East London at Last

Greetings Gentle Readers.
And so we reach East London at last.  After all of the warnings and doom-sayings that I've heard from all and sundry, it's a lovely place.  I really quite like it, and suddenly feel bad that I'm not spending more time here.  I suppose that this is stage four of the security check on South Africa.

1. Cape Town was safe as houses.  Despite repeated warnings and cluckings of tongues about muggings, murders, rapes, insurance fraud, defenestrations, etc., I can happily walk down the street brandishing an iPhone in one hand and a digital camera in the other whilst wearing a T-shirt emblazoned with "I am a World Cup Tourist!" in neon yellow across the front and back with absolute impunity.
2. Port Elizabeth is not Cape Town.  That being said, it's such a happy, friendly place that it proved that Cape Town is not some sort of freaky exception.  It's also relatively well-to-do, and very techno-savvy.
3. King William's Town is not a World Cup Venue.  If the theory goes that police are only guarding tourists in World Cup-hosting cities, then the fact that my father and I parked the car, wandered off for lunch and a bit of sightseeing, and came back without a hiccup should do that theory a disservice.
4. East London is also not a World Cup Venue, and if King William's Town is exempt from crime because it's smaller, East London is a large, bustling city-port, and we're still driving about with our windows down and digital cameras displayed proudly.  

Also interesting that I'm noticing the difference between Eastern and Western Cape folk.  Hitchhikers on the Eastern Cape just show their thumbs.  On the Western Cape, hitchhikers hold out 10 and 20 rand notes to show that they'll help pay for gas.  Speech patterns vary as well.  The Western Cape, in common with the western bits of North America, tends to be a bit more laid back in speech and behavioural patterns.  The Eastern Cape tends to have more explosive intonations and inflections in spoken phrases and sentences.  Also a fair bit more use of expletives.  

As an example, my aunt Florrie insisted that uncle Joey would corrupt my father and me; we both tend to eschew the more colourful of invective language.  Within a matter of days, my father began to get frustrated at the fact that the indicator lights on the hired vehicle are controlled by the right stem on the driving column, not the left.  By the third time he'd turned on the windshield wipers instead of indicating a turn, "Ach, sh*t, man!" had become de rigueur for any such minor irritating scenarios.

Went and visited my grand-uncle, who turns 90 this year.  A wondrous font of fantastic and bizarre tales, including the one that I shall relate with the substantiation of photographic evidence, as soon as I get around to uploading all of my photos from both digicams this evening.  Speaking of which, I'll sign this particular missal off for now, and see if I can get around to making these tedious ramblings less arduous by dropping in some visual relief from my turgid prose.  Back in a proverbial jiffy.

Cheers,

—mARKUS