcester on the N1 near Bellville) when I first heard news of the 9/11 terrorism. The Masha hadn't heard so we discussed the implications for a while as we headed north and then north east to Wellington. He has Islamic routes but is not a practicing Muslim and his views are normally a good mix of politics, philosophy and religion, which I find useful.We decided that OBL's death was probably not great news, given the likely reprisals on countless innocent people, not to mention travel delays to people such as us!

For once I took the right turnoff from the N1 (the R44) and before we knew it we were there. Well, in Wellington anyway. The trick is then to find parking which is reasonably close to the stadium. We finally opted for a recreation park. I was worreid about getting out so tried to squeeze the car (which isn't very large) into a space up on the perimeter,  an action which elicited a rather loud (as in meant to be heard) and sarky comment from the fellow standing next to the car alongside of "Moenie worry as hy jou motor scrape nie - dis niksnie!" (Don't worry if he scrapes your car - it's nothing). I got the hint and moved along about ten spaces, till I found another (better) spot next to a park bench also on the perimeter. We arranged to meet at the bench after the race.

Then it was a careful application of "glide" to the inner thighs, get the chest strap, earphones, Blackberry and  pouch sorted out, check and double check that the car was locked and head for the start, along with a gazillion others. We passed a number of portable toilets, each with an accompanying long queue. By the time we got to the start, I needed a loo myself, having had a cup of coffee en route. There appeared to be about 10 cubicles and around 30 people in the queue. This can't take too long, I thought. Well it did! The queue crawled along. I had lots of time to spare but it really was tedious. We had finally made it to just about the front when a friend of the bloke in front of me in the queue approached and informed us that this queue was for the ladies' toilet - the men's was "over there" and there was no queue since it was a "standing arrangement". Which it was - very quick, in and out. There are definitely some advantages to being male, even if one cannot multitask.

The race was ... well it was a pretty normal half marathon - usual frustrations, usual challenges. I was doing pretty well until around 13km despite some ups and down, with laps all under 6.30, many under 6 minutes (which is good for me). One then climbs about 100m in the space of around 4km, and my lap times went south - all over 6.30, some over 7, one over 8. One then drops those same 100m altitude in the final 4km, but by that stage I felt so stuffed that the best I could do was keep up a 6.30 so eventually clocked in at 2:18, just slower than my 2 Oceans (despite the quicker start). So not a great race - just ran out of energy.

On the other hand the race had many positives. I really enjoyed listening to Eagles, Elton John and Mannfred Mann while I ran. Not sure if it slowed me down or sped me up but it made it more enjoyable. I enjoyed the countryside, which really is lovely, with the farms around you the and mountains above and in the distance, the smells of woodfires, but also of cattle manure and once or twice things cooking. The little kids at the side of the road shouting "Hou bene hou! Hou bene hou!" which I guess is best translated as "Keep going legs, keep going". A female prison warder as we passed the Wellington prison, who spotted a colleague (I presumed) running, let out a loud shriek and careered after him, caught him up and fondly slapped him across the back of the head - he didn't seem to mind. She was rather large and very loud. And herself phoning me at around the 13km mark to ask if I was OK - that was a first. In-between puffs and gasps I managed to get out that I was.

The finish line eventually appeared and I gratefully accepted my medal and Pepsi and phoned herself to let her know that I was still alive and that she should hold off with the funeral arrangements. I made the mistake of sitting down on the grass to recover and very nearly couldn't get up again. I watched the runners and walkers coming in - some looked happy, some looked in pain, some just looked blank - I expect I looked like that. I didn't spot the Masha so made my way back to the car and had just got comfortable on the bench (Masha had the keys) when I heard a familiar voice say rather loudly "Now who's f**king crazy idea was it to run this race? Must have been yours!" - the Handsome Masha had returned.

We compared times, commiserated with each other about the toughness of the event and decided to head home. I somehow managed to fold my rigor mortis like legs into the car and we set off. It was not a comfortable journey but we made it home OK, just in time to go out again for herself's birthday lunch. Fortaunetly, P:rincess Firstborn now has a drivers licence, so I handed her the keys, got into the back with herself and pretended to be Prince William - ride on, James!

I think next year I may skip the Safari. Nice race but just wasn't ready for it.

Title	Safari
Sport	Running
Start Time	May 2, 2011 7:13 AM
Distance	21.23 km
Duration	2h:18m:23s
Avg Speed	6:31 min/km
Max Speed	4:36 min/km
Calories	1797 kcal
Altitude	147 m / 256 m
Elevation	121 m ↑ / 121 m ↓
Heart Rate	- / -

Invictus

Tonight they showed the movie "Invictus" on MNET. I had heard a fair bit about it - it has been out 2 years already - but had not seen it, so I was rather pleased that I had the opportunity - a cool, rather miserable night, so an excuse for soup and rolls and a couple of glasses of pinotage in front of the gas heater, and what better to do than to watch a nice feelgood movie, with a great director (Clint Eastwood) and actors of the caliber of Morgan Freeman and Matt Damon. I knew the basic plot about it being built around the unlikely alliance between our ex-president Nelson Mandela (then president) and our ex-Springbok rugby captain Francois Pienaar. In fact I remember quite clearly the final match which is also the climax of the film - I was mowing my lawn and could hear the roars of my next door neighbours who were big rugby fans erupting every few minutes. I played rugby at school, and enjoy watching the game, but for me it has never been a religion or a matter of life and death, the way it appears to be for many of my white South African friends and colleagues.

So the story wasn't new to me, although I enjoyed it anyway. I liked the clever way Eastwood tries to show how playing in and winning the cup had brought black and white South Africans together - little touches like the mixed security detail celebrating together, black fans gathering in a township shabeen to watch, white "madams" and black domestic workers hugging each other, and the best one, a white policeman dancing around in jubilation with a black street kid on his shoulders, after he had earlier told him to "Voetsak! Hamba!" for supposed loitering - all very moving and I guess even possibly true.

What I didn't know about was the poem Invictus, which is of course central to the story. Mandela tells Pienaar that he used often to read or recite it during his days in prison on Robben Island, when things were really bad. He then writes it out for Pienaar and gives it to him the day before the big match against Australia. They win the macth and the day after they are taken to visit Robben Island, and in particular the (very small) cell which was Mandela's home for so many lonely years - a visit which makes a huge impact on Pienaar.

I looked the poem up - turns out (according to Wikipedia) it was written by the English poet William Ernest Henley (1849–1903). "At the age of 12, Henley fell victim to tuberculosis of the bone. A few years later, the disease progressed to his foot, and physicians announced that the only way to save his life was to amputate directly below the knee. It was amputated when he was 17. In 1875, the Stoic ideal of indifference in the face of suffering inspired Henley to write his poem from a hospital bed. Despite his disability, he survived with one foot intact and led an active life until his death at the age of 53."

Out of the night that covers me,

Black as the pit from pole to pole,

I thank whatever gods may be

For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance

I have not winced nor cried aloud.

Under the bludgeonings of chance

My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears

Looms but the Horror of the shade,

And yet the menace of the years

Finds and shall find me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gait,

How charged with punishments the scroll,

I am the master of my fate:

I am the captain of my soul.

I am no judge of poetry. It is certainly better verse than I have ever written. Yet I find the assertion of invincibility worrying - I wonder whether true greatness does not lie in accepting and working around one's limitations, rather than deluding oneself that one has none. What I do like is the message in the last 2 lines - a message we could all profit from hearing in South Africa today, when half the population blames the old regime and the other half the new regime for whatever troubles us - a little acceptance of responsibility for making things work might go a long way. 

The final scene is both meaningful and moving. Mandela presents the trophy to Pienaar, the winning captain and they shake hands and look one another in the eye. "Thank you, Francois, for what you have done for our country", he says. "No, sir", says Pienaar, "thank You, for what You have done for our country!" Valour recognising greater valour, I guess. Pienaar was a great rugby player, probably a great captain, possibly a great man. But he isn't in Mandela's league and I expect he would be the first to admit that.

The movie had another effect on me - it reawakened in me some of the old idealism which propelled me in my twenties to work long hours with poor black patients in some of the most remote rural hospitals of the country for not very much pay. I resolved to read some of Madiba's writings - maybe they will inspire me to reclaim that vision and get back to a bit of nation building.