Jovi's holiday escapades

Now, for you who, for one reason or another, have not been able to travel far this dec. hols., writing textbooks, lan gaming or other "entertaining" persuits, i shall share what i learnt about my 3 trips this yr, to:

1. the incredibly beautiful and criminally rampant South Africa
2. the overcrowded Genting Highlands, Peninsular Malaysia
3. the overrated yet relaxing Port Dickson (y do i hear laughter?)

First off: WHINY WARNING, this post will contain minimal complaining about daily life!!!!!!

1. S. Africa (23 nov to 3 dec)

10 days, 30 S'poreans with various backgrounds including 1 Jovi, 1 exasperated tour leader with an unforgettable lydia sum laugh, 1 totally foreign and exotic country. I know, right? Recipe for disaster.

Anyway, the 1st thing one would notice out of the airport is the sheer number of whites. Whites that do NOT speak english!!!!!!!!!! and blacks who speak better english than folks back home!!!!!! Welcome to South Africa.

the blacks are incredibly friendly but my godma refuses to think anything positive of them. Go back to s'pore, you and your narrow mind!!! Getting stuck with her for 10 days is like the twilight zone. More on that later. The whites on the other hand are like the s'porean elite, cold as ice and unperturbed by minor issues like toxic waste slowly eliminating SA's penguin population (yes, there are penguins there, some of which bear great resemblance to people back home!!!).

Cape town was our first location. we left a rainy country and escaped to....... another rainy country!!!!! At least on the 1st day, it poured like no other. the ostriches at the farm were none too happy when they were instructed to give us rides. i swear without proper supervision they would have pecked us to death in the rain. we had raincoats, they didnt, plain and simple. More guilty pleasures later as we ate those ostriches!!!! they taste like beef and are healthier. they arent going extinct anytime soon so dig in everybody!!!!

Our cape town hotel was decent, and next to mob infested streets. we were ORDERED not to leave the hotel premises alone after dark and it hit home the next night. dinner at a thai restaurant. pls black list any such restaurant with the name "Wang" (again, laughter). 2 of our big group of 30 had their bags stolen. inside were passports and other impt documents. aiyoh!!!!! security there is like utter crap, the police do their job in the day and commit the crimes they are supposed to prevent at night. luckily enough, the s'pore embassy was visited late in our tour and new documents were prepared.

cape town feng shui rox!!!!! sea on the south side, mountains on the north side, city in the middle side, and numerous thugs on the underside. eating western breakfasts for days on end gave me a huge pain in the back side. Speaking of mountains, we visited most of them and got fabulous views of the city. wish i could post pics.

Anyway, we proceeded to do shopping, or rather some people shopped. the anime dvds there are so expensive, i can get about 5 of them in Singapore. Reality tv shows on dvd are non-existent. That really pissed me off, but when we returned to the hotel, a parade was going on. Hundreds of poor locals queueing up for free food. Sure makes us think of the wonders of home.

Anyway, i shall continue my escapades another day.

Note 12/1/2007: i have deleted all the crap i posted previously as some of my observations were totally unfounded. some new ones have surfaced though, and will be duly noted, but not on this blog. i hope this will reduce some of the negativity coming my way this few weeks.