Back in the saddle. Facebook blocked in China so back to old school. This site is great. Just not as many online with this system.

I haven't posted much here in the last few months. I've been relying on my Facebook page for quite a bit.  Since my last posting I was in Laos and got ill on the last night (food poisoning). Not cool. Rough trip home.

Will post some Laos pics shortly.

Cheers.

ps...bombs going off here. Firecrackers galore and some amazingly loud ones. Feels like I am in warzone.

I am in Washington state for nine days. Good to be home.  Happy Holidays!!

Politics.  Not sure I should write about it, but....

Thank God!!  The veil of darkness has been torn and will be lifted in January.  The earth just got lighter.  You'd be amazed at the sigh of relief from all the UK, Aussies, and other Europeans I work with. Even the Chinese are happy.  Most have told me "America finally got it right!!"

I've been voting since 1984 and this happiest I've been in a result.

CNN-International has been broadcasting for weeks and the world is now more positive. Let's see the market rise again!!

Cheers!!

If you have time check out my picture video of Kruger Park.  Pretty neat service:

Steve Kruger Park Picture Video

Cheers.

I've posted pics from Kruger Park. Kruger is the largest park in South Africa dedicated to wild animals. There are many private game parks, but Kruger is a national park.  The park is pretty impressive. The West side of the park is surrounded by mountains. The South where we stayed at Malelane is separated from humans by the Crocodile River which winds a long ways.  It is named for obvious reasons.

We stayed at a bed and breakfast owned by Johan and Duffy. They built the house with the plan of a b&b. Very big nice house sitting right on the crocodile river. They've built a huge deck that over looks the river.  At sunrise and sunset you can sit there and watch the animals come to get their water.  We saw many hippos in the morning and wild buffalo.  Many impala deer were around too. We didn't see a croc at this location although there were a few at the park gate down the river a few miles.  The breakfast at the b&b was great and the company too. Johan in particular can tell a story and knows the area well.  A highly recommended place!
 
Driving through the park - in your own car!!  You can take a tour if you wish, but most drive their own car.  The main road is paved, but there are many side dirt roads that you can go on as well. One such dirt road we came upon 2 white rhinos about 25ft (8m) from our car.  We watched them; they watched us. There are some photos of them posted on the site.  From the main road we saw elephants, buffalo, zebra, giraffe, hippo, rhino, wildebeast (sp?), warthog, baboons, vervet monkees (best photo), birds, and impala (deer); the latter was cool at first but there are so many after a while they annoy you as you are looking for movement in the bush to spot animals and they were so often impala!! 

We were looking for, what they call, the Big 5.  Lions, leopards, Elephants, Rhino and Leopards. We saw 3 of the 5.  We were close to seeing a lion but it was too far away and we'd just missed the action.  At a later park we saw some lion kill, but never a lion.  We were okay with that.

We drove around for 9 hours looking for game. It was quite fun and hard to believe that 9 hours had passes.  I would like to do it again some day.  No joke.  I may have to go back.

Going back?  South Africa is a long ways from Beijing or anywhere for that matter.  It was 8+ hours from Shanghai to Dubai and then another 8 hours to Jo-berg.  A long ways. South Africa is really dangerous in many locations. Carjackings in the big cities, etc., but we survived unscathed and I am ready to go again ... someday.

Zululand next.....

I have returned from South Africa. It was a great trip and I will go into detail later. I have many great photos to post, but alas they don't upload to this site well from a Mac so I will have to improvise the use of a pc.

While in Africa we went to Kruger Park, Zulu Land, Hermanus, the Cape Agulhas (southern most point of Africa), Cape of Good Hope (majestic!!) and  Cape Town (a very European style city).  That is the headliners.  I will post more later with some pics. As stated, Mac and MS-Live don't play nice together.

More later!!

Hi All,

Long time offline and off the grid here in South Africa. I am currently in Cape Town.  I've been all over Eastern South Africa and seen many things such as wild African elephants.  More on that when I have more time.

Internet is tough to get so I've been off the grid.  A little rough at times, but okay.  Today we are off to Hermanus to see the whales just off shore. A cheap b&b on the beach.  Looks good and the reviews have been good.  Going to try and see Cape Agulhaus the Southern most tip of Africa.

Tomorrow we are going to the Cape of Good Hope and more of Cape Town.

Lots to write about but it will have to wait.

Juan

It's been 7 days since the Olympics ended and I've been swamped with work. My staff and I have been doing 12 hour days preparing for the new school which starts tomorrow.  I told them not to come to work today and get some rest. There isn't much more we can do.  I will go in to make sure one of my vendors finishes their job by tomorrow.

As for the Olympics, I saw 10 events and 8 different sports.  I saw baseball and boxing twice.   I expected baseball and basketball to be fun, but I wasn't sure about the other sports.  Boxing was very exciting, but not just the pugilism.  The nationalism of the different countries there to see their fighters was exciting.  Mongolia, Ireland, and China were the loudest.  The Mongolian section was awesome.  Very excited and loud and just kept chanting the fighter's name.  I know that due to my friend's girlfriend who is from Mongolia.  Without her translation it would have just been cool chants.  I found myself in the Irish section. We had to stand a lot of the fight as the Irish couldn't stay in their seats always up and singing some Irish diddy.  A fight last 4 rounds of 3 minutes. The Irish had time for about 20+ songs (granted not the fully song).  The Irish fighter won and we could hear/see them outside the stadium and down near Paddy O'Shea's pub there was nearly 200 Irish in the pub and outside singing for at least an hour (I had to go home).  Very cool.

Other sports; Handball.  Not what we think of back in the States.  Handball is a team sport.  A cross between soccer and hockey. Six on six with goalies. The ball is passed around by hand and not feet or stick, however, the terminology is very much hockey or soccer.  We saw the women of Norway beat South Korea in a very controversial call (Koreans wouldn't leave the court) and then watched Russia beatup Hungary.  Good fun sport.  Norway went on to win the gold over Russia.  A very fun sport to watch. Too bad we Americans don't have it. It is apparently very popular in Asia and Europe.

Track and Field:  I saw Usain Bolt break the 100m dash World Record. Very exciting.  Track is probably one of the more exciting as most events are done right there in seconds. The cheering is great.  Very interesting to see live.

Beach Volleyball:  Very fun environment. Great music and it was much more entertaining watching the volleyball then I anticipated.  The women's teams in tiny bikinis didn't hurt either.

Field Hockey:  I saw Australia trounce the Netherlands (all fans where orange) 6-3 for the Bronze then Germany beat Spain 1-0 for the Gold.  Too different matches in style.  A much more exciting sport than expected.  The Germans were the loudest at this venue. Like the Irish they sing the whole game!!!  Watching the Medal Ceremony was cool as they had to build it to hold 20 players instead of just one.  Nice stadium too.

I've already mentioned Diving and Gymnastics in earlier posts.

I wasn't sure what to expect from the Olympics.  I can watch sports anywhere, but I must say sitting the USA section of the USA-Japan baseball game really got the nationalism flowing through me although we Americans are no where as creative as the other countries.  Japan is loud with continous chants and a bloody whistle...at a baseball game!!

Was it worth it? All the money spent to get into games?  The exhaustion of working 8-5 then racing to a venue around the city and then back home by midnight?  

HELL YEAH!!!  

Vancouver or London!!  Anybody?   Ready?   LET'S GO!!!

:) 

I am posting some pics of the Olympics; very slow from my Macbook so it may take some time.

I've been to Gymnastics, 3m Synchronized Diving, and Beach Volleyball.

Tonight: Taiwan vs. Japan baseball
Tomorrow Night: Boxing
Saturday morning: Basketball Angola vs. Greece and Russia vs Australia
Saturday Night: Track including the biggie the 100m dash

Rest on Sunday. See what comes up next week. :)

More later.

Pic is Martin and myself at the Cube for Diving

Day 3; people have asked if I've seen anything. Yes, I have.

Long story i will type later but I almost saw diving on Sunday. I got caught in a huge rainstorm and was quite wet, but I did see women's gymnastics Sunday night.  Brazil, France and others from misc. countries.  Interesting to watch. The beam is a lot tougher than I thought as about 60% fell off of it.  We only see the elite on tv.

Starting tomorrow my Olympic schedule picks up:

Wed: Diving from 2:30 to 4:00; Beach Volleyball 6pm-midnight
Thurs: Baseball : Taiwan vs. Japan (2 great teams)
Fri: Boxing
Sat: Track and Field (100m final)

I am also working on Saturday morning tickets for basketball.  Angola vs Greece and Russia vs. Australia. Not sure I can pull that one off, but I am trying.

It's a once in a lifetime thing (maybe) so I am trying to see as much as I can and different things too.

I will post some pics tomorrow.

Zaijian

End of my budget year is Thursday so I am swamped buying last minute things so I won't update the site for Kyoto until Friday.

Plus, if you do read my stuff at the bottom of each blog is a link to add a comment. I would love to know if this stuff is actually read by someone!