More taxi adventures....

It's Women's Month. Quite appropriate. At the moment there's an International Women's Cricket Tournament happening down the road from where I live. See the end of my blog on the 6th.

Went to watch Sri Lanka vs Holland and West Indies vs Ireland. I must say I was impressed with the skill of these women. The fielding and the batting would put many men's club sides to shame. The pace was fast and very energetic.

That afternoon I shuttled a number of them to our local mall, as I have been doing during the past week. With great excitement I was told that in my car I had a world record holder - Stephanie Taylor - from West Indies, who was the first woman to score 1000 runs in international women's cricket. She achieved the milestone that very afternoon. 

Friday was a day I will not forget in a hurry. 

It started out when one of the hotels called on Thursday for me to meet and arrange a trip to Johannesburg on Friday morning. I went along, met the guy - Michael Volante - and was told to collect him on Friday morning at 3.30 a.m. Turns out Michael, or Miguel, needed to get to the airport by 9 to get back to Manila, Phillipines. 

So promptly at 3.30 I arrived at the hotel to collect the guy. 

So why did we have to leave so frigging early, as the airport is only a 1 1/2 hour trip? Michael's wife, who is a flight attendant with one of the Middle Eastern airlines, was here in SA during the 2010 FIFA Soccer World Cup. She had gone home with stories of what she had seen and places she had visited. Michael was keen to visit those same places. So off we went. Still pitch dark, with the sun only expected to appear well after 5.30. 

First we drove to Soccer City in Soweto, where most of the matches were played, and the final game between Spain and Holland. Spain won the game to become world champions, of course. 

It was still dark when we arrived and not conducive to great photos, so I suggested we drive to Gold Reef City theme Park nearby just to have a look. 

The top pic of the entrance to the casino.

The sun had come up and we went back to Soccer City. Michael took a few pictures. 

Then on to Sandton and to Michelangelo Towers and Nelson Mandela Square. 

We had a very expensive - but good - breakfast at the Michelangelo Hotel. 

Then to the airport where Michael bought a World Cup soccer ball souvenir for his son. 

What a nice guy! He has a restaurant in Manila and if the opprtunity arises I'm sure to visit him one day. 

I left him and drove the 1 1/2 hours home. 

Sat down to do some work when the phone rang at about 2. Would I take someone from the bus stop in Potch to Pretoria, collect his wife and then drive to Bloemhof. 

Now those whose local geography is sound you will realise that Pretoria is 2 hours' drive north and Bloemhof is, after a turn-around in Pretoria, another 4 hours south, in the opposite direction!! 

We negotiated a price. I definitely undercharged the guy. 

He is a medical practitioner in the state hospital in Bloemhof, and had to get back that night (Friday) as he was on call over the weekend. Oh, and he and his wife are both originally from the Democratic Republic of Congo. 

I will spare you the details of the nightmare trip, suffice to say that I got back home at 2.30 a.m. on Saturday morning, loaded to the gills with Red Bull to stay awake. 

Do the arithmetic. I had been in my car for 19 hours all told, and had driven just on 1000km. 

It's Sunday evening and I'm still trying to get my energy levels back to normal. 

So that's it. Chat next time.            

  

         

Fun as a taxi driver

I have a little sideline business shuttling (read taxi) people around. "Shuttle" sounds so much more civilized, don't you think? 

Arrow Routes cc.

CK 2008/074976/26



SHUTTLES, TOURS & AIRPORT TRANSFERS

Well, I started the business 3 years ago as a perceived opportunity in my town of Potchefstroom. It began when visiting B&Bs, guest houses and hotels here as part of my job as a grading assessor. On more occasions than one could ignore I heard owners / managers complaining that they would have to drop everything in order to cart their guests from the establishment to wherever they needed to be - at times to and from the airport in Johannesburg.

It therefore wasn't too long before I had my little business up and running, serving as an added service to guests. I insisted that it was NOT a taxi service. I now run 3 cars. (My business plan indicated that there would seldom be more than 2-3 passengers at a time so investing in a mini-bus would have been an overcapitilisation)

During the past 3 years I have met the most fascinating people and enjoyed many and varied conversations. 

The highlight was capitilising on the fact that our City of Potchefstroom was host to the Spanish (eventual champs) team during the 2010 FIFA Soccer World Cup. I was adopted / contracted by the attendant Spanish media groups. I fetched them, I carted them, I sometimes rescued them from bars at 4 a.m............. and I became good friends. I have been invited to Spain in June next year so that they could reciprocate the hospitality I showed them. Of course I wasn't just their taxi driver. I was the best host I possibly could be. This warmth and freindliness was also shown by my other three drivers - my partners Vicki and Ben, and my son Mike. 

I received a call at around 5 one morning. The very drunken voice requested me to collect him from one of the bars on the wrong side of town. I arrived to find one of the TV crew cameramen completely wasted. It was in fact the security guard who assisted him into my car. "Too many womens but I drink too much", he mumbled. I took him back to his hotel. Later in the day, at around 4 p.m., I saw a slightly recovered cameraman trying to keep focus on the world around him. When he saw me he threw his arms around me, rattling away to his compatriots in Spanish how I had rescued him from an unknown fate and a possible long walk - stagger - back to his hotel in a strange town.

"Joo my Fadder", he said, "joo look for my life!!" I worked out that what he had said was that I was his father, and that I had saved his life. From that point on I was his 'fadder'.

I got to know Pedro, Fernando (x2), Javier, Miguel............... 

I met and spoke to members of the team - Coach Vicente del Bosque, captain Iker Casillas and players Cesc Fabregas, Carles Puyol, Andres Iniesta, David Villa, Sergio Ramos and so on. All great guys, very humble and complete gentlemen. I did not witness a single prima donna among them. Wonderful sense of humour and lots of laughs. 

Although security was tight one did not feel intimidated or unwelcome at any of the practice sessions. I guess it had to do with the chilled out atmosphere which prevails in Potchefstroom. 

I drove the media guys to Ellis Park Stadium in Johannesburg, to Loftus Versfeld Stadium in Pretoria, to Soccer City stadium in Soweto and many trips to and from the airport in Johannesburg, from whence they flew to Durban and Cape Town. 

Needless to say, my cars were festooned with mix of S.African and Spanish flags and wing mirror covers. 

Every time the team proceeded to the next round, and finally winning the final to become World Champions we celebrated like mad. 

Their impressions of South Africa and particularly Potchefstroom? We hosted the best Soccer World Cup ever, with fantastic success. The crime and political problems as stated in world media prior to the event came to nought. There were very few noteworthy incidents other than the odd theft of belongings (I am only aware of 3 incidents across the country, and we hosted over half a million visitors. Excellent stats by any world standards). The Spaniards loved our country, especially Cape Town, which is uniquely special as we all know. They found Potchefstroom to be clean, safe, wonderful and the people more than accommodatingly friendly, warm, sincere and helpful. 

 The media with del Bosque

 Dinner with the guys from Antenne3. Miguel, Fernando, Javier, Pedro and I

              Soccer City after the match

A few months prior to the soccer madness I was also privileged to shuttle the Jamaican cricket around town. 

So many other interesting individuals have sat in my car over the past year. Too many to mention, so I'll just continue my journal from here onwards.

The Aardklop Nasionale Kunstefees (National Arts Festival) began last Monday and concluded on Saturday the 3rd. Adventures during this period requires a blog of its own. Soon. 

At the moment I am shuttling members of national women's cricket teams who are participating in a tournament here in Potch.

Jamaica, Holland, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Ireland and South Africa. Yup, you read correctly - INTERNATIONAL WOMEN'S CRICKET. 

We are celebrating Women's Month at the moment, so it seems to be appropriate. 

I'm off to go watch some cricket, so till next time, or if something really pisses me off I'll be back to waste some of your day.                    

Exploring North West Province, South Africa

The most difficult part of this blog is my question to myself as where to begin. I guess by saying that, as a tourism and hospitality consultant and as an assessor for the Tourism Grading Council of SA, whose focus is on quality assurance, I travel quite extensively, particularly in the NW Province. My job in this regard is to assess the quality of product and service in accommodation establishments and to assist and advise on the maintenance of standards. My job, therefore, is to represent guests and their best interests and expectations. 

So join me on my journey of discovery. 

Over the past 11 years I have seen and discovered places and met people I never knew existed, or heard of but never visited. I hope to take you on the journey - past, present and future. In doing so I hope I will in some way whet your appetite and awaken in you a desire to want to visit the places I have seen and experienced. 

I am not going to be a salesman. I am not going to praise where praise is not deserved. I will tell it as I experience it. If I slate a property and the owners / managers don't like it then perhaps they should pull their socks up and prove that they are prepared to raise their product to acceptable levels. 

I am going to tell you about the people I have met and what we said and did. 

Together we will visit and experience the awesome beauty of the African bush at luxury game lodges such as Motswiri Safari Lodge in Madikwe Game Reserve, which I visited last month.

    

We will hunt game with our cameras, photographing lion, buffalo, elephant and rhino. Apologies to the more squeamish but we will see a lion and wild dog kill.  

We will also check out B&Bs, guest houses and hotels around the country.

So let's go and have some fun.

I will be going to Orkney, Mahikeng, Rustenburg and Klerksdorp in the next few weeks and I will update on my return.

        

Let's get annoyed about spelling.

Do you get as annoyed and downright angry at the way people spell these days? It's not just spelling but shocking grammar as well.
I do understand that there is such a thing such as sms-speak, which of course is a major irritant as well. Can people not just write "the" and not "da"? In this regard I guess it's a losing battle but I shudder to think how these YOOFS will cope in the corporate world one day. Imagine a contract, for example, which says: "Ol da peeps mus sine da c.tract bi tonite" or some such vomit.
Signage in the real world leaves one cold, and often hliariously amused. At the recent Aardklop festival in Potch I saw a sign (a typed and laminated page) - got the photo evidence - for toilets which says: "MANS    GENTAL MEN". A friend sent me a pic which he took on his phone camera of a menu at a restaurant in Parys which read: "Grill Omeletttte". Firstly I'm not sure what a grilled omelette is, and secondly why so many "t's". Then a sign at the bakery for "BURGER BANS". The best recently, and unfortunately I did not have my camera with me, was at my local butchery advertising "ICE BINE".
Some time ago I was invited to the launch of a new tourism destination in Groot Marico. They distributed fold-out pamphlets which advertised all the members of their accommodation association and other attractions and activities. I counted no less than 14 spelling and grammatical errors. People such as myself who are somewhat anally obsessive about this sort of OOPS would pick up the brochure, read it and and wonder who these morons were and think twice about visiting the area. I would wonder if this is the shoddy way in which they marketed their product then heaven knows what the quality of the offerings would be.
I would love to hear from readers of their own side-splittingly funny experiences.