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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