Daxk

I'm sure to lose a lot of sleep.

littlebrit

I can assure you that this is a genuine dilemma I'm facing. I was looking for British expats in Joburg when I found this forum. I wanted to know if I was being paranoid about the crime or not. As a Brit with one key for my house, the alarms, dogs, electric fences etc really scare me.

In real life the people I meet from SA are either sure they'll never return or would go tomorrow if they had a job to go to (but think because they are white they would not find a job). My husband's best friend and brother would both go back immediately if their partners would agree to it. They see our potential move as an overwhelmingly positive thing.

We have attended a Homecoming Revolution event and talked to people who have moved back and are happy they did so.

My husband is very homesick and apart from wanting to live in such a beautiful and sunny country, he also feels he could take his skills to SA and mentor/help young people in SA. He feels it's a country with a potentially incredible future, whereas the UK seems to be be going downhill.

At the same time, he agrees that we should leave our house and investments in the UK, in case we need to leave. We both have UK passports. He is highly skilled and would easily find work back in the UK or elsewhere.

At the end of the day, if we take the right precautions in SA I'm sure statistically we'd be reasonably safe. But my dilemma is whether those "precautions" will effectively make life not worth living. I don't want to live in fear. If I have all the security, will I still be scared?

I'm sorry that some of you believe this to be a wind-up. It is not.

Pugsy

Oh, please, if you think the UK is going downhill, OMG you need to look at SA news and statistics of crime and RTA's! You will not be happy with what you see. The news link I posted early on in this thread is only unusual in that the victims lived. Do you really want to live with the risk of that happening in your own home. Where would that happen in the UK?? It wouldn't, would it. Please don't be taken in by the British media's latest bone, knife crime... while individually tragic, it's not an epidemic. How can you avoid someone hijacking you or a home invasion when you already have all the precuations.

Your hubby's attitude lacks perspective, I'm afraid. I always like reading Martyn and Auds posts because they still live in Jhb and in my opinion are balanced. They know the risks and live with them, they're not in denial.

It doesn't sound like your opinion matters anyway, your hubby seems to have made the decision, so go, enjoy, but go with your eyes wide open.

Pablo

...and now you've been told. But you don't want to believe it. So what now? More pointless bleating?

Well all that stuff is there. You have seen it for yourself, apparently. So either everyone just put it up for fun, or they have a genuine belief that it is all necessary. Go figure.

...and who do you suppose is capable of answering that, other than yourself?

I think you're wasting everyone's time. You've been given plenty of info to do research of your own, but you keep banging on about "will I be scared?". Suck it and see.

Tegwyn

Ship hubby back home for a long holiday. Let him work off the starry eyed version for a reality check when he is back home.

AudsFrmSA

Tell him to turn on Sky News channel, today they are talking about the crime in South Africa....and speak to the parents of a 12yr girl who was killed in a shoot-out while being driven to school!

Pugsy

Ja, seen it today, it was so sad. It just makes me want to scream when people talk about returning... they need wake up and come to terms with the hard cold truth that there's no future in SA. Forget about a big house, a swimming pool, a maid, the hot sun, homesickness, a good career move and whatever the reason, it's just not good enough.

Humans are quite complex aren't we? So often we choose not to see what is right in front of us and it is that final act of violence that shocks us into reality.

The OP thinks she will be safe if she takes all the right precautions. This case, publicised on Sky, would sadly disprove that theory. The crime is so random, how can you avoid it? It's a brutal lottery. Think of your children, if not yourselves.

Cosmos

Hi Littlebrit

I was in a very similar situation to you, married to SA husband who was desperate to return home for similar reasons to yours.
We've now been living in JHB (Northern suburbs) for a year, I'm happy to answer any questions you may have (can't guarantee I can answer them, but I'll try) just PM me. I don't post on here very much.

Life for me is pretty good, I have a very interesting job, good lifestyle, husband still has friends and family here so we are out and about with them a lot. My biggest issue is the hours I work which are exhausting but that's not really related to SA.

You will absolutely need a car - no question. However I do find I walk a lot more here than I did in the UK as the weather is so nice. I walk to the shops, we walk round the local golf courses or drive to gardens and walk there. Walking day to day to school, shops etc is not particularly practical though.

I do't want to talk too much about crime, its been covered enough - however I would say I understand what your husbands family say when they say they don't think about crime day to day. However you learn to live with things such as locking car doors, being on the alert driving, living behind high walls and fencing, paying someone to look after your car in the car park.
However I was very unlucky with crime in the UK and had several burglaries, car stolen etc.. (yes I know that type of crime is not what the real issue in SA is) but I am more used to dealing with alarms, watching my back, being very nervous about who is in my house when I return home as that was day to day living in the UK for me.

I do think you get very different perspectives from people who have left SA than people who live here day to day. Most of our friends here have UK passports through ancestory, have often lived in the UK for a few years but all have moved back and would not leave SA again.

Pablo

Life was pretty good for this woman too, until it suddenly stopped being pretty good.

http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?set_i...4014630C120322

That is the nature of violent crime. Yes, you can live with the fear, day after day, or you can just ignore the fear, day after day. In my own case, I tended to ignore it, admittedly after taking all the precautions. Even when I was held up at gunpoint in the post office, made to lie on the floor, and robbed, and screamed at by a gun-toting youth, I didn't let it change the way I lived. And when I left, I didn't leave because of the rising tide of crime.

But none of that detracts from the fact that it is the nature of this sort of crime that it doesn't really affect you until it really affects you. I mean, you don't get raped or murdered that often, even in South Africa. Once will do.

My own position on the whole crime question has always been this: if you are prepared to live with it, then do so. I have no beef with those who do. What irks me is those who try to deceive people who don't know better, by making out there isn't a problem when there clearly is. I'm not suggesting you're doing this, Cosmos, but I'd rather be clear about it than be jumped on later.

Pablo

While I'm on the subject of emigration, I'd like to add this, for anyone thinking of emigrating from the UK.

There is a psychology to it. The first few months are a lot of fun. Everything is new. You enjoy the things you didn't have in the UK - like lots of sunshine, or perhaps a swimming pool, or servants, or whatever.

Then, after about six months, you go through a phase of missing old friends, family, that kind of thing. A lot of people throw in the towel at that point (just look at all the poor bewildered Poms on the Australia section of this site).

Then, if you get through that six month danger phase, you're usually ok, mentally, until about four or five years. Then it begins to dawn on you that, in practical terms, going back is going to be very difficult. Instead of things being lovely and cheap in South Africa, you start to see it as a South African, where your earnings are low, and everywhere else in the world is much more expensive, even unaffordable, and also a very long and expensive plane trip away. That is the second danger phase. Five years. A lot of people throw in the towel at that point too.

After that, if you stay, you just push on, and life just becomes normal, whatever normal is for you.

But there is always a price to pay when you're an expat. It is this. You are always looking in from the outside, and many expats don't like that feeling. You never quite belong. And, if you go home on visits, you find you never quite belong there either. You become kind of rootless.

In the case of South Africa, you start to look at what the future holds - next year; five years hence; ten years hence. And you start to realise that your life there is always going to be very unstable. You meet people who once built a life for themselves in Kenya, or Tanzania, or Rhodesia, and who ended up losing everything and having to try and start again. You ask yourself whether that's going to happen to you.

And you find that more and more of your friends are emigrating. And then, as you get older, you find your children are emigrating too, and you wonder about how you'll cope when you start to get old. Suddenly those tedious African wars in far-off places you've never heard of become just around the corner. And you ask yourself how those countries managed to get into such an appalling state.

I've seen it all. It's not all easy.

MartynK

I found myself thinking about the original "Will I be scared?" question again. Well, none of us can answer that for anyone else, unless we know them pretty well, but I think I can put it into some sort of perspective.

I meet a lot of expat's wives as part of my job. A few of them seem completely oblivious to the risks and can't understand what all the fuss is about; most of them get some personal security training, make a few adjustments/get on with their lives, and some are petrified to the point where they refuse to leave the house unless their husband is with them.

Please bear in mind that most of these women are married to men with highly paid positions in companies that provide generous perks and subsidies (including security costs) for expats, and are only here for 2 - 3 years. I've only met a few who would like to stay when the contract expires, but a lot who are counting the days.

Pisces

Pablo hit the nail on the head.
We have emigrated to Australia and my sister and her family are following next year. My parents are in Johannesburg, are in their 70's and are terrified of being left there on their own when one of them dies. It is gut wrenching and depressing for all of us. How can I enjoy my life in Oz when I know my parents are so unhappy, scared and alone. What can you do? I have to think of my children and their future, so would never go back to SA, but they are my parents.
It is amazing here and I should be enjoying it as much as my children are but it is hard to do so. My children walk to school, to their friends houses, ride their bikes and play outside.

Tegwyn

You have my heartfelt sympathy. It is the hardest thing for any of us expats to do. I was fortunate that my parents went back to Wales shortly after my father retired, because after our experience in Zambia, he had fully clarity as to what was eventually knocking on SA's door. My sisters did not feel the same and decided to stay. They, and their families are paying for it now.

Rocsta

Hiya...

I reckon it'll depends where ur based in Johannesburg.U can live in secluded places with high security or some privated guarded suburb.Yes,there's crime and don't think it'll affect u that much.Just log-on to a south african property website to get an idea.

All the best and enjoy ur stay....

gilliana

Pablo, i've read a lot of your posts on different threads and think perhaps you should start your own website...maybe call it www.i-hate-sa.com?
what exactly are you doing on this forum? you sound like a big bully standing at the gate of SA preventing anybody from entering.