Bazaruto in Mozambique

We flew on a pelican to an indigo bay,

With Rod the frog as our stowaway.

We swam in the sun, saw turtles and fish,

And ate like royalty enjoying crayfish!

I hid in Telana's bag so she had to take me with! It was well worth being so sneeky! I had my first flight in a small plane, and my first duneboarding!

More photos on my facebook profile and on flickr.

Spring picnic

What a fun day! We had a picnic at the Walter Sisulu National Botanical Gardens to celebrate spring in September 2008! I listened to jazz, ate strawberries, had a ride on a tortoise, played hide and seek, climbed up the mountain cliff, and kissed some girls!

I even had my first dance!

More photos on my facebook profile.

Waterberg Wilderness

My first taste of the South African bushveld and a bit of 4x4'ing was a weekend at the Waterberg Wilderness in April 2008. We saw giraffe, eland, kudu, wildebeest, lots of bugs and bush!

I even chatted to a wild frog!

You can see more photos on my facebook profile

Traffic in Mumbai

The rides in the autorickshaws were such fun! Quite cramped though, and the drivers were extra zippy!. it made for hair-raising trips trying to find our way around Mumbai.

The most unusual bit of driving we experienced was trying to get off the highway- a busy 3 lane highway which had no offramps. Where there was a street that intersected with the highway, cars just edged their way across lanes of traffic until that traffic stopped to let them through and off the highway. Then a few seconds later, the stopped traffic would edge their way across the lanes turning off the highway… all with no traffic lights or any road signs- just hooters and guts!

Mumbai Madness

Rod experienced the hecticness of Mumbai. It's a hecticness that only Mumbai has. And unless you've tried to cross over a street like this one (in below clip) where the cars and autorickshaws and busses and taxis and bicycles and cows don't stop for you - you won't know what I mean by Mumbai's hecticness. And this street wasn't even a busy one!

Rod joined me to celebrate my dear friend Satneet's wedding. Satneet had been studying abroad for a few years, and returned to her home town Mumbai to marry her sweatheart, and even she said to me that she now understood what I meant by Mumbai's hecticness.

Well we did cross this street in a fashion like the old computer game leap frog (much to Rod's amusement). We crossed this road to get to some huge film studio's, where we were in a bollywood movie. The movie was called "Money hai toh honey hai" directed by Ganesh Acharya, and what a lot of fun! We even learnt some of the dancing moves by watching them rehearse so often!

After our film debut we had a train trip back to the Colaba area and then walked around the streets of Mumbai till way passed midnight. You see a very different side of the city at that time, with rats the size of cats running passed vendors sleeping on the floor.

We also watched cricket being played in Oval Maidan, admired the Fountain in the botanical gardens at Horniman Circle, and waved at Haji Ali's Mosque as we zooted past in a bumblebee taxi!

The highlight was the four days of ceremonies that we were invited to for the wedding, and getting my hands henna'd.

The low was Rod almost being eaten by Rufus.

And if you don't believe me that Mumbai had a madness of it's own, watch the movie "The Slumdog Millionaire" or go visit this marvelous, but mad, city!

Namaste,
Telana