SunSquare Montecasino Sandton

... Soweto, as we learned on the drive, stands for South Western Township. The driver let us off in a pretty non-descript neighborhood, and we were handed our rooming assignments. <br><br>We were then invited to have dinner at the Soweto residence of Archbishop Desmond Tutu. Archbishop Tutu is a Nobel Prize winner, a tireless defender of human rights in Africa and recipient of numerous international tokens of ...

... When almost all conceivable social negative items in your life seems directly related to "the other" race, it has to be difficult not to place blame. The thing is, as an irony, this works both ways because black people see it like that at well. So you have mutual blame. When I ask how long it will be before things settle down and change for the good, the optimistic view is about two generations. The cross-directional blame is based on the past, but there ...

Holy cow peoples.. what a terminal. So we arrived 2 hours before the plane was due to leave and I was totals thinking about the nice little sit-down and hot chocolate I was going to have. ha ha ha.. so naive. OK,so the place was PACKED. I went directly to my check-in counter and waited in line whilst my uncle went to wrap my bag... If you go on facebook you will see what Blairs bag now looks like. haha. Nywho, whilst in line there were heaps of people with a ridiculous amount of ...

... people during Apartheid. They HAD to live in these shanty towns. We drove by Nelson Mandela's original house and where he lives now. We also Desmond Tutu's current house and Winnie Mandela's current house. Surprisingly, they still live very modestly and still in or very near Soweto. Soweto is home to over 3 million people and there is an upper middle class area, lower middle class, lower class and then shanty towns. It was these shanty towns ...

... Garden route weaving our way through the wine regions, beginning at the Fairview estate which is owned and run by the "Back" family then onto Backsberg, there's a clue in the name! Naturally I claimed relative status. Stopping off along the way for a spot of Great White Shark cage diving. WOW. The 3 meter shark cruised slowly past the cage twice before I saw him, much to Michael's frustration. Visibility was so poor, about 1-1.5 meters, when I eventually saw him he cruised past ...

AIDS in South Africa A cursory glance at any newspaper or magazine here reveals the enormous challenges facing South Africa, but few seem more difficult than the HIV/AIDS epidemic. Here are a few relevant statistics: Ø Currently, 18.34% of people between the ages of 15 and 49 are infected with the virus, and it is responsible for 71 % of all deaths in this age group. Ø The highest rate in the adult ...

... Africa and ended in Uganda) to Africa from Frankfurt, Germany. The cheapest one happened to be Emirates (which allowed me a free stopover to Dubai, the fastest growing city in the world). From the United Emirates of Arabia, Emirates flies only to Johannesburg, not Cape Town. I had to start a grand trip in a place I didn't want to go to. Before taking my day train ride to Cape Town, I had to stay in Johannesburg for a day. Maybe I could finally see Soweto and the ...

And so the journey of a lifetime regretfully ends with a few tears and regrets that this kind of life of travel can't be ...

... is petrified by heights. We had lunch at the V&A waterfront and acted like tourists for day exploring the brewery and little shops. We only spent two days in Cape Town before traveling an hour down the coast to Hermanus. Hermanus used to be a small fishing village before it was swept with tourists. People come form all over the world to see the Southern Right whales and the Humpback whales that frequent the bays of Hermanus over spring. It was reported ...

... Nothing special there. The South African country side looks like every other ones. At least the ones from our countries. Along the road, the name of a Guest House catches my eyes, Mata Hari. I decide to spend the night. By some strange twist of faith, the owner is Namibian. He has a lot of tips and ideas for me. What to do, what to see, where to go. Once again, my lucky star precedes me and luck smiles at me. In the early morning, the ...