The Hidden Fence

Finally I had time to update my gallery to contain all my South African albums.

Have a look at the whole South Africa gallery (over 200 pictures) or at some of the highlights:

• First Game Animals (mentioned in the previous post)
• Kruger National Park (over 60 pictures)
  
• Renault F1 Roadshow

I would also like to point out the map feature: most of the pictures were geocoded using my N95 as a GPS receiver and the free GPicSync software. Like that you can see a small Google Map below all geocoded pictures as well as an overview over all images inside the albums.

I don’t want this blog to become a diary, but the story of the last weekend must be told. It could have been the nice story of my first sight of giraffe and warthog (almost) in the wild, but things turned differently…

The weather was not so good the last days and as I haven’t really been out of the city for almost two weeks, it was time to do another trip to visit Nora (a Swiss working for three months in an orphanage in Mookgophong).

I should have seen the bad omen already on Friday evening: as it was very cold again, I turned on all three heaters in the pool house (my “apartment”). This was a bad idea as the fuse went off - and of course not the one in my apartment but the one in the main house and as my lessors are out for holidays I had to call some of their relatives to come here just to put the fuse back on.

Saturday morning I spent as usually cycling and enjoyed the fact that the temperature was not below 10°C during the whole ride. After the usual Saturday shopping was done, I finally left for Mookgophong. Shortly before arriving in that small town about 200 km from Jo’burg the engine of my car started overheating and exactly when entering the town it just stopped and I couldn’t start it anymore. Thankfully Nora came and helped me to get my luggage to the place she lives. After a short refreshment we went out to search a workshop, we found one with a very friendly mechanic who repaired the car over night so we could go out to the countryside on Sunday.

It was on that trip where I saw the first wild animals from a public dirt road inside a fenced game farm: giraffes and warthogs. The warthogs didn’t really like us and left very quick for the bush, but the giraffe posed well for us. Only a few hundred meters further we saw a big ~3m snake (probably a python) lying at the roadside.

After we were making another photo stop at a small lake, my car didn’t start up anymore. Fortunately a farmer from a nearby farm came to help us start the car and we drove on the shortest way back to Mookgophong.

I was quite anxious that the car wouldn’t start but it went well and after refuelling I left to head back to Jo’burg. On the way back it happened: my car started overheating again and after a few kilometers I had to stop on the emergency lane because smoke came out of the engine. As it had to happen, the engine didn’t start anymore afterwards and I was there standing on the emergency lane trying to figure out what I wanted to do. I phone back to the workshop in Mookgophong and they tried to get help for me.

Suddenly another car stopped by and a friendly black man came and asked me whether he could help me. As he was driving to Centurion (~40km from Jo’burg), I asked him if he could bring me back home. He accepted and so we loaded all my luggage (including my precious laptop and digital camera) into his small van. There were two other women already lying there, but the front seat was still free so I could sit beside the driver.

I must admit I was feeling quite uncomfortable leaving my luggage with the two women, but it turned out I was totally wrong, when we drove through Pretoria to drop off one of them: we drove to the SAPS (South African Police Service) police school area. After a long drive through Pretoria and Centurion and after changing the car (to a smaller one) we finally arrived at my home. I served my “driver” some Spaghetti and thanked him by giving him some money for him and his kids.

After a not very calm night (thinking of what happened to me this weekend) I woke up this morning just to find out that the lights were out in the whole suburb: to substations had collapsed this night, which lead to a big traffic chaos because of robots (traffic lights) not working and the police absolutely unable to control the situation.

So this weekend I learned much about South African friendliness, from a white farmer as well as black worker. It was an interesting experience, but I wouldn’t like to repeat it again - I will for sure soon buy a good car!

Die Zeit geht schnell vorbei. Nun sind es schon zwei Monate, dass ich hier in Südafrika bin. Der letzte Monat ist relativ unspektakulär vorbeigegangen.

Auch von der Euro 2008 in der Schweiz und in Österreich haben wir hier nur in den Sport-Schlagzeilen etwas mitbekommen; wobei ich doch die eine Passage aus dem Saturday Star erwähnen möchte, denn kurz vor der Euro wurden alle Austragungsorte aufgezählt und zu Bern stand (frei übersetzt):

Wer süsses mag, ist hier richtig. Die Fabrik wo die Toblerone hergestellt wird, ist nur einen Steinwurf vom Stadion entfernt.

A propos Schweiz: Anfang Juni ist mit Nora der erste “Besuch” eingetroffen. Das Wort steht in Anführungszeichen weil sie natürlich nicht wegen mir nach Südafrika gekommen ist. Sie arbeitet für drei Monate in einem Waisenhaus in Mookgophong (200 km nördlich von Jo’burg) und arbeitet gleichzeitig an ihrer Diplomarbeit. Für mich war das die erste gute Gelegenheit, endlich etwas aus dieser Stadt hinauszukommen und die schönen Seiten dieses Landes kennen zu lernen. Ich habe auch ein paar Fotos gemacht, wenn ich endlich dazu komme, meine Galerie upzudaten werden sie dort zu finden sein.

Die Wohnungssuche steht auch immer noch an, aber langsam habe ich mich schon an die Kälte gewöhnt: am letzten Samstag bin ich schwitzend aufgewacht und freute mich schon, dass es endlich schön warm ist in meinem Zimmer… tja, es war gerade mal 17 °C.

Zum Schluss möchte ich hier noch allen danken, die mir auf mein Sammelmail geantwortet haben oder meine Website besuchten. Es freut mich immer wieder, News aus der Schweiz zu hören!

Today it is exactly one month that I arrived in South Africa. My adventure began when my Swiss A340 landed on May 1 at about 9 AM at O.R. Tambo Johannesburg International Airport.

In the last 31 days I learned much about this city and its inhabitants, but I have not yet seen much of South Africa - no wildlife, Kruger National Park, Drakensberg mountains, the Cape or anything else but the city of Johannesburg. This does not mean that I had not my personal “adventures”:

• Car rental: since you cannot be in Jo’burg without a car, I had to rent a car on my first day. The problem was that May 1 is a public holiday and the renal branch I had reserved a car at was closed. The second branch did not have a spare car and at the third branch we had to wait about half an hour to finally get the car because the lady was out for lunch… That was only the car for the first weekend, afterwards I had to get my one-month rental car at a garage, but since the car was not yet there, I got a replacement for another two days. Then finally I got the car I am still driving and will be driving for another month: a white 1989 Toyota Corolla.
• Shopping centre: In Switzerland we are not used to very big shopping centres (even thought Westside will become one), so the first days I spent in Sandton City one of the biggest shopping centres of Johannesburg. I had to buy new clothes since I could not take much with me - a 20 kg limit is not much! Also I had to buy food and other stuff needed for living. Sandton City is so big, that you can spend half an hour just to find a certain shop… For now I know where Checkers (hypermarket), CNA (bookshop), Woolworths (clothes and food), Ackermans (cloths) and of course the Food Corner (all fast and slower food restaurants) are.
• Get to know Jo’burg: The first two weekends I just drove around Johannesburg to get to know the city and its suburbs. I stay in Melrose North and work in Sandton, which is one of the two business centres of Johannesburg (the other is Jo’burg CBD - Central Business District). I have to know at least a little bit the suburbs to be able to search for an apartment - which will be my big adventure for the month of June.
• Open a bank account: it is not as complicated as in France, but on the first time I got to the bank, I did not have a confirmation of my address, the second time the letter from my company was not formal enough, but the third time it worked and I got my debit card a few days later. And my employer transferred the refund of my expenses for getting the work permit so I finally got the first Rands on my account and did no more have to use my Swiss credit card (with a very bad exchange rate and a 2% fee on top).
• Xenophobia: I have already written a few lines about that and just want to add here that it has become calmer in the last week even thought still five foreigners were killed. Government is now building refugee camps for the displaced and several civil organisations take care of the displaced.

As you see, my life is going on down here in South Africa and I hope, I will get soon out of this city to see more about what must be a very beautiful country.

As several people in Switzerland are worrying about what is happening around Jo’burg in the last days, I have decided to write about my thoughts. My understanding of the whole situation is based on discussions I had with colleagues at work and from what I heard on the radio and read on News24, the most popular South African news web page.

The first thing I would like to mention, is, that this violence is against (black) African immigrants living in the poor townships. Until now I have not come into contact in any way with these events except for seeing a SANDF (South African Defence Force) helicopter flying by my office window this afternoon.

Things started on May 11 or 12 in Alexandra, a township about 4 km away from where I live currently. In that first event two people were killed and over 40 injured. About what was the reason for that incident there are many opinions. The government and police think there is a “third force” behind these attacks. This might be the case, but what is also true is that the government was not doing much about immigrants in the last years. There are for example no refugee centres for the over three million Zimbabwean refugees, so they just settle in the townships, which are found around big cities like Johannesburg.

On Wednesday May 21 President Thabo Mbeki finally reacted and called in troops. They are now helping the SA police to raid townships and so far arrested several people and found fire arms and ammunition. Newest numbers speak of over 42 people killed and over 17,000 displaced in the last ten days. The biggest fear is now that this violence could spread out to other cities like Durban or Cape Town.

As a final note I would like to speak about the first travel warning issued by a European country, the one by the German “Auswärtiges Amt” (department for foreign affairs): They are saying that under the current circumstances you should not go to townships, neither alone nor in guided groups. I think it is in any case totally irresponsible if a white tourist would go to a township. In my opinion the situation is currently not more dangerous for (white) foreigners in South Africa than it was before those xenophobic attacks (see also my text about security in Johannesburg).

Click here for a map of locations of xenophobic violence.

Yes, it is quite obvious I was going to write about this theme. Security is really a big problem here in South Africa - specially in Johannesburg. Fortunately I haven’t been exposed to crime yet, but security measures are so high, you get remembered that it can happen to anyone anywhere at any time.

Where you see that security problem at first, is on the road. All houses you pass are surrounded by high walls with barbwire fences on top - sometimes even electified. And then these large signs from the different security companies. Where these security measures are not enough, whole quarters are surrounded by additional walls and all entries are closed with turnpikes and are conrolled by private security companies.

There are of course certain things you just don’t do around here in Jo’burg, because it is to dangerous (this list is not meant to be exhaustive):

• Never walk in the streets. You will almost never see white people walking in the streets, it’s just much too dangerous. And the few you still see are either jogging (most certainly with a black bodyguard) in the security perimeters or they are just naive tourists (specially found near the hotels).
• Lock your car doors when you are inside. At least at night one should never leave the car doors unlocked when driving, robberies can happen so fast.
• Do not stop at dangerous red lights. At night in certain areas of Johannesburg it might be too dangerous to stop at a red light.

This list might be expanded much more, but I don’t want to scare people too much that want to come and visit me :-).

Nach einigem hin und her hab ich am Donnerstag endlich mein Mietauto beziehen können - eine Filiale war wegen des Tages der Arbeit geschlossen, eine zweite hatte hatte kein freies Auto mehr und in der dritten mussten wir über eine halbe Stunde auf die Angestellte warten - sie war wohl gerade Mittagessen gegangen…

Zum Glück war dann anständiges Wetter um meine ersten Kilometer auf der linken Strassenseite zu fahren. Mit etwas Konzentration ist es tatsächlich kein allzu grosses Problem, einzig mit dem Linksvortritt habe ich noch etwas zu kämpfen und ich schaue auch noch immer zuerst links und dann rechts vor dem Überqueren einer Kreuzung.

Da ich am Freitag einen Strassenatlas gekauft habe, erfuhr ich auch noch die etwas anderen Geschwindigkeitslimiten: 60 innerorts, 100 ausserorts und 120 auf Autobahnen - wobei das alles wohl nur Richtwerte sind ;-).

Am heutigen Regentag wurde mir dann erneut klar, dass Regeln eher fakultativ zu befolgen sind: obschon man teilweise nicht mehr sehr weit sehen konnte, fuhren immer noch viele ohne Licht herum - sogar die Polizei! Und dann kam es halt wie es kommen musste: Unfall mit mehreren Fahrzeugen und langer Stau auf der Autobahn. Immerhin etwas weniger schlimm als gestern, als die Autobahn wegen eines Unfalls mit mindestens einem involvierten Lastwagen gleich ganz gesperrt wurde.

Wenn ich schon mal bei den Autobahnen bin, gleich noch eine Anmerkung zu den Spuren. Man würde davon ausgehen, dass - da Linksverkehr herrscht - die linke Spur den langsamsten Fahrzeugen gehört, doch weit gefehlt: alle drei Spuren sind gleichberechtigt und man darf sowohl links als auch rechts überholen - auch Blinker setzen ist fakultativ. Und dann gibt es noch den Streifen ganz links, den wir in Europa “Pannenstreifen” nennen; hier ist es der “Wanderstreifen” und die längste Taxihaltestelle der Welt - wer mit einem der zahllosen Minibus-Taxis unterwegs ist, kann hier jederzeit aussteigen - immerhin schalten die Taxifahrer meist den Warnblinker an.

Welcome on my blog about my expiriences in South Africa.
Willkommen auf meinem Blog über meine Erfahrungen in Südafrika.

Da dieser Blog sowohl Südafrikaner wie auch Schweizer ansprechen soll, werde ich gewisse Artikel in Englisch und andere in Deutsch schreiben. Those articles intended for my family and friends in Switzerland will be in German, all others in English.