ededed

Sorry Campbell, think you've been had. I saw it ages ago too.

Campbells

Amazing.

This actually was a front page spread in the NZ Herald, the largest newspaper in NZ.

That’s one of the things that I love about it here in NZ is that by comparison this would be what kind of news in SA? Would it even make the news?

Personally I think South African have no idea just how complacent they have become and wrapped up in THEIR OWN worlds until you move out of SA and realise the big picture.

There is life beyond:

Rugby
Cricket
Braai
Castle Lager
Latest cars
Latest cellphones
Latest sunglasses
Who’s looking at me?
Who’s not looking at me?

Mate, if you want to compare NZ to SA I can guarantee you that will be a tough one for you

In the last couple of days I was served in stores by two South African ladies, both happened to be from PE (supposedly a crime-free zone) the one has been here three months and the other five. I spoke to them for a while and I tell you, it just reminds me of the reason why I left SA.

I think ultimately people like yourself have to justify why you stay in SA with the risk factor and all the other nonsense that is going on whilst you have options to stay in other countries.

Yeah sure, you get your dishes washed for you and your shirts ironed by your cheap labour domestics, you have sunshine and cheap golf courses and sure booze and smoke are give-away by comparison to the UK – really cheap.

The value of your life – cheap too! That’s the real risk of SA and as a trade off I would rather iron my own shirts (mine go to dry cleaning) and have to earn more money to afford golf. Both my wife & I play.

Ultimately you are a big fish in a small pond in SA and it is all a good time. At some point the good time wears off and reality is what is left and these are the moments for me that SA doesn’t feature.

Just for your info. We had a power failure (lasted about 4 hours) last year and we got a $100 credit off our bill as compensation.

Telecom, our ISP had a problem with their network a few months back & our broadband speed was affected for about a week, we were credited our whole month’s bill as compensation.

The interesting thing about this article (you posted the link to on NZ) is that it was mentioned that her family were present when the power was cut off. I wonder if the family actually took her condition into account when they received the reminder s that the electricity bill had not been paid. If the family could not afford to pay the electricity bill well guess what? Hospitals in New Zealand are free and she would have been moved to one.

I am really surprised that if her condition was so reliant on electricity there was no battery back up. Although we have pretty reliable power in NZ I still run our desk top machines on UPS. Ultimately there is more to this case


Next time you’re on BBC read this one:-
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/6703621.stm

Right now it is 22.27 and there is hardly a sound outside, can’t remember when I last heard that choir of dogs barking that is so common (front row alarm system) in SA.

I think I’ll turn in for a peaceful sleep. Oh my, wait, are my doors locked? If they’re not who cares, this is New Zealand not Africa.

I will sleep well tonight.

ededed

I will sleep well tonight. [/QUOTE]

I'll sleep well too - I'll be in business class at 35,000 feet with 2 or 3 bottles of decent red inside me

All of what you say is true - I don't think anyone with half a brain would deny it, and maybe you're right about the big fish thing. I do feel somewhat insulated from it all. In total I have been here for 5 years. No-one I know has been robbed, mugged, raped, hijacked or killed. No-one who works for me has either. None of my neighbours have. I see it on TV and read it in the papers, but don't see it with my own eyes on a daily basis like some would have you believe. We were back in the UK for 2 months and our house was robbed and then I was mugged in London - so my perception is different to yours. I lived in a nice part of London, and live in an average part of Jo'Burg. Go figure. Am I just lucky?

This doesn't make what goes on here acceptable, and neither I or anyone else (save the government) is living in some dark denial - but I have still to see the "war zone" that's been quoted. Maybe one day I will then I'll be on the first plane out!

I'd rather stay and try and make a difference than leave - but I completely understand and accept people's reasons for behaving differently. This is where my wife and kids are happiest, and that's good enough for me.

Pablo

Well I didn't leave because of the crime, though in 2001 it was perhaps not quite as gruesome as it is now.

As for crime happening to me, I had a car stolen (no big deal, I wasn't in it or anything), and, one sleepy sunny afternoon at Aukland Park post office I was there when the place was held up by gunmen. Everyone was made to lie down on the floor by the screaming guntoting youths. I had my watch taken, and a gun pointed to my head, but was otherwise unscathed.

Afterwards I just picked myself up and got on with my day. I felt oddly calm, though all about me people were crying and stuff.

Otherwise it was clients and friends, or friends of friends. One friend's neighbour was burgled in Woodmead while she was at home, tied to a chair and pistol-whipped. But not killed or raped. The burglars came back a week later. Not sure what happened the 2nd time, but she had a policeman sleeping over for a while after that.

A client was hijacked with his wife and kids in his driveway (in Mondeor, I think) and they were all held at gunpoint while the house was ransacked. No one was killed.

A friend's elderly father was killed at his smallholding outside Jo'burg.

A work colleague's brother was hijacked twice in his driveway in Bryanston, once with the kids in the back. No fatalities.

I lived in London for 10 years. Never suffered any crime.

Like I said, it doesn't happen to you till it happens to you. In SA I was prepared to take the risk, perhaps naively. I just stopped reading the crime reports. They were too ugly.

I had the sense it was getting closer and closer to home (Northcliff) - gun raids at Cresta and the Northcliff Shopping Centre, that kind of thing. I left for reasons that nothing to do with all that.

I considered going back, and did a recce trip in 2003. Despite some glitzy new buildings in places like Sandton, I had a clear sense of decline. Jo'burg was rapidly turning into a ghastly mega-city encompassing Pretoria, Centurion, Midrand and Joburg itself, the traffic was far worse, the pollution worse.

Even so, I might have considered returning, but the deeper troubles are not being tackled; there was quite a sense of pessimism beneath the glitz and swagger; friends whose judgement I trusted, and who were in the know, told me stuff that doesn't make it into the popular press. In the end I decided the upheaval was too much, and SA was not making the kind of choices it needs to make to succeed.

Pablo

Campbells

Amazing, you have such a different experience from mine. I don’t think I could name you one person I know in SA ( social or business) who hasn’t been a victim of some sort of crime.

You see the pump action yielding car park attendants, the cash in transit staff in body armour, the treble door security in all the banks and the countless security companies all around you ? Next time you drive down a street in Jo’burg, try this – spot the house WITHOUT the Armed Response / ADT / SAS / Chubb Armed Response on & on. They are all there for a reason and are a costly service.

You got armed response where you stay ?


Mugged in London – mate you are still alive. How many people live to tell the tale in SA ?

Mine is not a perception but an experience. I was hijacked at gunpoint in 96 and left SA in 2005 so nearly ten years later. Let’s just say that after my experience I had my eyes opened.

You drive with your doors unlocked ? Your windows open at the traffic lights ( robots) ? You know what safe rooms are ?

What are you doing that is making a difference ? It sounds more like you are enjoying the good life in business class with nice red wine.

Bianx

With regards to ededed with the 'I see no war zone' comment:

You have obviously never been caught in a taxi war, or had some strange man in your house (with a gun) at 4 in the morning. Or you havent had to fight off rapists (my friend). And I live in a good neighbourhood!!!

ededed

No I haven't.

ededed

No I haven't. I'm truly sorry that you have - I'm not condoning or being blind to it at all - I'm just telling people my experiences...

Forgive me for not being able to empathise by sharing the experience - I do sometimes feel like an apologist or traitor for not having been a victim of crime....

Campbells

Personally I think it is the de-sensitising result here.

People in SA are starting to accept crime and I can tell you that a few of my good friends do not want to hear about the realities. Drink a few bottles of red and talk rugby , cricket, cars, business deals and you remain in the circle of trust…

Mention crime – out you go………

The problem with SA is that when it hits it hits hard .

The thing about where you live in SA is overplayed. You still have to drive and lots of times at night and that is not safe.

My sister’s best friend’s daughter was slaughtered at the age of 21. How do folk cope with that stuff going on all the time.

Bianx

Im glad that you haven’t been a victim of crime yet. But I have. And so many other people have. I just hope that you are still doing things to prevent things happening to you?

Campbells

Hey Ed,

You write the scripts for the call centres ? Slik dude

Campbells

Some folk just have to bang their heads !

Pablo

Campbell, I don't think people ever really get over that kind of thing. I don't think they do "cope." A part of them dies. Period. They never really recover.

You can't tell people what it feels like, because they have no conception of what it could possibly feel like. They have no hooks for their own imagination to latch onto what you describe to them.

One can describe gruesome stuff and even show pictures. But tv has become so appallingly gruesome nowadays that even that doesn't compute with people. They don't *feel*.

Just as when I look at all those Brits wingeing about Oz on this site, I think to myself: can they really have been so naive? The answer, alas, is yes.

Pablo

ededed

I am employing people who previously didn't have work, giving my spare time to feed and clothe the homeless, driving up service standards to improve inward investment by making us competitive globally, inviting friends and family to come to ZA to see how beautiful this country is, keeping SAA in business and treating the huge, vast majority of citizens of this amazing country with dignity and respect.

I'll take your final comment as tongue in cheek - otherwise I'd be incredibly offended by the assumption that I was on some kind of gravy train. That's a very personal accusation to make. I put as much in as I take out. More even.

ededed

Anyone who doesn't happen to agree with you is an apologist for the government?

#sigh#....