Last year I was lynched for writing a tongue in cheek blog post about
the Jo’burg hop on hop off bus, I won’t go into detail about what I said, but
where my blog never gets read by anyone or commented on, I suddenly had about
50 very harsh cruel messages for writing the post. I guess sometimes I think that I only write
to get stuff off of my mind and not that anyone will read it, and then when
people do read and even worse leave mean, nasty comments – I suddenly feel like
my privacy has been invaded, which is wrong.
I am not the best writer, and sometimes
when I am just writing my thoughts I don’t realise that the person reading the
post may read it in a totally different way to which I wrote it. So my tongue in cheek post, maybe taken up by
some person as being derogatory instead.
Anyway since then I am very careful about
what I write, for fear once again of being chastised – however I do belong to a
few South African pages on Facebook and I can’t believe the negativity that
comes from ex-pats and people living there, it’s no wonder people get “gatvol”
of reading and listening to people running down their country.
I am at the stage now though, where I hate
hearing people run down the country I live in that has adopted me as one of
their own, and I also hate hearing people bad mouth South Africa. The worst I think are people who have
decided they need to leave South Africa because of the crime, and go to their
chosen country and run down South Africa, like it is the worst place on
earth. I want to take these people and
put them in the middle of a shanty town in Columbia, Palestine, Lebanon or any
poor African country. Then to top it all
after living in their new country for a few months, they start running down the
country that has given them a new home, a new chance of starting a fresh. Inevitably after a year or so these people
return to South Africa with their tale between their legs, they missed their
family and friends too much – but not half as much as they missed the Maid,
Nanny, Gardner and all the other cheap labour they had in South Africa.
In order to leave your home country whether
it is South Africa, Ireland, the UK or any country in the world, takes a lot of
guts and bravery and most of all its HARD, emotionally, physically, mentally it
is so damn hard. You are torn between your “HOME” country and
your new Country.
No country in the world is Perfect, Ireland
certainly isn’t and neither is South Africa.
Yes South Africa has changed in the last 20 years, but it has only “righted”
itself after all the wrong that the government did to its people. Growing up I was always taught to be proud of
my country which I was, but unfortunately we were brain washed, we never knew
what apartheid meant and I don’t think we even heard of the word. Yes we knew there were curfews for the Native
people, and we had a maid but so did everyone else. I grew up in the South of Johannesburg and
went to an English school, so we had kids from all different nationalities in
our school; we probably represented every country in Europe both East and West,
parts of Africa and even Australia.
You just took things the way they were, and did not question, as soon as
you started questioning the government, you would have been branded a traitor
and siding with the Enemy.
We could talk about that forever, I always
believed it wrong, so when I was old enough I could vote for a party that was
looking for change, which I did. And
each time there was a vote to help the majority I voted for them, so why did I
leave South Africa?
When I tell people now I think it sounds
quite cheesy, I had been married 5 years and all my husband’s colleagues were
taking up jobs overseas, this was round the time of Y2K – making loads of money
and coming back to South Africa and buying a house cash. Our plan was to do the same, come over for 5
years, enough time to get a foreign passport as you always need a plan B if
South Africa became like Zimbabwe and we are forced to leave, not that I ever
think that would happen, but you always have to have a plan B or as they say
plan for the inevitable.
But I guess the advantage that his
colleagues had, was they went with very little, stayed in a house share with
like 10 other people, they were very frugal lived on Baked beans and toast and
saved every penny they made, did not travel, use public transport or enjoy
themselves. I guess that was our first
mistake, we found an apartment in a good area, and it’s not as simple as
renting in South Africa all the utilities are then placed in the name of the
renter, and things are by no means cheap! And of course being that far from
home we wanted to travel, and then before we knew it I was pregnant and we had
something else to take care of. So now
it was just a means of being able to survive, enjoy life and take care of our
family. The Foreign passport was still
the number one priority, but unlike the UK it took 9 years to achieve, by that
time we had bought a house, the housing market had crashed, we were living in
Negative Equity, had a daughter who spoke her mind and was not willing to leave
Ireland as this was the only home she knew.
So I guess those were the factors for us not leaving or returning to SA,
and by God there were numerous times I would have packed my suitcase and gone
to the airport and climbed on the first flight out of here! Especially after I was made redundant and it
was so hard to find a job. Jobs were for
Irish people, they didn’t want foreigners, even if you did have that Shiny new
passport that said you were a citizen of the country and you no longer had to
stand in queues at the department of Immigration waiting for a work visa.
Did you notice I totally deviated off the
point of this post!
Even though I am living in Ireland now,
South Africa is still my HOME and will always be, I never ran away,
circumstances just led us to not returning, we’re happy, content, get
frustrated with the government and the laws, there is lawlessness here too –
People go through RED traffic lights (Robots), they hardly EVER stop at STOP
signs, the only thing they do well here is Traffic Circles, they know how to
use them and don’t treat the like 4 way stops which they do in South Africa,
don’t know how many times when visiting SA I have nearly had an accident at a traffic
circle!
They like to Protest, Strike just like they
do in South Africa, the government is somewhat corrupt and plenty of people
getting very rich on tax payer’s money.
There is an element of people who feel they don’t have to work because
they can get everything for nothing, house, utilities etc. What really gets to me is when you see people
who live in council estates driving brand new cars. Young girls fall pregnant so they can benefit
from the State Welfare system! But here
people aren’t branded by colour.
What really gets to me when I read comments
on Facebook and News24 is it doesn’t matter who you are or what you say, but if
someone doesn’t like it you are branded a racist …. Lol.
Suzi:
I went to the store and the woman behind the counter took ages to serve
me because she was chatting to her friends.
Mpho: Well aren’t you just a racist expecting
to be served straight away, why don’t you just leave the country.
Conclusion:
Mpho assumes that Suzi is of a different colour to the lady serving in
the store, and assumes the lady serving in the store is the same colour as he
is, so therefore because she is making a statement that is not positive she is
racist! Ké????
This is just a made up stupid comment, let
me see if I can find some real ones.
But what I guess I really wanted to say is
that I believe in South Africa, I believe that this beautiful country will
still be the heart of Africa in 100 years’ time. I believe that it will go from strength to
strength, and like every country in the world will still have an element of
corruption, crime and lawlessness, but South Africa will always be in my heart
and will always be one of the most beautiful countries in the world. South Africa has a uniqueness that you will
not find anywhere else, the smells, the sounds, the colours, the people – its diverseness
and Rainbow nation for everyone to be proud of.
I am now even more proud of being a South African citizen than I ever
was in my life, I can honestly say I am an ambassador for SA, encouraging
people to visit and discover MY beautiful South Africa.
South Africa has its dangerous parts where
tourists should be aware of their surroundings but so does Ireland, Australia,
UK, America and every single part of the world.
All of this is debatable though and of
course everyone is going to have their own opinion, this is just my opinion of
course, and just something I wanted to get off my mind. I know that South Africa is still 2nd
in the world for the most murders (according to the Huffington Post), 1st
by the way is Columbia, but you can see the top 10 list here.
In my opinion I think South Africa’s
biggest problem is immigrants, not those that contribute to the economy of the
country, but those that come to South Africa with the intention of committing a
crime and getting rich on unsuspecting people.
Once you have been to Africa it is always in your blood.
