about south africa.

if there is one thing that i really sucked at, i think it has to be doing travelogues of the places that i have been to. especially the longer trips. i didn’t complete my honeymoon entries and it got stuck at rome, the day i went to the vatican. and there was the melbourne trip.. which was done halfway as well.. and the south africa ones, which concluded to only ONE entry post trip. and not to mention the melacca trip, which i have already LOST all pictures of because my darn computer crashed when i was doing backup and everything was gone. =X

der says because i travelled too much hence it was hard to write.. and now that i have the US trip coming in a few days.. its a wonder i chalk up a lot of backlog. but seriously, i dont think that was the reason!

you know what is the hardest part? sorting out the pictures. i had wanted to start the entries on south africa, because it is by far, the most memorable and unforgettable travel destination that i have been. the experiences have been amazing and so close to nature. if i could afford the time and money, i’ll spend my days trawling the safari and soaking in all that awesomeness. but alas, the truth is.. having 38GB (this is NOT a typo) worth of pictures to sieve through is really quite a pain in the arse.. let’s not go into converting them into jpeg or editing them cos i am just plain lazy, plus you really need a fast computer to even go through the pictures to select the ones that are better.

in case you are wondering, that’s what i have been doing for the past week.. so i shall try to write about my trip, even though its been 2 years since it happened. the trip happened because one of my uncles had to attend a medical conference in cape town, and the other is quite a fanatic for safari adventure (like me). we were just toggling about it and after some research, i was so darn set about heading there.. it has got to the trip that i did the the most research on, and decided, heck! i just HAD to go.

uncle andy and me flew into johannesburg from singapore on a red eye flight and scored a day more than my folks who came from seattle and landed in the evenings. we spent the day exploring the hotel area where it was all fenced up, with guards at the door with machine guns and when i attempted to head out, i found out we were serving a “jail sentence” of some sorts because you cannot leave the hotel without a chartered taxi and they cost a bomb (SGD$72 round trip), even if it was to go to the mall that is visible from my hotel window and probably 5 mins walk away. safety is a big issue there and i ended up taking the free shuttle to and fro from the airport because getting to shop at the airport is better than no shops at all!

we had brunch at spears steak ranches at the emperor’s palace and casino which was adjourning to our hotel (new peermount metcourt) within the fenced up area and signed up for a day tour to while the rest of the day away popping into nelson mandala’s house to read about his life stories, hector pieterson museum in soweto and of cos, checking out the famous slums where the living conditions were quite horrendous. we heard stories of how there was this white female report who ventured in with the intention to help, but was found dead subsequently. it is actually dangerous to even venture near if you are not a local, so we mainly sat in the car to observe and take pictures. you can read the adventures in depth in my earlier entry.

the whole country is prepping for the word cup that is being held in south africa the following year, hence all the decorations and salutations at the airport are all world cup themed. guess it was a good time to be there and soaking up all the atmosphere.

the stadium where world cup is being held at.. at the point in time, they were still building it!

right after our tour, we popped over to the airport in hope to receive our folks.. only to MISS THEM totally! we missed them by a few minutes while we were busy in the shops buying drinking water. argh. they got back to the hotel where i subsequently found my aunt napping in my room (and wondering where the hell we went!).

the night ended with a heavy weight stand up comedy that bore the socks off me and i was soooo hungry because we didnt eat dinner at all.