Tribal village

We were introduced to the Venda tribute by Jamaica, the grandson of the chief of the little village. Jamaica told us about the traditions which were used still a few years ago, nowadays, only a few of them subsist. The chief was allowed to have until 8 wives, and had to pay 12 cows for each of them , but not if they were from the same family, in this case, for the price of one, he got one for free if he wanted to!!! The reason for so many wives was that the chief, busy with his responsibilities needed lots of help to assure the commune life of the village. His first wife was in charge to choose his other wives, her goal was to find hard worker and women who wouldn’t make problems between each other. The chief live in a hut, all of the village are round, the speciality of the chief’s hut is an inside wall which protected him in case the village is attacked. Also the entries are very low so the men inside the huts, warned of an attack were ready to fight with their weapon as soon as the first enemy entered. The men stood on the right, the women and children on the left so that the enemy killed only the men and saved women and children. An other hut was for the grand parents, here is also a wooden elevated lying space where exorcism was operated. A more recent hut was built and thought by Jamaica’s father. It is the teaching hut, with a bank all around the wall, and a very clever idea was to dig a place in the middle of the hut where the teacher or the speaker in front of a his public could stand up and his eyes could be at the same level like the people sitting! What for a lesson of humility! In the middle of the village stand a tree, which must obligatory give fruits, otherwise it would bring bad luck. The village is articulated around the tree, which is the first thing to choose to know where to build a new village. The “kraal” is a delimited circle where all events where celebrated with songs and dance. An other one is the women area, it means…the cooking area of course.
The entry of the village for the visitors is always celebrated with a welcome song in the tribute language, Tshivenda. If the people don’t sing on your arrival, they would do you a lots of trouble and you never would be accepted. We felt so very happy to have enjoyed our first minute listening the young children singing and dancing for us, wearing their traditional clothes. The visitors were placed in the first hut at the entry so if the enemy attack, first the visitors are killed and this village get a short time to collect their weapons and took their appropriated place.
The education is very strict in the village. The boys received a 6 months education (fishing, hunting, hut building…), Jamaica received 5, nowadays are still 3 months obligation and the young boys still learn how to hunt and catch birds, as well as hut building, however, this last task is only an education of traditional culture which allows the new generation to know how their parents lived, because today all the family live in the next township. What the girls learnt, Jamaica couldn’t tell us because the girls are not allowed to speak about it to the men. Jamaica could imagine that today, the women speak about it with their husbands, but himself didn’t know…legend or reality? It is not always easy to do the difference between what was tradition before and what is still on today.

For our personal experience of Tswana life, we were invited to taste the delicious food cooked by 2 Tswana women during our visit. We sat on the bank of the cooking kraal and were first welcome to wash our hands with warm water in a wooden container the 2 women offered to each of us. We get for all dishes a plate and helped ourselves of “miele meal”, a nutritive corn flour cooked in water, cabbage, tomato and onion sauce and chicken, each meal in a container placed on the bottom. Without fork nor knife nor spoon we enjoyed the taste of this basic but very nice food. As desert, we were invited to listen and watch traditional songs and dance around a big fire inside the kraal. We also took part and learnt a few words and dancing movements. Toilets are now available for the tourists with drinking tap water, but electricity doesn’t exist so we enjoyed the nice light of the candles in our respective hut where they had organized a mattress and a mosquito net on it for us. We spent the evening in the kraal enjoying a few beers of a icebox, talking between us until Jamaica and his little cousin joined us. And we had together a very very nice time. Flo, Hoi Kee, Jamaica and Alem took a drum and learnt to play all together even if no one could really drum anything it sounded surprisingly great, I did the metronome and the dance show. Obviously it was nothing worth for a musician or a dancer but as participant we had extremely fun at this time which marked the end of this enjoyable experience and this excursion for me, before all thanks to the wonderful company I had the chance to meet on this tour. The last surprise come late evening : Jamaica and Alem have grilled some interesting meat : Impala!!! Usual for them, almost impossible to munch for us!!! I ‘ve chewed for 10 minutes a little peace of this unexpected grilled meat.
Gideon the young guide learnt me a lot about his company, I took the chance to ask him thousands questions about the management of this tour operator on the way back to Nelspruit. The dream was already over, back to work. Actually, my work is a sort of tourism without moving. I listen interested about the travel the tourist who come here like to tell. This week is a wonderful one, almost every night all rooms are booked out with a lot of person coming and leaving, every night I learn more and more about the possibility for them to go on tour in the Kruger Park and the panorama road or details about other destination. Dave is almost always absent because on tout with guests. I stay then with Bella which is very busy with other rooms of other houses they offer to rent monthly. It means that I have got much more to manage myself and it gets more and more every day, Bella explains me many interesting things very patiently even though she is running all day between visit, pick ups, phone calls and her 2 kids keeping on fighting together when they come from school… busy work, hard day, tomorrow I must be awake at 4:45 for the first guest leaving to Kruger earlier especially those days because of public holidays. It is a crazy week, most of South African took 10 days off. Monday was public holiday as I wrote yesterday, tomorrow Thursday is Labour day also, Friday is public holiday then as it is only one day before the week end. Tuesday and Wednesday are not normal working day in consequence. The Dutch students coming every week end home have come back today already, no school today, one of them had 2 children at school yesterday… How do you want the country healthy running if they do 1 working day for 10 days…

Flash : Electricity

Wonder! Today is Tuesday, we should have a blackout. Yes, for a few weeks, the government sent a timetable in every region to inform the days and hours in the week the city collapse into the black. In Nelspruit, on Tuesday s, Thursdays and Saturday s from 8am to 10am we are not able to use any firm of electricity as it’s cut for 2 hours. But because today is a day included in long week public holiday they let the electricity running!!! Great, otherwise, three times a week, in Old Vic, we are not able to offer the breakfast, or only before 8am. You can try to imagine the chaos it is in Jo’Burg when they cut it from 6am and 8am, no lights on road, Emmy told me that she leaves her home at 5am to avoid the chaos on the road with all cars stuck and the police trying to rule them… Do you imagine all companies without electricity for two hours three times a week, in a all country as big as South Africa!!! Generator are doing a huge business now, if you want a piece of advice for increasing invests !!!!
The government was warned 10 years ago that they must build new poles because South Africa will need more and more electricity, nothing was done, laziness? Bad management for sure… And now, everybody is reduced to live and keep their companies running 6 hours a week!!!

*******LANGUAGE SWITCH********

Des rapports établis il y a une dizaine avaient prévenu : il faut construire de nouvelles centrales, l’Afrique du Sud a besoin chaque jour de plus en plus d’électricité, le gouvernement n’a rien mis en place, si ce n’est prévenir la population et leur demander de faire attention, mais le message n’a pas été écouté vous pensez bien, comment ?… du coup ils en sont réduit au jour d’aujourd’hui à couper carrément l’électricité pendant 2 heures 3 fois par semaine dans tout le pays, avec un calendrier établi, ici c’est de 8 à 10h les mardis, jeudis et samedis !!! c’est incroyable mais radical, jusqu’à ce qu’ils trouvent ou mettent en œuvre une autre solution, qui prendra des années quoiqu’ils fassent…

Few weeks now in South Africa. I spent some quite difficult days after my last report, concerning my job, the town, miss of contact with local people without ideas of option and other bad feelings. That’s the bad part : and it’s over! It was short but I really had a difficult moment. Thanks to mum and dad (what could we do without them, even so far away) but also the help of your mails or your motivation words (especially thanks to you Markus, Wolfgang, you know, I always persist and don’t give up fast, it’s not the first time J, and it seems me to have good effects, thanks anyway). I had spoken with a guy, Steve as mentioned earlier, and he was really scared for me about such a long time at the same place but I realized that it will be a big advantage for my placement in Old Vic ‘cause in few weeks I should know most of the business, however it takes quite a long time but I will have time after that to practice it and I should learn a lot thanks to Dave and Bella, also thanks to the fact that I am the only employee working for them. Thanks to Bournemouth’s students, Marine, Etienne, Jessy, Matthieu, your experience and your feelings about it helped me considerably to balance mine and I felt really better thanks to it, so thank you very very much.

About my job
I spoke with Dave and Bella which told me I must be more self confident and don’t be shy with clients who don’t totally with our rules, I learnt that rules are security for the company and are not here to be rude with customers, even if they can feel it annoying sometimes. I must learn to say “NO” if necessary and not be ready to give them all what they expect otherwise it’s not business worth : interesting, so I’m learning to bring in application exactly what my boss teach me. I convicted Bella to give our guests a free cup or coffee in the morning though and am quite proud of it! Indeed, some of them could have been really disappointed about it although it doesn’t cost a lot, a simple service which can make a big difference for the satisfaction. My main problem with the job was that I felt bored without nothing to do all day, waiting, reading on the desk and I didn’t feel comfortable with it. Since this “weekly meeting”, Dave and Bella have given me much more tasks to do. I found out actually that as much from their part as from mine, we need a time to know us better, a time for them to see what I am able to do and that they can trust me, what I can do and what not. An example would be about “answering the phone”, they waited May to give me this responsibility because of my language competences which are not high enough to help out by the phone. For few days now I answer the phone, give the information if I can or take messages, take booking or person’s details. It was a sign of trust from their part that made me feel much better and confident. So what do I have to do? Stock list for linen and cooking tools : a reason for that is to control what we lose through thieves : from the customers sometimes but also from the staff : Bella found out how the girls took things with them even if she already took lots of precaution (their bags are closed in a ARMOIRE, so that they don’t hide anything inside) but they used to steal it with a clever imagination : they through out the objects like AMPOULE, pillows, plates in the main dustbin, once a week, the dustbins are placed outside so that it can be picked up by the dust trucks. The girls asked friends of them to come and take the things they had kept in safety bags as many Blacks come to look for some interesting and valuable things in the bins of the Whites, it was not obvious for Dave and Bella! Anyway, they control the girls a lot now which doesn’t help make a relax atmosphere I think so… but one mote time : necessity for their business!!!
Other task is to prepare a list of questions for tourist office and try them to find out how much they can be helpful, if it worth it to send our guests there or if it’s better if we inform them directly, also we hope to get some new info about transport or activities but it doesn’t seem like they will learn a lot (I only was in one of the tree ones though). So it makes be move, discover the city and different part include in the tourism business and also create contact with other persons.

About social life
In fact I met last week Loraine, she works in the tourist office and thanks to a question about bars and pubs, she noticed I like have some beers and more sometimes and invited me to her house, where I was three days later with some “black Label” : favourite beer for both of us), I spent 2 hours with her and met her family, a brother, a sister (who works in tourism park management of Mpumalanga and offered me to visit her there ), the aunt, and some cousins. They live in Nelsville (taxi driver’s advertisement : “don’t walk alone around here it is very dangerous”). Poor decoration : main decoration with the school graduation of the kids of the family, many rooms quite empty though, cement walls, roof in iron sheet, a big house though with a piece of field in the front. I had a warmed welcome and all members of family were curious to see me here and asked me some shy questions. “ They all like you very much”, Loraine said. I wondered because of Loraine as we were waiting for my taxi outside of the house in the front garden, she told me she wants to pie and before I got the chance to answer anything she disappeared quickly behind a tree where she makes an improvised bathroom although the toilet inside are just in the entrance of the house : no complex. We shall meet us next time for a cinema or a beer in a pub somewhere. Maybe next week.

I had some nice time during the weeks with the guests and I guess it will keep coming other very kind persons, from all over the world. It is such a good occasion to speak about everything happening in each country with a big tendency for South Africa of course. As well as Zimbabwe right now that nobody knows the result of the election for the new president of the 29th of March, which has some important impact in South Africa too. Many Zimbabweans leave their country to come here especially in Johannesburg with the hope of a better life, which is not always good welcomed by the south African population claiming those want to steal their job. It’s interesting to notice that here around Nelspruit, many South African emigrate to Mozambique because seen like safer and more relax… A mix of languages, thing that as you imagine I mostly enjoy. Only Spanish I wonder if I will get the chance to speak once few words because Spaniard and South American are at the bottom of the customer list.

I attend a course of belling dancing which is most than enjoyable. The teacher is a pretty nice woman and all feminine participant are very nice too. One of them started to ask me about my occupation here and when I told her I hadn’t met a lot of persons yet unfortunately, she suggest me to come with her on Sundays to the “women meeting” in the church to talk…and prey! I need social contact but I’m not gonna convert me into religion never! Do you imagine me going to the church on Sundays? Me?…I don’t. So I hope to meet her for a coffee sometimes or with her friends why not but rather in a pub than in the church. It could be nice to go once though, I’ll see.


About security
Everywhere you hear the same and I already get sick of this topic. Okay, it’s dangerous, South Africa is not Europe. And I heard some terrible stories as unlucky situation which make me conscious, really, be carefull. However, South Africa is not in war and you can if you take some precaution walk in the centre, also it’s not that worth because the centre is really poor if you think shopping or having a drink in a bar. Don’t take your camera with you, a little amount in your pocket, no paper, no bag, no obvious valuable jewels or things and let your map in your room. Walk confident and don’t look shy, and you are ready to enter into the centre. So yes it is possible, but nice, I’m not sure yet. So the fact is you can do it but actually you don’t do it because you wouldn’t enjoy it. Here tourism is not about visiting towns and walking in the streets, but it’s a lot of other discover. I don’t want to say it’s close to paranoia because I understand the owner of touristy place can’t let them take any risk, but after one month here I dared cross the main street between the two parts of a shopping/bar/sport area, what Dave recommended me not to do the first day he drove me there. I can’t either say you can cross this road without any risk but the probability (with the same precaution as above) of getting robbed is really limited by day, I would never cross by night though. This can sound emphasized or ridicule for some of you and I would understand it because it is really difficult to imagine if you never lived the situation. So is the way I am learning how to live in Nelspruit. Steve, always the same guy deliver a summary of frightened stories he heard about, and it doesn’t help to get relaxed but if you adapt your behaviour on the place you are going to, the risk decrease enough to find some freedom of movement… certainly more about it

My tourism

I was a tourist from Saturday afternoon till Monday afternoon. With the Baz Bus, two unexpected girls arrived on Saturday. Bella organized very nicely everything for them according to their desire (and she did it very professionally and friendly, I mean, the service Dave and Bella offer to the guest about accommodation is stared, and their job as tour operator is close to the perfection. They know a lot about the tours and the transport and can help you more or less with exactly what you want, it’s admirable. I am for this reason very very satisfied to have the chance to get a formation with them).
Horiko, a Japanese from the States and Hoi-Kee, a Chinese from The Nederland were the best company ever for those two days. We spent the evening in Nelspruit in 2 pubs and had to conclude pubs in Nelspruit are definitely not the greatest night life place. But well, a pub is a pub, a public place you can try some funny drinks, we had different kind of shooters; the most enjoyable is incontestably “Amarula”, actually a fruit creamy liqueur, the taste is utely the same as Bailey’s so, of course, I love it. Another interesting liqueur is the chocolate liqueur, a deep black one, quite strong though. We get one shooter free by Ali, obviously a habitué.

The next day, I got up at 6:30 to be ready for the guests leaving and found out at 7:30 that I was off until the next day afternoon. I had something like 30minutes to plan and organize something for my 1 ½ DAY off. Perfect, Horiko and Hoi-Kee had planed to take the same company to go a panorama road I won’t explain in details all what the tours offer and what they wanted to do and not but it was highly interesting to see that each of us did something different with the same bus anyway as a tour operator I think it is the best combination we could have found ever! We left Nelspruit at about 10 o’clock and joined a Canadian girl leaving in Jo’Burg for 2 years, Emmy, and a Swiss boy travelling in the world for one year, a perfect association of individual person travelling on his own who meet each other and want to share and enjoy their time. Gideon was our guide, I sat at the front next to him to learn a bit more about the company Livingstone for whom he works : fascinating also to see how it works, excellent for my report and my future studies (about it I don’t have any idea yet where I am supposed to be next September…).
We drove through huge artificial forests of some trees from Australia imported because they grow very fast and reach the perfect size in 10 years to be used in mines and consoled the walls and prevent the tunnels to collapse. Amazing : 350 000 trees are planted every working day in the region !!!!!!!!! More than trees, lots of culture especially of bananas and avocadoes.

For the lunch we stopped at the famous pancake’s town of Graskop with many possibilities of restaurants and uncountable shopping availabilities. A charming place.

On the panorama route, we first stopped at God's Window for the point of view on the Lowendal. A little walk between deep vegetation and flowers brings to a 180° panorama, photo is an obligation.

Second Stop at the enter into the canyon, where the two rivers “Sadness” and “Happiness” join. Their name came from a boer true story. In the 18th century, a caravane from Cape Town stopped close to the future “Sadness” river, men, women and children. The men went forward to look a next hopefully free place to stay, let wives and children and told them to go back if they are not with them within a certain time. The ultimate date arrived and the men were not back. Desperate of the destiny of their husbands and fathers, wives and children started to turn back as it was planed. On a stop at the junction between the two rivers, the men joined finally their family and so Happiness was given to the second river. The place is very touristy and especially this week end which was a public holiday. The 27th is a public holy day and remember the first democratic election in 1994.

Our third and last stop before the village where we spent the night was the most impressive and fascinating one : 30km of drive in the Canyon and at the end the Three Rondavels and the peacefully lake : admiration in front of the nature, one more time…

..…soon coming : tribal village……

Mes deux premiers jours de congé

.....................Explorer les alentours de "Old Vic"...............

Jana et Helger (il se fait appelé Chris ici, c’est plus facile au téléphone) viennent d’Allemagne, Hambourg et parcourant l’Afrique du Sud depuis 3 mois et demi en empruntant exclusivement le Baz Bus, c’est à dire, à partir du Cap, longeant la côté des océans Atlantique et Indien en s’arrêtant à chaque ville desservie par le Baz Bus jusqu’à Durban, en remontant par le Drakensberg et le Swaziland avant de se rendre à JoBurg-Pretoria. (Nelspuit étant situé à deux heures au Nord du Swaziland et à 3h30 à l’Ouest de la capitale). J’ai passé la journée avec eux, journée langue allemande, j’étais donc bien entendue, rien que pour ça, over-ravie. On est allé dans la réserve naturelle derrière l’auberge, une marche de 3h dans les collines verdoyantes aux cascades inattendues que je m’empresserai de recommander à mes prochains clients en quête de randonnée. J’aurais pu rester la soirée avec Jana et Helger-Chris mais une autre proposition avait plus retenue mon attention.

***************Sabie**************

Un client travaillait sur Nelspruit la journée et se rendait à Sabie en fin d’après-midi, j’ai décidé de profiter du transport et d’aller rendre visite au Sabie Backpacker, une auberge où j’aurais aussi pu faire mon séjour ; les proriétaires m’avaient très aimablement proposé de venir leur rendre visite quand je serai arrivée à Nelspruit. Sabie est à 40 min en voiture direction Nord-Est. Neels est contrôleur sanitaire et travaille principalement au Mpumalanga où il a grandit, mais habite maintenant à Pretoria. Il m’a déposée directement à l’auberge. Le réceptionniste se faisant attendre, la faim au ventre, on a décidé d’aller manger au prochain restaurant et de revenir pour le check in après le dîner. Le seul client de l’auberge, Steve, sur qui je reviendrai un peu plus bas surveille mon sac, no worries. Ca a été un réel plaisir de se retouver enfin dans un nouvel environnement, dans un sympathique restaurant de la petite ville de Sabie, où nous avons mangé et bu pour 136 Rands, 11 euros à deux…, plus le pourboire quasi obligatoire par tradition de 10% environ. Tradition maintenant, taxe autrefois.

Bella me disait la semaine dernière qu’il n’y a pas si longtemps, une quinzaine d’année, les serveuses ou réceptionnistes ne percevait pas de salaire mais vivaient des pourboires, qui n’étaient pas compris dans le montant de la note, maintenant, ils ont instauré un salaire fixe obligatoire, évitant également le recrutement de mineurs, qui ne peuvent être salariés. Quand Bella a connu Dave, elle était serveuse dans son bar, et avait refusé la place d’assistante manager parce que le salaire proposé était moins élevé que ce qu’elle arrivait à gagner avec les pourboires.

La langue maternelle de Neels est l’afrikaans, son anglais est plus abordable que les personnes à l’anglais sud africain en tant que langue maternelle. Michael un Américain m’a toutefois avoué que l’anglais de Dave et spécial et lui même doit prêter doublement attention pour le comprendre : histoire de me faciliter la tâche, …On a bien discuté autour de notre belle part de viande et notre bon vin rouge. King Dave le réceptionniste de Sabie Backpacker avait réapparu à mon retour. J’ai continué la soirée à discuter avec cet incroyable globetrotteur professionnel lui c’est le cas de le dire, Steve américain émigré ayant délaissé son pays il y a 8 ans ; il se retrouve en Afrique depuis 6 mois après avoir passé 3 ans en Asie, Malaisie, Inde, 2 au Japon, une année à traverser l’Europe de l’Ouest à vélo et volé à d’autres coins du globe terrestre, il survit de boulot, principalement en enseignant l’anglais à droite à gauche ou informatique ou encore d’autres choses suivant les propositions qu’il reçoit sans rien demander. Il a du coup dix mille histoires à raconter et j’ai passé une soirée à rêver en écoutant ses récits, parvenant à les agrémenter parfois avec mes expériences, drôlement minces comparées aux siennes.

Je me suis levée de bonne heure pour aller explorer les deux rues de Sabie, devant quitter la ville à 11h pour profiter de la voiture du patron qui devait se rendre à Nelspruit faire des achats. Sabie se situe au beau

milieu de milliers d’hectares de forêt, le bois étant l’industrie faisant vivre cette petite bourgade très appréciable à l’allée principale bordée de petites boutiques, de restaurants, cafés, stations, où la vie semble vraiment paisible. Sabie dispose aussi d’une impressionnante librairie où j’aurais pu passer la journée, j’en suis ressortie avec deux livres en anglais, il faut bien se lancer un jour… Je suis donc en train de lire l’histoire d’Olga Chekhova, The mystery of Olga Chekhova, actrice allemande émigrée russe à Berlin appréciée aussi bien d’Hitler que de Lénine.

A la porte d’un magasin de Sabie, la vendeuse m’a abordée dès le premier regard « where are you from ? are you here in holidays ? » Precious loves speaking with tourists, je suis restée avec elle à boire un café sur le banc à côté de son magasin plein de bijoux et bibelots attrayants pendant l’heure qui me restait. Precious a deux enfants et a la charge des trois de sa sœur décédée dans un accident de voiture il ya quelques années. Elle est Zulu et parle (du moins c’est ce qu’elle dit) 7 des 11 langues officielles !! quel talent ! On a échangé nos numéros, elle vient souvent sur Nelspuit, j’espère vraiment avoir l’occasion de la revoir, et plus d’une fois, Precious est bavarde, joyeuse, forte et agréable, j’étais vraiment déçue de devoir déjà la quitter. Ce passage à Sabie ne m’a pas aidée à revenir enjouée à Nelspruit, où de tels contacts sont à première vue (au bout de deux semaines) très loin d’être si facilement concevables. Attristée de quitter cette petite ville forestière, le retour avec le patron de l’auberge, Sarel, l’un des deux frères-gérants m’a doublement fait peut être regretter de ne pas avoir accepté cette proposition, mauvaises pensées qui m’on hanté l’esprit ces derniers jours, qui j’espère vont disparaître rapidement. Je prévois de retourner à Sabie à la prochaine occasion, si une autre destination n’est pas accessible dans mes deux jours de congé, on verra… Ces quelques heures hors de mon antre m’ont fait réalisée qu’il y a une vie là à l’extérieur à laquelle j’aspire vraiment mais qui ne m’est malheureusement accessible que deux jours par semaine, je suis donc revenue à Old Vic un peu la gorge serrée, mais comme indiquée ci-dessus, je ne peux encore tiré de conclusion de ces sentiments mélangés.
J’ai été invitée à l’auberge, pour cette nuit-là et de prochaines si je le souhaite par Sarel, le voyage ne m’a non plus rien coûté, et m’a beaucoup apporté, que j’aime vagabonder !!!

First days in South Africa

From London to Johannesburg via Doha, with Qatar Airways, excellent service!

First impressions, beautiful landscape, rich vegetation, red earth, mountains… Nelspruit is a region where the culture has a big importance. Oranges, lemons, mangoes, avocadoes, litchis, tabac, wood… fruits are sold on the border of the road in open shops, I don’t have had the chance to buy some here yet but I enjoyed the exotic fruits and the taste of bananas a lot. So around the capital of Mpumalanga, it is nice to drive enjoying the big fields. However, Nelspruit the city is not a touristy attraction, apart from administrative interest, it doesn’t seem to have a lot to do here. It is a big city because of the situation : close to the Kruger park and on the road between J’Burg and Maputo, capital of Mozambique, 2 hours away by car.

I travelled with City Bug from J’Burg ( I didn’t see anything there apart from the airport : hope to discover it next, ‘ve got a contact there now…) to Nelspruit. I was lucky as someone cancelled his reservation in the bus at 10 am, otherwise I would have waited in the airport till 17pm…In the bus, some young persons spoke Afrikaans, I can understand some words thanks to german, but no more unfortunately. Dave picked me up at the bus stop. Waiting in the sun, jacket of London finally at the back of my luggage! About 28°C, it was so enjoyable!

Okay is Dave’s favourite word, fine, I understand it. But the rest it’s more difficult, English here is with a different accent, the “r” sounds like Spanish “r”, “i” and “o” are sometimes very different too. But it’s just the time to find out how it works. Moreover, my accent is the worst one so… I’m gonna speak english comme un petit nègre !J they don’t emphasize every expression here like in England and I’m very glad because I don’t support it. I found ridiculous when I told Steward or Davina my day at school which was nothing special. They always answered : fantastic, marvellous or this kind of enthusiasm… british way of speaking, I know they don’t think it that strong but for me it sounds really TOO MUCH. Bella, Dave’s wife, my boss, peaks afrikaans as first language, English as second, at least to communicate with her husband, and the tourists pf course. Thiew and Cherese, their children grew in consequence with both languages.

.................Old Vic..............

3 girls and one boy work for Dave and Bella and speak swazi. But they all know English, they learnt it at school. Sibongile told me : before at school they had to learn English and Afrikaans, now the children can choose either English or Afrikaans. Sibongile doesn’t speak Afrikaans but manages an average English, as well as Suzan, Anna and Patrick. The relation between them and Dave and Bella reveals more distance than employees/boss. 4 of them are black people make their job conscientiously. No one would tell their boss with their name, they call Bella “M’dam”, they pronounce it actually “Muum” and are always extremely polite and devoted. They would never say “no” or contest what Bella order them to do and don’t speak about anything else than their job. I try to have more conversation with them every day, but it’s not esay because they are very shy. Sibongile is the most talkative, we sometimes have our lunch together, when she dares sit on the terrace and not on the wall. She likes speaking English or at least, it’s what she told me, she wants to try to practice even if it’s not perfect. Sibongile is 22, she graduated high school when she was 20, which is 2 years more than the average and didn’t find a job for one year. She means that she is happy with her job and doesn’t intend to change. This situation is obviously the real reflect of a big part of the society (not a general reality however). Blacks work for white people and are happy with that, they don’t expect a better job, a better place or a better wage… satisfied as long as they’ve got a job, because unemployment is a huge huge problem here; 25%!!!!!!!

I was impatient you can imagine to discover the place I shall stay for 26 weeks… I let you appreciate with some photos. My room is situated 3 meters from the place I use to stay, in the main room, available for everybody (guests, staff, boss, their dogs as well unfortunately). I share the bathroom with the people staying in the dorms. Dorms are just 2 rooms, one of 2 beds, one of 3 beds, if you ask for a dorm and are lucky, you sometimes get your own bathroom or your own kitchen for the same price! I spent most of time on the terrace, but it gets colder by night now…L It’s nice to stay on the terrace in the middle of the trees and many many species of birds. I had the chance to meet 2 birds watcher from The Nederland here coming with an important material to look the birds and enjoyed the coloured species they showed me.

*****************THE KRUGER PARK***************

Exhausted of the leaving party night in Bournemouth, short night in the plane, Dave informed me on my arrival that I have to get up at 4:30, I go to the Kruger Park :good surprise the first day! One hour by car from Nelspruit and you can reach one of the nearest gate to the Kruger. At 6 o’clock at the gate, we were almost the first car waiting for the opening. Dave went to the office to pay the entrance and we entered in the wild African space… what we saw this day : only 3 of the Big Five. But we were very lucky with elephants! They made me scare! So close to us! Babies elephants, big mama and overall big dads elephants! We were face to face with one of them, it was amazing!!!!!!I didn’t want to be stressed with my camera to take the best photos with the best view so I didn’t take so much pictures but I will do it the next time : here a general survey.

................THE BOTANICAL GARGEN IN NELSPRUIT...........

An other excursion I did is the only nice place to visit in Nelspruit : the botanical garden. You can easily spend 3 hours until one day, bring your picnic and eat in front of the Nelspruit’s waterfall, or near the baobabs. I wouldn’t recommend to eat on the wooden bridge which is infested of monkeys. I had a funny time with them : playing to know who of me or them would cross first. After I first turned back I finally trust to go over them. The first contact can be a bit scary but you get relax quickly

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