Just a few pics

Ok, so I was going to upload a few pics here but I am just fed up with how long it takes to upload them to blogger. So instead let these three be a teaser and then go to facebook to see the rest. What you see below is the hospital that I got to visit just outside of Durban. The 1st is a general view from the front yard whilst the 2nd and 3rd is of the childrens ward and maternity ward respectively.

See you all on facebook (link to my page is on the right of this one).

Back to the Rat Race

Hello all

So this is my first Monday back at work since I got back from South Africa. I am particular bored as I haven't gotten to go out to court today and have really spent the morning catching up on all sorts of administrative things. Anyways, no one is really interested in that I am sure but would rather hear about South Africa. And since, I still have another 15 minutes for lunch I shall try to oblige. Sorry, no pics yet, they are on my home computer but they are coming, I promise.

So here are 7 thoughts from South Africa

1 - South Africa must be the most economically diverse country on earth. I saw the most extraordinary wealth when I was in the country and yet I also saw incredible poverty. I am not talking Malone Road vs Shankhill Road but I am talking Royalty vs near death. It honestly amazed me that people could live so well and not be affected by what is on their doorstep. Still, the issues are far more complex than I can do justice to in this blog but suffice to say that the number of people in poverty is so vast that perhaps it will be many generations before they work their way out. However, the crazy thing is that South Africa is the rich African country!!

2 - Apparently people are keen on me with a beard. I shall let the readers be the judge upon posting a few pics soon.

3 - South Africa is incredibly beautiful. I guess to an extent, people had told me to expect beauty but I honestly had no idea just how fantastic the place was. From the mountainous terrain around Durban to the stunning Capetown waters and the vast Krugger National Park, there really is a little of everything. And I didn't even get to try the surfing!!

4 - Racism. What I mean by that is that it is not unusual for people out there to call people simply "the blacks" or "the whites" or indeed "the colours". Again, I was somewhat expecting it but when you hear it at first it's most peculiar. I definitely did detect racist undertones amongst some of the White South Africans that I met who honestly believe that their lifestyles are under attack. I suppose to an extent they are right. That's an interesting debate in itself. Affirmative Action, good or bad?

5 - The HIV crisis out there is very very real. I was "fortunate" enough that the doctor that I stayed with at the start of my trip brought me into all the areas of his hospital. What I saw there was incredible and gave me even more faith in the African people. People who were suffering with all sorts of ailments putting on their best face and not letting their difficulties get them down. The only exception to this was in the HIV ward in which there nothing but absolute despair.

6 - Paranoia. This is to do with the vast crime rates in the country. At the start of the trip when I was with my parents, everyone that I met couldn't believe that I was going to head off by myself. It got me so nervous that I felt like it was a 50-50 chance that I would be mugged as soon as I arrived in Port Elizabeth. No worries there though, PE must be one of the most chilled out places around.

What is odd with the crime though is that a lot of people have had bad experiences. Yet, everyone and I mean every single person that I met treated me well. I guess there must be a small minority that spoil it for the rest. But still, the majority are wonderful wonderful people.

7 - The highlight of the trip. Well, it might surprise you. It should be the safari that I was on and yes that was incredible (I even got to see all of the Big 5 on one afternoon). However, the real highlight was at the District 6 Mueseum in Capetown. Now bear in mind that I had been a bit unlucky with the weather in Capetown in that I had been prevented from going to either Table Mountain or out to Robbin Island (Nelson Mandela's prison for 18 years of his incarceration).

Anyways, I arrived at District 6 Mueseum was is basically a memorial to those "blacks" that were displaced from that region as a result of the apartheid policy. I spent an hour just wandering around the mueseum and as you can imagine the whole thing is quite moving. At the end of my time there though I wandered into a room at the back that I thought was the tea room and seeing that there was no one there went looking for someone who could get me some tea. I didn't realise that the back of the place was attached to a small local primary school and I wandered straight into it. When the kids saw me there, it was just incredible, so moving. When the kids saw me they just ran at me and started to hug me. I honestly didn't get it and at first I thought that they wanted money or sweets or something. Once I saw the teacher with them though I realised that this wasn't their objective but rather it appeared that they were just happy that a white man would actually come into their school and spend a little time with them. At least, that's what I was told. I'm still not sure that I understand. One's thing is for sure, I was moved.

Anyways, I've tried to give a quick summary albeit I know that this entry has probably went on a little longer than I had envisaged. I didn't even get to talk much about the fact that I did a rope swing with a freefall of some 110 metres. Very scary indeed.

If anyone wants anymore detail do let me know and I shall try to provide.

For now, I've gotta get ready for dinner with the President.

James Brown and Luciano Pavarotti (It's A Man's World)

Hi, I'm back from South Africa with lots to say and a few great pictures to post.

First though, I thought that in light of Luciano Pavarotti's death today I would post this video of two of the greatest singers of my lifetime. They will be missed

This is Africa

Greetings from Port Shepherd some 100 km south of Durban. I have finally made to South Africa and the last few days just getting here have been something in themself.

Unfortunately I am on a slow connection and so don't want to spend some a lot of time on this entry except to say that I think that this holiday could be quite something. I have already spent some time in an absolutely luxurious hotel one night only to spend the next in a shanty town as filthy as perhaps I have ever seen followed by a hospital that, whilst being quite modern in its facilities is just full of tragic stories.

That and getting absolutely scared shitless about the prospect of doing some back packing by myself whenever all that people do it seems is talk about violent crime!!

The basic plan if it can be done/afforded is to head up to Krugger National Park for a few days potential safari and then fly to Capetown before perhaps going back up the coast towards Port Elizabeth.

It's all quite exciting, scary and to be honest humbling. More to follow

South Africa is the Call

So as we enter the mid point in August, I have now been back working full time for at least two months. Since I still have another year to go before I qualify, I figure the best thing to do is go on holidays!!!

Typically I try to get back to Canada at this time of year and indeed for the longest time this year I was going to do just that and maybe try and combine it all with a trip to New York. The reality was though that any trip back to Toronto is done simply to catch up with people and whilst that is great, as time goes by I am discovering that those people aren't there anymore. So whilst I am letting Robin down by not visiting her in New York as I really wanted to do (sorry Robin!!), my new plan is even more exciting.

On August 23rd, I am flying to South Africa with my parents. Once there, I am spending two weeks by myself and with other friends that I am hoping to meet up with touring around the country. Now, I'll be honest and say that I really don't know much about South Africa aside from the fact that they have a pretty good rugby team and an ex President who is already considered one of the greatest leaders the world has ever seen. All that and also, I hear there is a lot of surfing.

I am so excited to learn about this place which is meant to be a model for how Northern Ireland should bring its divided communites together. I have so many friends who have already been to this place and not one of them comes back with a bad word to say about the place.

Anyways, that's it for the update for now. I will write again soon with this entry on false humility...I promise. Oh and if you're on Facebook check out Lindsay Bauer's page for pictures of her and Dave's trip to Northern Ireland.....good times.

Oh, and in case you haven't already, check out the video below. Seriously, it's something else. I actually heard an interview with the guy who filmed it and he said that the footage is actually from 2004 and that it had just sat on his home video collection until some somputer geek visited one day and posted it. 9 million views later......oh and without giving anything away about the ending of the video, any bad thoughts that you might have about the long term health of the animal involved are apparently misguided!!

Battle at Kruger

I am honestly not kidding when I say that these piece of wildlife footage is possibly the most incredible I have ever seen. It takes about a minute to get going but keep watching trust me.

Why do we blog?

It's amazing how many of my friends who blog have got updates at the minute that involve some sort of apology for not havingt posted more. I'll admit it, I do exactly the same thing. The strange thing is that of all of the links from this blog to others, it is really only Steve-o (and to a lesser extent Jeff Gulley and Sarah Flemming) who keep their blogs regularly updated.

So what's with this spate of inactivity in cyberspace? Is it that we are all leading such adult lives that we are leaving university behind and instead focusing on the working world and all the stresses that go with. Maybe, but I recall most of these people being equally busy throughout much of the last few years and still finding time to blog.

Alternatively, it may be the excuse that I often use - nothing exciting happens to me in my day to day life. Well that may be true but (and this is not meant to be an insult), but Steve-o leads a life as mundane as the rest of us, i.e. he works 9-5, enjoys going out and loves his sports and music and yet Steve-o manages to put together a blog which I generally find so interesting that I rarely am online each day without checking to see if it has been updated.

Another possibility is that we look at blogs of a higher quality of work that ours and feel somewhat embarrassed at how unprofessional or sometimes darn uninteresting our posts our. However, I can't buy that option either as it reeks of false humility as I am definitely arrogant enough to think that when I put my mind to it, I can churn something interesting. (Incidentally, this whole concept of false humility is definitely one for another entry).

However, if I am truthful, I know that the reason that I don't blog enough is that I no longer get the same attention out of it. If I wanted to make myself sound better, I would rephrase that and say I don't get the same kick out of it but let's call a spade a spade. When I started this blog, I did genuinely start it as a means of keeping in touch with Canadian friends who were near and dear to me. In the initial few months, I wrote often and indeed wrote quite well. The blog began many enjoyable MSN conversations and the compliments certainly helped feed my ego.

Somewhere down the line though I started to do two things. The first was that I stopped updating regularly out of nothing more that pure laziness and the second was that I did update, they were updates purely for that sake and as such were remarkably dull. Soon the MSN conversations and resulting compliments stopped and I started to go elsewhere to help fuel my ego. I would post the occassional decent entry (I still quite like "The Problem of Pain) but by and large my writing was substandard.

I'm not sure what the purpose of this entry was. Perhaps it was nothing more than a glorified "Sorry for not posting" entry but I hope not. Maybe just maybe, it is the start of me being a little more honest with the reader of this page and maybe just maybe in the potential resulting MSN conversations one or two original lines of thinking might come out.

Cheers for reading.
Tim