We are now just over a week until I am on my way home. In
this entire endeavor I have had to pack multiple times. Packing to come to
South Africa to begin with, Packing when I changed accommodations in Cape Town,
packing when I moved from Cape town to Hawston, packing when I changed
accommodations in Hawston, packing for various Holidays, packing when I moved
back to Cape Town from Hawston, and now looking towards packing to leave Cape
Town to return to the states. This is a big pack job, because I will have to
decide what I want to bring back and what will be left behind. While I am
thinking of various possession to bring back, I thought it might be fun to make
a list of all the non-material things I wish I could bring back. Things that
they do here in South Africa that they don’t in the United States. Throughout
my time here I have made various mental notes along the line of “oh, that’s
cool, I wish we did that back home” and so I will put them on this packing wish
list.
1) Moving over to allow passing. On
two lane roads here (one lane of traffic in each direction) it is common
practice to pull over to the side (the left here, since the side you drive on
is flipped) onto the shoulder to allow faster moving traffic to pass you. You
don’t pull over and stop, just move to allow more room for the passing car (the
shoulder is usually wide enough to accommodate this, so the car won’t have to
encroach upon oncoming traffic). This is a level of consideration and awareness
that I feel is lacking from American driving.
2) Use of 4-ways (hazard lights).
It is also common practice here to flash your 4-way blinkers to signal
appreciation. I have encountered it most commonly in reference to the
aforementioned action of passing. When someone moves over to let you pass you
flash your 4-ways after completion of the act to thank them. It can also be
used as an apology or acknowledgment of a wrongdoing. An example would be if
you cut someone off (learned that from an Uber driver after someone cut him
off, but they flashed an apology so it was ok). I think that many people in the
states don’t communicate properly on the road. This includes simple things like
using a blinker to signal a turn or lane change.
3) TEA TIME! Ok, so I love this
common practice. Tea, or coffee, seems to be an accepted part of the culture
here. At the care center everybody had a scheduled tea break (30 minutes). In
the Cape Town office, there’s not a scheduled tea break, but it is common
practice to fix a cup of tea or coffee when you come in, and then perhaps get
one or two more throughout the day. Typically you bump into one or two people
while fixing the cup, and it turns into a social event. I think of this as a
replacement for the “water cooler” chat in the American office, or the smoke
break for those that don’t smoke.
4) Mentioned in the previous one is
the social aspect. This country (at least the communities I have been around)
is a very social one. This is something I both love and don’t. I enjoy talking
to people, don’t get me wrong, but I am very much an introvert as well. I need
my time to be alone and that can be clash sometimes with people here. It is not
uncommon (especially in the community I was in) to drop in on other people
randomly or planned for tea or coffee and a chat. When I was staying with a
family in Hawston, their grown children would regularly stop by every day for
tea and conversation. Otherwise, one could just be walking through the
community and pass a house of someone they knew and decide to just stop by. In
the office in Cape Town, we take a communal lunch.
5) The Food. Once again, it could
just be the area that I am in (Cape Town being a major City and the Hermanus
area being a vacation spot), but the food and restaurants I’ve visited have all
been really good. I’m not talking the chain one or the fast food ones (though
some of those are not bad), but the local ones. When Alexis visited, I don’t
think we ate at the same place twice, and we enjoyed each and every one of our
meals. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not like each meal was absolutely stunning, but
each one did have at least one dish that we both thoroughly enjoyed, even if
what the other one ordered wasn’t good. And with the exchange rate being what
it was, meals where we both ordered an entrée, drinks, and either an appetizer
or desert were quite affordable.
