The house hunters

We've been scanning the websites for weeks now, know all the suburb names by heart and enjoy sitting around with the calculator trying to figure out whether we can afford the townhouse in Waramanga that comes with gas cooking and a dryer. During the day, at seemingly random times, there are inspections, so I drive off to look at apartments. Beginning to give up on anything around the $240 mark. It is either complete shit, or nicish but incredibly tiny.

Going to see a granny flat for $250 this afternoon. Have strong misgivings about the idea of living in a granny flat. I'm guessing that means that the owners live in the house in front of the granny flat. If that is the case, I will feel very uncomfortable. I will see how private it is and whether it has separate access and outdoor area. Don't want to feel like I'm sitting in someone's garden. Couldn't they at least have called it a unit?

Don't know yet whether we've been accepted for the places we applied for on Monday, of course. Drove out to Hawker today to inspect an apartment. People were still living in there, though not home. Thoroughly depressing. Got lost driving there and got lost again on the way home. I decided to try a different way back to where we are staying that I thought would be quicker. Now, I'm not quite sure how this happens, but it seems to happen to me a lot here, but I take a turn off, follow the signs in what appears to be the right general direction, and end up exactly where I started. Today I jumped off a major road (built like a freeway with exit ramps, etc), took the bridge over the top of it, took several rights and several lefts, and came out.... entering the very same freeway a couple of hundred metres further along- I didn't even know I crossed back over (or under it) again. Then I jumped off again at the next exit, went under the freeway again, and finally found the road I was looking for.

Yesterday it happened to me too. I was looking for a petrol station, missed the turn off I wanted, took the next one with the intention of going around the block, ended up driving past the Dutch and German embassies and pretty much back on the same road, without having located the petrol station. All the roads twist and curve around so much that I lose all sense of direction.

Well, see you, better go inspect the granny flat...

Chaos theory

Actually I know nothing about chaos theory, but it seemed to reflect how I feel about the last few days.

My internet server was down for about 24 hours, and when I finally got back online on Friday, there were two emails there from my mum. The first said that my brother Leon was almost arrested as a burglar after prowling around the streets in a ninja costume for his end of year 10 hi jinx. It also mentioned that my cat Coffee, who is temporarily residing with Mum, hadn't come in that night. The second email said "Coffee is still not back, haven't seen her for two nights, have called the microchip people and given them my number, and will put up posters around the area, and notify local vets to keep an eye out for her. Has she ever disappeared for this long before?"

Actually, I don't think she's ever disappeared for more than a few hours before, so I was feeling pretty frieked. Although she is independent spirited, and distrustful of strangers, she likes plenty of affection from people she knows (and she's stayed with my mum for long periods before) and doesn't stray far from home.

That afternoon I picked Scott up from work and told him that she was missing. We had been planning on going to inspect an apartment, so we drove down to Mawson around quarter to five. In Canberra, they don't give out keys or give guided tours. They advertise on the internet "Open house: 5-5.15pm" and you have to rush through the place with a dozen other people or you don't have a chance of getting it. It was a very attractive top floor (level 4?) apartment with a balcony and I was quite enamoured of it. However, when I asked the real estate agent whether they would take pets, she said no. I took a deep breath and admitted that I wasn't actually sure whether I still had a pet.

We got in the car and drove about 100 metres before it conked out. We were actually in a slight hurry, because we had to get to the electoral office to vote in the Victorian elections (where we are still registered) before it closed at 6pm. That was our last chance. Scott looked over at me: "Did you put in any petrol?". oops. Petrol gauge only works about a third of the time, so I usually just fill it up regularly. Unfortunately, I depend on driving past petrol stations and thinking "that's a good idea" but in Canberra, petrol stations seem to be hidden away in back streets that I haven't yet had the fortune to drive through.

We had spotted one down by the Mawson shops (but we'd been on foot at the time, so hadn't dropped in to fill up). So, we walked down the hill to the petrol station, bought a can of petrol and walked back up. Looked at the can, looked at the car, realised that all we were going to achieve was to slop petrol down the side of the car without a funnel. Scott was about to head back down the hill to the servo, but I said "wait" and opened the boot with vague ideas that there might be something I could use. All that was in the boot was an xray of Scott's knee. It doesn't normally live in our boot, but the removalists had failed to pack it, so it got shoved in the boot with the rest of our junk, and ignored when we unpacked the boot. In case you ever find yourself caught in a similar situation, an xray, rolled into a funnel, is excellent for putting petrol into a car.

Drove back to the servo to return the can and put in more petrol, then drove to civic in a race against time to vote in the Victorian state election. We lost the race. We failed to vote, in the full knowledge that our vote doesn't count anyway, as we are registered in the safest labor seat in Australia. If they try to give us a fine, do you think they will believe us about the petrol and the xray?

Went home in exhaustion and waited for the phone to ring. Would our pet reappear?

Saturday morning we went out to Queanbeyan to inspect a place, as we'd heard that rent was much cheaper. We walked around the smelly, musty apartment, observed the two person (standing room only) balcony, the miniscule bedrooms, depressing view, the funky, disgusting kitchen and the stained bathtub and shower nozzle that would only come up to Scott's chest. Scott looked at me and raised his eyebrows "No brainer?". I nodded, refused a rental application form from the agent and went down the stairs. It was $180 per week. The same as our gorgeous house in Reservoir. I was gutted.

Back to Mawson to look at another place. It was pretty depressing too, though bigger, and with a courtyard. On the other hand, they will apparently consider people with pets, and the carpet, paint, stove, bath, vanity and curtains are all going to be replaced with new ones by next week. So we are going to apply. Wish us luck. ($270- ouch).

Spent the afternoon snoozing through the cricket. I had not slept well, as I had been plagued with dreams about my cat and woken at 3am and not been able to sleep. In the first dream, we were inspecting an apartment when a dying, emaciated Coffee came through the door. She also had a clone, so there were two of them. Although the apartment rules were "no pets" I raided the cupboards and fridge and found some food to feed Coffee and the Coffee clone, and they quickly gained energy and curled up to sleep on the couch. I worried that the owners might complain about the cat fur.

In the second dream, my friend Emma came over and asked that if Coffee didn't come back, could she have first dibs on the left over pet food for her cat Rain. I was very upset with her and ran very quickly down a mountain.

All day Saturday there was no more news, she hadn't been seen for three nights and hadn't touched her food. We contemplated the possibility of her attempting to go home from Mt Evelyn to Reservoir, being catnapped, lost or stuck in a tree or hit by a car and dying in a ditch. I was very upset, and by 10.30pm, Scott needed a break from his crying, distraught wife, and begged to be allowed to go to the pub. 20 minutes later, a call came from my mum to say that Coffee had just stalked through the door, looking a little dusty and skinny, but none the worse for wear. She apparently scoffed down a plate of food Leon gave her.

I called Scott, he cracked up laughing and then I washed my face, got changed and went down to the pub to join him.

Moving into our nation's capital

"Our nation's capital"- Sounds very impressive for a largish country town I think. Mind you, the other day I had to quickly pull over to answer my mobile, and suddenly realised I'd parked smack inbetween the US embassy and the French embassy.

We got here Monday at 1pm, and are staying in a tiny apartment that is across the road from Parliament house- one street south of there, actually. If you remember, it was stinking hot that day, (as it has been every day since- weird to think it was snowing last week!). We went grocery shopping, had a nap and settled in that afternoon. In the evening we went for a drive to one of the suburbs we've been considering moving into- it has lots of blocks of flats, is comparatively cheap, and close to work and the city. We drove past the shopping mall (Southlands), parked the car to take a look around and what do you suppose we found??? A baseball ground. (Picture Scott in seventh heaven). Actually, there is quite a bit of nice parkland around, which is particularly handy if you are living in a block of flats. The shopping mall was nice too. Two second hand bookshops, discount liquor, far too many hairdressers, little outdoorsy cafes, a cheap greengrocer, etc. Also found that meat and veg in the woolworths there is a third of the price of the supermarket in trendy Kingston that we shopped at yesterday.

Tuesday, Scott started work. The Commission is only a five minute drive from here, 7 minutes in peak hour traffic. I did some study in the morning and in the afternoon I went down to Woden plaza. Apparently, at these apartments, their idea of "internet access" (as advertised in the brochures) is limited to the presence of a phone jack in the apartment. So I had to find a prepaid dial up internet starter kit. I thought I'd try the telstra shop and get a bigpond one, but the guy there said they didn't stock them (although they do apparently exist), raised an eyebrow at me and asked scornfully why I wanted dial up. I put him in his place by saying I was only going to be living in the apartment for a month, so I wasn't too keen on a 24 month contract. He said to try Dick Smiths.

Last night we went for a drive up Red Hill, where there is a beautiful view of the city. There was a couple sitting up there drinking glasses of red wine. We thought: "What a good idea! We just bought a cask and it's in the boot." Then realised we had no glasses. I don't mind drinking from a bottle when the occasion calls for it, but even I couldn't come at the idea of drinking directly out of a cask. Came home and sat in the garden (a big garden with picnic benches shared by all the apartments) and had a glass of wine, read the paper and ate a green Thai curry. Very nice. I could get used to this.

Last day in Africa

The conference dinner that I mentioned was a lot of fun. Lots of interesting conversation about linguistics, travel, etc. Probably not the best dinner to bring a non-linguistically involved spouse to!

The next two days of the conference went really well, it was all very sociable with everyone going out every lunch and every evening. A very wonderful pub in the town served a fantastic ostrich salad and a bucket of beer. I kid you not. The jug of beer is out. A red bucket filled with ice was delivered to our table, with six stubbies of the ale of choice nestled inside for the grand price of 50 rand ($10 AU). Also tried some other local favourites at different times, the Cape Malay curries are very good.

Ran out of clean clothes by the Saturday and in the dorm room in the half dark packed a daypack with dirty laundry and took it to the university laundry and paid for them to do it for me. When I went to pick it up in my lunch break was very surprised when the lady handed it back to me with the words "Your camera is in there too". The camera must have been in the bottom of the bag. Ooops. Wasn't I the lucky little traveler?

On the Monday, after the conference finished we had an excursion to the !Khwa ttu reserve, which has been set up by and for the Khoi and San peoples who are indigenous to this region. They have a cultural centre there and a one teacher school for their kids. The kids did a magnificent song and dance performance for us. Then we sat on hay bales on the back of tractor trailers and went to the top of a hill with a view of the ocean where they served us a huge cold lunch. The land had been farmed but was quite poor for farming so they are trying to replant native plants and have reintroduced some small game (antelopes, etc). Had some great conversations with the guides who are justifiably proud of the land they have reclaimed themselves.

We attended a lecture after that about language initiatives in the region and then hopped back on the bus for the hour and a half drive back to Stellenbosch. Large sign on the side of the road. "No hooting. Ostriches getting laid".

Today, met up with two other conference goers and we all caught the train back to Cape Town. I walked back to my old hostel and moved in. Went out for a walk and had so many people asking me for money along the way that I went back to my hostel feeling v. depressed. It didn't seem to make me feel any better whether I'd given them anything or not. The problems of poverty here are so huge, it feels like anything you might do is so small. Even if you worked there your whole life it would just be a drop in a bucket.

I have had a cold since Friday (several days of sore throat followed by dripping nose and watery eyes) so I lay down on my bed and had a nap, which made me feel marginally better. Tonight I am going to go out to a bar and have something to eat, possibly with fellow backpackers, and then tomorrow I will be boarding my plane again to come home. I am ready to go home for this time. Probably this feeling is enhanced by my current fluey misery.

Being here has been so amazing though, I will definitely be coming back to Africa (with husband in tow) in the future.

Table Mountain

You've all seen it in pictures, now I have traipsed all over the top of it. After going out Wednesday night to the Zula bar with a Belgium girl and an Israeli girl and listening to Bob Marley blaring from the DJ, I got up and put on my hiking shoes. Caught a 'rikki' to the mountain. A 'rikki' is a minibus with an odd shaped roof and two bench seats running down the sides in the back. These thoroughly unsafe vehicles fly around the town and will take you anywhere for 16 rand. Bargain.

So, Table Mountain and a queue several hundred metres long waiting for cable car tickets. Not being too excited at the prospect of climbing up the incredibly steep slopes, I waited in line and got my ticket. It was well worth it. The cable cars are round with transparent sides and a rotating floor, so as you ascend the mountain you get a 360 degree view. Soooo cool. At the top there were heaps of tourists, a cafe, shop, public phones and a cocktail bar. None of which are actually visible from the city. After walking for a while I had stepped off the 15 minute tourist walk with wheelchair access and was walking on my own along narrow rocky pathways. Took a wrong turn and ended up on the 2 hour walk, rather than the 45 minute one I had planned on. Still, it was spectacular, and scarily close to the edge at times, clambering along rocks while the sheer drop and the amazing view below takes your breath away.

Back down the cable car, packed my bags and walked to the train station. I bought a first class ticket for the trip to stellenbosch. I normally prefer to travel with the masses, but thought that perhaps the masses wouldn't appreciate my backpack taking up heaps of room in the carriage. The ticket was only 12 rand anyway ($2.40). So my trip was boring, except when I saw half a dozen zebras in a paddock and nearly jumped up and yelled "Look! Zebras" at the thoroughly unimpressed locals.

Got off at Stellenbosch, and after a five minute walk was at my youth hostel. Stellenbosch is a very Afrikaans city, very pretty and obviously wealthy. Had pizza and put the finishing touches on my presentation for Friday (Until 11pm). Slept in a dorm room, waking every hour because I knew I had an early start at the conference.

Ran into quite a few familiar faces at the conference this morning, people from other conferences. That was nice. After lunch it was my turn up the front. The presentation went well, the powerpoint worked and lots of people wanted to ask me questions. The other presentations were very interesting and I've been having lots of interesting conversations. Waiting now at the internet cafe, because the conference dinner is tonight and I have time to kill.

Zuid Afrika

Finally I am back at an internet cafe and I have some time to kill.

Well, where was I?

Aah. Day 3.
I walked down to the waterfront and bought my ticket for the 10am ferry to Robben Island. Former prison of black and coloured political prisoners in Apartheid South Africa. Including Nelson Mandela for a period of 18 years who was there from the sixties till the eighties. The ferry we traveled across on was the same ferry used to transport prisoners' wives to the island prison, so that they could visit their husbands. At the island we boarded a bus and toured the island, visiting a small jail that was set up to contain just one person, Robert Sobukwe, who the authorities considered such a threat that they had him there in solitary confinement for years, and passed laws in parliament, just to govern him. A contemporary of Mandela's, in the 1960's there were pass laws, requiring all black South Africans to carry identification cards, which showed where they were and were not allowed to go. If you were caught without one, you were immediately sent to jail for three months. Sobukwe rallied black South Africans to all walk into police stations on the same day, without their pass cards, and demand to be arrested. Unable to arrest so many people, the administration was thrown into chaos, and their solution was to make sure that this man never spoke to anyone again.

We also saw WW2 guns on the island, which had been placed there, but never fired in battle. There is a whole village there now, where ex-political prisoners live in harmony with ex-wardens. Don't ask me how that happened.

Then we were taken to a limestone quarry where the prisoners laboured, and were shown a cave which the prisoners had used for a toilet. In Nelson Mandela's toilet the political prisoners taught each other about politics, they called it the university.

Then on a tour to the prison cells, where our guide, who was a political prisoner himself for 5 years in the 1980s told us what life had been like as a prisoner. We saw Nelson Mandela's cell and on the way out I saw a bird, which had flown into a cell, stuck there and flying repeatedly into the window. An interesting symbolism there, I think.

South Africa

Writing in a state of Jet lagged and post hike tiredness. Sorry if it doesn't make much sense. Nevertheless I'm determined to stay up and write rather than fall asleep again at 8pm like I did last night (which resulted in my waking up at 4am).

Back to the beginning. I am here in South Africa for a grand total of 10 days, in order to attend a conference on endangered languages in Stellenbosch. I flew out of Melbourne Sunday afternoon 5pm. 7 hours later I arrived in Singapore (9pm). Spent about 5 hours sleeping in an armchair at the airport then went to board my flight to Cape Town, via Johannesburg. To my surprise their were a large number of Chinese businessmen also boarding the flight. We were all handed our customs declarations form to fill out in the waiting room, before boarding the flight. The businessmen were sitting next to me and I could hear that they were engaged in a heated discussion about the difference between surname and firstname, because of course, their first names are their surnames and their last names are their given names. As it didn't seem any closer to being resolved I went over and offered my translation services.

After a moment of blank astonishment, they showed me their forms and we got it all sorted out. I sat back down and chatted to a Chinese gentleman who was very intrigued as to the hows and whys of my knowledge of Chinese. Boarded the flight and was seated next to a Singaporean woman and her little boy, so no more conversation. Relaxed and watched a few movies and tried to catch some sleep on the 10 hour flight to Johannesburg.

The sun came up as we flew over the Indian Ocean. Then over the South African mainland. There was quite a bit of farmland that we flew over, and I was bemused to notice that a lot of the fields were perfectly circular. I finally figured out that they had a watering system that was fixed in the centre of the circular field and rotated around, accounting for the perfectly round circles of green. We didn't get to get off the plane in Johannesburg, so I sat and watched the airport staff unloading luggage and postal and other products they were transporting. Included with the boxes were quite a number of cardboard boxes that were clearly marked "Live Fish- Urgent" I still haven't quite figured out whether they had fish tanks in the cardboard boxes being thrown carelessly off the plane.

The approach to Cape Town was very different. There were rocky mountains in the region surrounding the city, which were quite spectacular from the plane. It took an hour to clear passport control and the huge queues, after which I got a backpacker bus to my youth hostel the 'cat and moose' in a bustling section of the city. The bus first drove past a shanty town, a huge area filled to bust with houses constructed out of corrugated iron and about the size of a caravan. No sooner were they past then we came upon the large mansions with security fences and swimming pools. Pretty striking.

It was midday when I arrived, (10pm Monday night Australia time). The "Cat and Moose" was very pleasant with a large sunny courtyard in the middle, where I dozed and chatted to backpackers for the remainder of the afternoon.

This morning I went on a tour. There were about 10 of us in a minibus. We went out to a fishing village, and got on a boat to see some seals. Yes. My first African animals to see were seals! Hmmm. Oddly enough, on the boat I ran into the Chinese gentleman I met in Singapore, and he has invited me to visit him in Hangzhou. Then we went to another village and saw ..................(Drum roll).... Penguins. Not the fairy penguins you see on Phillip Island though. These ones are known as African, or Jackass, penguins, due to the donkey like braying that they do. Very weird. Apparently a pair of them moved into the area about 20 years ago and now there are a few thousand. They've had to put up fences confining them to the beach because apparently they started venturing into peoples homes and taking a dip in their swimming pools.

From their we drove to the original object of our journey: the Cape of Good Hope. It is set in a national park and we had lunch near the ranger's station. One of the rangers came up to have a chat to me. In the space of 5 minutes, this elderly black man had ascertained that I was from Australia, told me that the 'fynbos' which that region is very famous for, is even more extensive in Australia (I think he meant what we call 'scrub'), how many species there are (In S.A. as well as in Aus.), discussed the separation of the continents, the political situation in South Africa, including economic immigrants from Zimbabwe and South Africans who migrated out after the end of Apartheid but now want to come back. Kind of reminded me of Scott's Dad, Eddie. Bit of a storyteller.

Then, on to Cape Point (which houses the lighthouse) and the Cape of Good Hope next to it, which is the most south-westerly point of Africa apparently. We had quite a hike around there. It was really spectacular country, lots of rocks, scrub, cliffs, white beaches and two oceans running into each other. I saw some Dassies (largish guinea pigs) eating scrub and a few lizards. We climbed down off the Cape and rejoined our minibus. As we drove off, we came across four ostriches hanging out on the beach, which was pretty cool. Oh and we saw some bontebok in the far distance earlier on.

I didn't join in the cycling this afternoon, because my body decided it had had enough. Got back to the hostel at 6 pm, showered, and went out for sushi. One thing that really surprised me about this place is how much it reminds me of Australia. The countryside, anyway. Obviously the black population is much much huger than in Aus, and income differences are more evident.

Can't think of an elegant way to end this post, so think I'll just go to bed. Night Night.