C is for Cape Town
By the time you are reading this, I should be in the air on my way to South Africa so it seemed appropriate that this week’s posting should be C for Cape Town, our eventual destination.
We are visiting South Africa to see our daughter who is living there at the moment, but the primary purpose is a holiday to experience the country and I will be armed with my camera in the hope of getting enough material for a whole round of ABC Wednesday.
Crackers
We always plan to light every time we go away, but it never seems to work that way. There is always something else t0 throw in the packing “just in case.”
For me, the problem is books. I have this mini library of titles that I must get round to reading some day and holidays always seem like the prefect opportunity. But I have to have a wide selection of fiction and non-fiction because I don’t know what reading mood I’ll be in and the upshot is I end up taking more books than I can possibly read in the time available.
The History Boys
“Those who cannot remember the past, are condemned to repeat it.” I’d like to paraphrase those words by George Santayana and say they are condemned to become politicians. More precisely they become health ministers.
Whenever a new party takes office, especially after years in the wilderness, it has to run around with dynamic zeal and change all that went before it in the NHS because it was just plain wrong. They know the cure for the ills of the health service, except that the medicine is usually the same as the one that failed before, but with a different label.
Think the Unthinkable
I was getting quite depressed reading that more young girls are binge drinking, but then that’s young people generally, not to mention middle-aged, seniors, working-class, middle-class etc. It’s all the fault of the supermarkets and alcohol industry for selling booze too cheaply.
Next it was the NHS managers that Andrew Lansley says he wants to cull. All those senior bods no longer required to run our hospitals as the GPs will be doing that out of the goodness of there hearts.
New Face of Sky
Now we know why the Daily Mail has stuck the knife into Andy Gray — they’re lining up their own man for the lucrative £1.7 million a year job.
As reported today, Ambam the silverback has mastered walking upright without dragging his knuckles and is now working on his onscreen persona.
He bears more that a passing resemblance to Gray, both in looks and attitude.
Ticka Ticka Timex
They say a little knowledge is a dangerous thing, but it can certainly feed your paranoia. I made the mistake of browsing a site for ex-pats in Cape Town that attempted and failed to be reassuring.
It said that the city’s reputation for crime and violence was totally unwarranted, that Cape Town was an idyllic place to live provided the prospective settler takes sensible precautions.
Sky’s the Limit
One of the great innovations brought by digital tv is the ability to pause a live broadcast if you have other things to do. Like answering the door or the phone, or feeding the dog.
Very handy, although I do feel a little guilty at making everyone else in the country drum their impatient fingers while I make a cup of tea, but that’s progress for you.
B is for Bridges
According to the Tarot Reading Psychic: “…the symbolism of the bridge is not to be taken lightly. In fact, bridges often indicate major transitions in a persons life including important spiritual transformations.”
True or not, I find bridges fascinating and seem to photograph them a lot. Like the one on the left which I took from the footpath beneath the busy A627, while beneath traffic thunders east and west on the M67 motorway.
Why the Sony Bravia? Discuss
In these modern times when everything has a price and we’re told to get real and stump up for state sponsored ‘advantages’, isn’t it time that the government and its unofficial tax collectors also changed their attitude towards us “customers”?
I’m thinking about education and the ever increasing university tuition fees. Setting aside the false premise that a degree equals higher pay (what happens if half the workforce has one?), you’re still expected to jump through academic hoops to qualify to spend your hard earned cash.
The Fear of Crime
Do you know which European country has the highest crime rate? The Vatican City. There are around 1,000 crimes reported each year, or 1.25 instances per head of population. It also has the lowest age of consent and it is legal to have sex with a 12 year old.
The fact that it has such a large influx of tourists every day accounts for the former fact, mostly pick-pocketing and purse-snatching and since the majority of its 800 population are Roman Catholic priests then the less said about the latter, the better.
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