Missing in action
We were in South Africa for two weeks visiting family and that’s why I’ve been missing in action lately.
I can’t really say that we did anything exciting or touristy while we were in South Africa. We really just caught up with family and friends. It was the whole reason we went, and honestly, two weeks is not enough to see loved ones and fit in sightseeing.
Why we moved
We also reminded ourselves of why we moved. For example, stage 6 loadshedding was announced as soon as our plane landed. Oh, you don’t know what loadshedding is? That’s good, you’re not supposed to know what it is because loadshedding when your power is turned off for a couple of hours a day because there’s not enough power (or the infrastructure keeps breaking). Then, there was the crime. We weren’t the direct victims of crime while we were there, but I was so paranoid about it. I would check multiple times whether the house and car were locked. A few years ago, someone tried to steal my car, so I didn’t want to repeat the experience.
Also, I was reminded of how terrible Bloemfontein (my hometown) was to drive in. People there drive like maniacs. I mean, I drove the speed limit, but then everyone sped past me like I was crawling. And don’t get me started on the potholes. I had to transfer money to my dad to get the car’s wheel alignment done again. He was not very impressed.
Dogs
I was elated to see my dogs again because they can’t understand why I was away for so long. But remember, my parents got a dog soon after we left the country, so he didn’t know who I was. My parents’ dogs are very protective of them and they don’t like strangers, so they bark at any ‘intruder’. So imagine the new dog’s surprise when he saw me, a stranger, and the other dogs were happy to see me. That poor dog was so confused, and to be honest, he feared me. However, he thought I was good enough to play fetch with him. It seems like anyone, even intruders, is welcome to play fetch with the ball-crazy dog.
A true holiday
It was so good to see the family again, as well as not having to worry about preparing meals for myself and hubby every day. We mostly did our own washing, but we didn’t have to clean the house. Everyone spoiled us so much, it was like a proper holiday. Then it was terrible again to say goodbye to everyone because we didn’t know when we’d see them again.
Medical stuff
While we were in South Africa, we got some medical stuff done – nothing serious. We went to the dentist for a check-up. The dentist did minimal work on one of my teeth and worked on two of my husband’s teeth. It cost literally a fifth of what it would have cost if we did the same thing here in Australia.
We also went to the optometrist, because I really like mine and I don’t trust these Aussie optometrists just yet. Luckily, my eyesight did not deteriorate, but I got another pair of glasses as a spare. My husband also got his eyes checked and his eyesight is perfect. It’s so ironic because he’s a programmer and you’d think for someone who sits in front of a computer the whole day, his eyesight would be poor, but no. He has perfectly straight teeth, and perfect vision – and he’s handsome as well. Geez, some people just have everything.
Also, since everything was cheap for us over there, I bought my parents a bunch of stuff. They reprimanded me for spending money on them, and then I had to explain clearly that it really was not that much money for us because of the preferable exchange rate.
Jet lag
I was so worried about the jet lag on the way to South Africa because I thought we wouldn’t have a good time. After all, we’d be so tired. Honestly, the jet lag was not that bad (on the way there). We were pretty man-down the first two days, and I just wanted to sleep. I slept so much that my in-laws reprimanded me for sleeping instead of spending time with them. After that, we got into a regular sleeping schedule, except that we got to sleep in much later than we can when we have to go to work.
However, the jet lag back to Australia was terrible even though our travel time was much shorter. Apparently, it has something to do with the direction in which you fly, because we lost time on the way back. The jet lag was the weirdest thing. For five days we were zombies because we couldn’t sleep every second night, and when we could sleep, it was not enough to catch up for the nights we couldn’t sleep. One morning I got up at 3’o’clock in the morning to do the washing because I couldn’t sleep for the life of me. It was crazy. Now that I’m back at work, I can sleep through the night again because kids can be so exhausting, you know?
Lastly
And that’s the reason I was missing in action for a couple of weeks. It will probably happen again soon because it’s the last few weeks of the school year and it’s going to be busy.
P.S. If you’d like to contact me, feel free to comment below, send an email to thatmichelleperson@gmail.com, or follow me on Twitter @M_ClutterBox.
