Arrival
I have arrived safely in Johannesburg. Or as we call it, Jo’burg. It’s about 70 degrees outside, or 20 degrees C. Lots of sun, but it’s already starting to fade and its only 4:30 local time. That puts me 6 hours ahead of DC and 7 hours ahead of Texas. Yes, I am now a time traveler. Wait until you see what happens at 12:30 today for you guys.
The flight wasn’t as bad as I thought it could be, except that my butt was crying for relief about halfway through. Next time I’ll try to put some more weight on before I come.
Some items of note from the trip over:
It’s been 5 years since I’ve been on an international flight. They now put a camera on the fin of the airplane so that you can watch the plane taxi. The sad part is that we were all enthralled by this experience. Seriously, you can put anything on tv and we’d probably watch it.
I ended up with exit row/window seat. I had to bribe the flight attendant for this honor. Just kidding...as far as you know.
The safety video was equal opportunity and featured two main characters that looked eerily similar to F.W. de Clerk and Nelson Mandela. It was pretty entertaining to see de Clerk demonstrate how to properly inflate the seat bottom cushion.
I was disappointed at the lack of Africans on the flight over. It was almost all Americans as far as I could tell. There was one black African family, and a smattering of white Africans as well. Beyond that there were just a whole mess of folks with southern accents. I overheard a bunch talking about their homes back in Texas. At least the US is sending over its best and brightest as tourists now.
The other interesting thing about the flight is that aside from some honeymooners, I think every person on the flight was here to hunt game. They call it “safari”. That’s kind of unfortunate because in Swahili, “safari” means “journey”, not “kill a bunch of animals with high-powered rifles”. But I did hear some entertaining stories of hunting buffalo on the open range. I think all of the hunters on the plane had mustaches. They would have worked great as characters in a novel. Right down to the khaki clothing and Indiana Jones hats. One of them said that they were looking forward to hunting in “their own Jurassic Park”. But wait, didn’t that turn out bad for the hunter? Hmm…
When my butt wasn’t hurting me, I slept some with the aid of Nyquil and “There Will Be Blood”, which was a good movie, but definitely helped send me off to sleep.
Haven’t seen much of Jo’burg yet because my hostel is right next to the airport. I’ve got a flight that leaves for Livingstone, Zambia tomorrow morning at 10:40am. So by tomorrow afternoon I should be gazing upon Victoria Falls. Until next time, Adios!
The flight wasn’t as bad as I thought it could be, except that my butt was crying for relief about halfway through. Next time I’ll try to put some more weight on before I come.
Some items of note from the trip over:
It’s been 5 years since I’ve been on an international flight. They now put a camera on the fin of the airplane so that you can watch the plane taxi. The sad part is that we were all enthralled by this experience. Seriously, you can put anything on tv and we’d probably watch it.
I ended up with exit row/window seat. I had to bribe the flight attendant for this honor. Just kidding...as far as you know.
The safety video was equal opportunity and featured two main characters that looked eerily similar to F.W. de Clerk and Nelson Mandela. It was pretty entertaining to see de Clerk demonstrate how to properly inflate the seat bottom cushion.
I was disappointed at the lack of Africans on the flight over. It was almost all Americans as far as I could tell. There was one black African family, and a smattering of white Africans as well. Beyond that there were just a whole mess of folks with southern accents. I overheard a bunch talking about their homes back in Texas. At least the US is sending over its best and brightest as tourists now.
The other interesting thing about the flight is that aside from some honeymooners, I think every person on the flight was here to hunt game. They call it “safari”. That’s kind of unfortunate because in Swahili, “safari” means “journey”, not “kill a bunch of animals with high-powered rifles”. But I did hear some entertaining stories of hunting buffalo on the open range. I think all of the hunters on the plane had mustaches. They would have worked great as characters in a novel. Right down to the khaki clothing and Indiana Jones hats. One of them said that they were looking forward to hunting in “their own Jurassic Park”. But wait, didn’t that turn out bad for the hunter? Hmm…
When my butt wasn’t hurting me, I slept some with the aid of Nyquil and “There Will Be Blood”, which was a good movie, but definitely helped send me off to sleep.
Haven’t seen much of Jo’burg yet because my hostel is right next to the airport. I’ve got a flight that leaves for Livingstone, Zambia tomorrow morning at 10:40am. So by tomorrow afternoon I should be gazing upon Victoria Falls. Until next time, Adios!
posted by Michael, aka Tex, aka Jett | 8:07 AM
2 Comments:
Welcome to the rest of the world, roomie! You should have loudly proclaimed, in earshot of the hunters, that Ernest Hemmingway was incredibly overrated. That way if anyones asks you if you've ever been beaten up at 30,00 feet by a man with a jaunty waxed mustache, you can say yes.
Were any of them going to hunt Man?
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