After much deliberation, contemplation and master…ful thinking, I decided that it was the New Zealanders that were going to be honoured with the presence of Hoox. I know, they’re lucky aren’t they? It’s a damn long haul from Zeroville so they better appreciate it!
All considered, planned, booked and paid for. New Zealand… Here I come!
DESTINATION: 
My Chariots:
The dumbassness of this place has struck again. Sitting here waiting to get home for a much needed holiday and I’m just shaking my head. To list everything that is winding me up would be no short story. The highlight of this bullshit though is these assholes failure to realise that 24E is not a window seat. So much for SAA’s wonderful online booking management system. Why do they even suggest they are capable of pre-seating?
I guess on the upside though is that the paraffin budgie is here, I have a seat on it and it’s heading in the right direction. Home!
Just a giddy up and go. Off to Seff Effrika.
I went on a bit of a rant before regarding DHL and it’s incompetence of mass destruction when I had to get a package from Rome to Albania. It’s happening again. This is supposed to be in the top courier companies in the world right??? I quote from their website:
So Puccino calls them yesterday to make the arrangements (cos it’s easier for her to speak Albanian) and set everything up for a Thursday collection of documents at the South African Embassy in Rome. This way we are giving them plenty of time and notice so that the collection and delivery can go ahead unhitched.
This is what they told her: “It would be better if you email us on Wednesday to order the job for Thursday otherwise we might forget”. I mean honesty is one thing but this is just plain downright stupidity, ignorance and extremely bad business practise! So Puccino says to them, “You didn’t forget to send my passport to Singapore last time did you? How can you just FORGET?” So they ultra intelligently answer, “Well you know we have a lot of things in the system so we can’t be expected to remember and track everything can we?”
It seems they have fantastic global technology, a great fleet of planes, trucks, vans, cars, bikes and other methods of transport but what they lack severely is competent staff!
I can only wish that I was making this shit up! This is the new me so I’m not going to act on impulse and go and stab the bitch in the head with a cell phone!
DHL, you had better take care of your crap in your own back yard!
The beauty of the little red book, being the British Passport, is that it means very little consideration has to be given to travels plans including routing and destination. Most importantly, NO VISAS!
My original plan was to fly from Johannesburg to Tirana via an Istanbul layover. Admittedly this was purely out of habit as this is the way I have travelled before. And that’s they way Puccino travelled before. Something clicked in my head the day I was buying the ticket, which happened to be a few days before flying, and I checked other airlines and other routes. Well blow me down and feed me biscuits! I was expecting to pay roughly $1400 on Turkish Airlines which included a crappy layover in Istanbul. I was pleasantly shocked to see Virgin Atlantic with a direct flight to London at $590. Way less than half the price! London, here I come! With the British passport, the gates just open! Hello world!
I was an idiot! I thought that it would be really kewl to try and slum it into town along with the other young travelling backpackers on the trains and tubes etc. Perhaps in a way trying to regain my youth if not for more than just a fleeting moment. I repeat, I was an idiot! What a stupid idea! Heavy bags, rush hour on the trains, delays, tickets which ended up costing me more than I bargained for and the fact that I actually hadn’t slept properly for about a week trying to sort my life out. It ended up costing me about 20 quid and 4 hours of my life let alone the pain in my back, neck and shoulders from lugging my crap up and down a million stairs. When I asked a mini cab how much a Heathrow pickup was he said about 35 quid. For the sake of 3 or 4 pints! Arrgghhhh! NEXT TIME!!!
It was fabulous to see all the old faces. Well not old but you know what I mean. Happy Bean and Katz, Knackers and Puddle Duck, Mildew, Fairlane and J9, Stu and Hawks, Syko and of course Shazza who was kind enough to offer me a bed for 2 nights. It was awesome to be back. I say that tentatively cos I have always felt that London is a great place to visit. I stand firm in the belief that the warm and fuzzy feeling would wear off quite soon and it would be a drag to live in again!
I got some shopping done. Some drinking. Some more drinking. A little more shopping. And mostly more drinking. It was a very necessary trip career wise as well as I managed the opportunity to catch up with an old boss and discuss future possibilities! Always a good beer when money is discussed.
I knew it was going to be a fleeting trip and that is exactly what it was. I achieved a hell of a lot in 2 days and then it was time to go.
Thanks everyone for such a good time!
Today started just like any other day. Not a lot of plans with the exception of a bit of Playstation 3 and job hunting. I was successfully sticking to those plans when my phone rang. I didn’t get to the phone fast enough and it was a number I didn’t recognise so I just left it. 10 minutes later my mate Mullac called me. He had fantastic news. The call that I had missed was the Uitenhage traffic department to advise my ordeal with my driver’s license has been sorted 3 months faster than predicted. I had fortunately listed Mullac as a secondary contact in case I had already left the country.
Now I am awake and I am ready to get cracking. I was in the car in a flash and on my way to Uitenhage. All the way there I was thinking how wrong I was about this country and it’s abilities (lack of) to run a streamlined government and it’s associated services. Today I was impressed. Sadly though, my original impressions were more accurate. After standing in the queue for about 45 minutes I was issued the temporary license which is to be used while the new card license gets issued. That’s when I noticed it.
That temp license only has my new motorcycle license on it and was sorely lacking any indication of my light vehicle driver’s license. My heart started pumping when I enquired about this obvious mistake. That’s when she said, “Oh I think you misunderstood what the process is. When we sent your license details to Bisho to get sorted out, what they do is delete or cancel your license from your ID book, not give you a new one”. When I asked why, I was told because I never got it converted before so it just had to be removed from my ID book. Even after explaining AGAIN that I was overseas in 2003 when this stupid government came up with this ridiculous new 5 year money making renewal scheme system she simply said that there was nothing she could do there.
I asked with much dread in my gut what the next step was. She said, “Oh you will just have to rewrite your learners test and redo your entire K53 driving test.”
Please try to imagine how must constraint I had to exercise to remain calm and not hop on my imaginary soap box and scream at the top of my lungs exactly what I think of those people and their entire system of useless, fat, greedy bastard idiots in this useless Banana Republic that’s fast being “driven” down the toilet!
Thank God I still have my British diver’s license so I don’t need to put up with this crap. It can flush all on it’s own!
I was shitting myself last night. Not for the test today but more for the weather. It wasn’t looking good at all. Any rain and they cancel the test and postpone. I really didn’t want to have the test postponed. It became frontal last night which to the lay man simply means the wind blows like a son of a bitch from the west and that drags in all the crap wet weather from Cape Town. Fortunately this morning it was holding out sufficiently.
I rushed off to the testing station for an 11:30am booking while staring at the sky and hoping like mad. The test itself was very uneventful. The rain held out and I completed my test. It went really well. I guess that comes with good preparation. I passed with flying colours
And then the shit storm began. The government kicked in and that’s when the happiness ended. There’s a problem with my driver’s license apparently. Supposedly in 2003 while I was out of the country I was supposed to convert my old ID book style driver’s license to an ID card license. Since I did not do the conversion there is now a block on the license. Now that I have passed my bike license they need to issue a card license with both licenses on it. Simple? NO! This is Africa. First they have to remove the license from my ID book before they can issue the card. Simple? NO! They are useless! Apparently it can take up to 4 months to sort this out in a distant town called Bisho which looks after the entire region. Only once this is done can I go in to sort out and pay for my new license. But I am going to be away by then so I have to make another plan for issue and collection. Just a real pain in the ass. I can only hope it will be sorted without too many problems.
Africa!
Yesterday was my first time back on a bike properly (and legally) in about 15 years I guess and it was great fun! But now I have to do things the right way. Riding bikes in this country is actually a crazy thing. Bikes kill you quicker than cars but yet all you need is a little piece of paper being your learners license at the age of 16 and that allows you onto a bike capable of going 150kph on the highway (up to 125cc). So that’s how I learned way back when but then the limit was 50cc and we were not allowed on the highway.
Now I want to get my full (unrestricted) bike license so I have to go through the entire process again. About a month ago I got my learners license. And this week I have my bike test which is pretty simple I must admit. I hope I didn’t just jinx it!
I got on the bike and I was feeling a little apprehensive since it had been quite a while. I wanted to go for a quick ride around first just to get used to it again and it was great fun. Pulled off like a champ and was flying around the parking lot in no time. When I got back the instructor said that I was lying and that I had definitely ridden recently. That made me feel good. I guess it is like riding a bicycle!
A few more lessons and then my test. I am a bit nervous but it’s also like an adventure which makes it worthwhile. I don’t know if I even want a bike but I want the license just in case. Leave my options open. It’s very difficult to get it anywhere else and the South African license is internationally recognised so I can get it switched for a UK license.
Even when travelling around your own country it is advisable at times to get yourself a great guide book to ensure you don’t miss out on anything that may interest you along the way. The only problem is when these guides get it wrong. What’s odd with this statement: “Above: Sunset on Durban beach”? Found in the AA Spiral Guide of South Africa.
If you can’t guess or are not from South Africa so have little idea where Durban is, I will give it to you. Durban is on the east coast of South Africa. The sun (even in Africa as backward as it is) still rises in the east. Therefore, there is NO SUCH THING as a sunset on a Durban beach. If you are lucky and crazy enough to wake up that early then you may just be in time to catch a “Sunrise on Durban Beach”
Bunch of CHUMPS!
Or two days in the lives of two pilots should I say. This was quite the adventure and after successfully landing this aircraft on the motorway we can safely say that it is possible but certainly not recommended.
LNELL and I, who were of course the two named pilots in this little event, had even discussed similar events in the past when reviewing the options for landing with engine failure. If I have not mentioned it before, then I will outline it now. It’s quite simple really.
Although the flying / cruising speed of a Cessna 152 / 172 is substantially faster, the landing speed is around 55 knots which in highway terms is just a little over 100kph. This of course is a fair bit slower than most if not all traffic. The idea then is to come in with the flow of traffic and settle down (force your way) in-between traffic which is not unlike most taxis on the road. Here’s the clincher of the theory. The traffic in front of you which should be going faster will not see you and travel on without any idea they almost had a Cessna on their head. The vehicles behind you will hopefully have the common sense to apply a little brake and give way to the aircraft. This could not be said for the F***ING taxi who was trying to overtake us as we touched down. I shit you not!
Anyways, we got to walk away from the whole ordeal without a scratch to ourselves, the aircraft or any other 3rd party. The ego took a little hit I might add and we will not live it down in the bar for some time to come.
When looking to courier important documents or require a speedy, safe and secure method of postage, one usually immediately thinks of DHL or UPS couriers. Personally I have always been fond of DHL as they are a household brand, but even though UPS is right up there, I just haven’t really given them a chance up until now. KP bless her soul didn’t want to use UPS because it sounds like OOPS and she felt that was not a good sign!
UPS however, will from now on get my business wherever they are available when I require urgent secure mail. This is why:
When KP travelled here she needed to send her passport to Italy to get a visa at the South African Embassy. Immediately and without question, we thought DHL. They are the best. The passport got there just fine, but this is the return journey:
Read from bottom to top:-
SINGAPORE?? What the fuck? Bearing in mind that you can almost see the shores of Italy from certain parts of Albania, why did it travel to the Far East and take 5 days for an overnight courier. And then via Bulgaria and Greece? This meant that she very nearly almost missed her flight to South Africa. Needless to say I was pissed however I was grateful that it all worked out for the best and she had her passport and she was on the plane. Great. No harm no foul.
Last week I decided to get all my mail shipped in from London so I called my mail handling people at the service that I use (MBE) and asked them to set it up. They asked DHL or UPS? Again, I just said DHL as they were £5.00 cheaper. All set, lets go…
First of all I get sent 2 delivery notifications via email with 2 separate AWB (Airway Bill) numbers and when tracking them I saw one just got forgotten and left behind so I figured sensibly that there was only one package (hopefully), not that I got any notification that this was the case. I then checked regularly to plot it’s progress. I was a bit nervous as it had 2 credit cards and a debit card inside. It did ok considering public holidays etc until suddenly it went on hold at 08:29 yesterday morning:
I waited and waited but the status never changed so I called DHL’s main number and got through to someone in Johannesburg. They said the package is on hold because they have “lost the paperwork, there is no AWB attached”. For fuck sake. They are the document couriers of choice and they lose their own paperwork? So I tried to call Port Elizabeth to work things out but got no answer. Now I was pissed, so I got in the car and drove down there and had to sort this out face to face armed with the Wrath and Fury of Hoox. After 20 minutes they released it to me. I asked them what would have happened if I hadn’t been aware of this parcel or hadn’t been tracking it so closely and she said, “Well you probably wouldn’t have got it until you eventually called!” Well that’s enough! 2 out of 2 in 2 months? Now I see they put on the tracking information that it was there “Awaiting collection by recipient as requested” which is bullshit. I collected it only because they were not releasing it otherwise and it was not a request, it was a demand!
UPS, you are my new baby! Don’t let me down as I will be comparing you very closely!
