Marie-wind! Take Nine

Fun, Facts, and Follies From the Last Few Days...

• A note about eating pancakes (flapjacks) here: instead of pairing them with butter and maple syrup, South Africans prefer golden syrup, jam, and cheese. 

• Coolest thing ever: in SA, you get to book your seats in the movie theater in advance. This means no rush and no panicking once the doors open. You simply pay for your ticket, choose your seat, and calmly proceed to the big screen at leisure. Why oh why haven't the North American theaters taken note of this genius idea??

• Dinners are eaten much later than the usual 4:30pm-5:30pm time back in Canada. Here, food is on the table around 7-8pm.

• In Manitoba, we say something is "clutch" if it's considered cool. Here, "clutch" is short for the slang word "clutch plate", which is a derogatory word for an Afrikaans person. I found this out the hard way. Whoops. 

• The South African "lunch" is always a good time. They usually take place on Sundays as an excuse to gather the extended family together and drink good wine, but they never quite hit the "lunchtime" mark. You're usually expected to show up around 11:30am and then the spread of food is served around 3 o'clock. 

• My birth control pills back home cost around $25 a month. Here, they cost me 68Rand -- that's only $9.50! ... I just may have to stuff my suitcase with pills for the flight back... 

• I got the chance to have a quick lunch with Kern and Leah this week before they jetted back to Canada for Sarah's graduation. It was so lovely to see them again and a good experience for Didier, as he got a little taste of being surrounded by Canadians and our accent! 

• Grocery shopping in Joburg is always an adventure. And by "an adventure" I mean "unhealthy". Haha what can I say, I spend most of my time scouting out imported things from back home. And most of those items end up being chock-full of sugar and sodium!

My haul: Alphagetti, pudding cups, Starbursts, Oreos, pancake mix, processed cheese slices, Icebraker Sours... YUMMM.