The homecoming………ups and downs.

Hi again everyone. Our SAA flight to Johannesburg was really very pleasant and I even got quite a few hours’ sleep. There were several young South African businessmen in our cabin, and as soon as they started chatting to one another, I felt I was home already. Their conversation was liberally sprinkled with those  words and phrases so unique to South Africa, which I hadn’t heard in six months, like “Howzit bru?; Jozi; to die for; hang of a; lekker; braai; jislaaik hey; ja-nee,” etc.. Just listening to them was like a breath of fresh air. I felt like saying the same thing to them that the Americans had often told me, “I just love your accent.”

I have to mention the food we had for dinner, even if it’s only to make my friend “The Asian” reach for another slice of her sister’s chocolate cake.

Smoked salmon, with crab, capers and creme fraiche to start, along with a glass of Moet & Chandon:

 

Followed by beef fillet, roast pumpkin, parsnip and mange tout with dauphinoise potatoes and a very good Uva Mira merlot/cabernet sauvignon blend.

Raspberry chocolate mousse cake was the perfect end to a delicious meal. The choccies are still waiting to be eaten. I so prefer SAA over Virgin.

I always tell myself that when get on the plane, I’m going to drink only water, and have just a salad, but that never happens.

When we got home, the first thing we noticed was how warm the house was, and it didn’t take long to find out that the aircon wasn’t working. The temperature was 29C, so within ten minutes of walking in the door, hubby was up the ladder and onto the roof, checking it out. Two capacitors had blown,

so, being the amazing “jack of all trades” that he is, he went off to buy new ones, and within a couple of hours, it was all fixed again, for the princely sum of R115.  We think that it couldn’t have happened more than a day or two earlier, as nothing in the house had gone mouldy or mildewed, which it would have done if it had been off for too long.

Whilst visiting our local mall to buy groceries, I noticed quite a few changes since we left for America. Lots of things had shrunk! The parking spaces are all a lot smaller, the escalators have all got much narrower, whilst the stores themselves seem to have decreased in size. There are far fewer products to choose from, and at the checkout they don’t shower you with free plastic bags. The only thing that hasn’t shrunk is the petrol price, which at almost R11 per litre is so much more expensive than the just under R7 which we paid in the States, and of course the food prices seem to have gone through the roof.

We went for a walk along our beachfront yesterday afternoon. It was good to see that the lighthouse is still there.

The Umhlanga rocks haven’t been washed away,

and the new pier is holding up well.

Today is “Spring cleaning” day, and also buying a new dishwasher day, as the wretched thing decided to finally give up the ghost tonight. RIP

Have a great weekend everyone. Chat again soon.