August 1
Just got transferred by my company from London, UK to our new home in Richards Bay, KZN, SA.
Now this is a town that knows how to live!
Beautiful, sunny days and warm, balmy evenings.
I watched the sunset from a deckchair by our pool yesterday.
It was beautiful.
I've finally found my new home.
I love it here.

September 1
Really heating up now.
It got to 31 today.
No problem though.
Living in air-conditioned home, driving air-conditioned car.
What a pleasure to see the sun every day like this.
I'm turning into a sun-worshipper - no blasted rain like back in London !!

September 15
Had the back yard landscaped with tropical plants today.
Lots of palms and rocks.
No more mowing lawns for me!
Another scorcher today, but I love it here.
It's Paradise !

October 1
The temperature hasn't been below 35 all week.
How do people get used to this kind of heat?
At least today it's windy though.
Keeps the flies off a bit.
Acclimatizing is taking longer than we expected.

October 15
Fell asleep by the pool yesterday.
Got third degree burns over 60% of my body.
Missed three days off work.
What a dumb thing to do..
Got to respect the old sun in a climate like this!

October 20
Didn't notice Kitty (our cat) sneaking into the car before I left for work this morning.
By the time I got back to the car after work, Kitty had died and swollen up to the size of a shopping bag and stuck to the upholstery.
The car now smells like Whiskas and cat sh*t.
I've learned my lesson though: no more pets in this heat.

October 25
This wind is a *******.
It feels like a giant f .... blow dryer.
And it's hot as hell!
The home air conditioner is on the blink and the repair man charged R200 just to drive over and tell me he needs to order parts from JHB
......The wife & the kids are complaining.

October 30
The temperature's up around 40 and the parts still haven't arrived for the f#... air conditioner.
House is an oven so we've all been sleeping outside by the pool for 3 nights now.
Bloody R4.000.000 house and we can't even go inside.
Why the hell did I ever come here?

November 4
Finally got the f.. air-conditioner fixed. It cost R1,500 and gets the temperature down to around 35 degrees.
Stupid repairman.

November 8
If one more smart ******* says 'Hot enough for you today?'
I'm going to f... throttle him.
F... By the time I get to work, the car radiator is boiling over, my f... clothes are soaking f... wet and I smell like baked cat.
F... place is the end of the Earth.

November 9
Tried to run some errands after work, wore shorts, and sat on the black leather upholstery in my car.
I thought my f.... @rse was on fire.
I lost 2 layers of flesh, all the hair on the backs of my legs and off my f.. @rse.
Now the car smells like burnt hair, fried @rse and baked cat.

November 10
The Weather report might as well be a f..... recording..
Hot and sunny.
Hot and sunny, Hot and f... sunny.
It never f.... changes!
It's been too hot to do anything for 2 f... months and the weatherman says it might really warm up next week.

November 15
Doesn't it ever rain in this damn place?
Water restrictions will be next, so my R5,000 worth of palms might just dry up and blow into the f... pool.
The only things that thrive in this f.... hell-hole are the f... flies.
You don't dare open your mouth for fear of swallowing half a dozen of the little *******s!

November 20
Welcome to HELL!
It got to 45 f... degrees today.
Now the air conditioner is gone in my car.
The repair man came to fix it and said, 'Hot enough for you today?'
I wanted to shove the f.... car up his f.... @rse.
Anyway, had to spend the R2,500 of the mortgage payment to bail me out of jail for assaulting the stupid p..ick.
F...Richards Bay!

What kind of sick, demented f...idiot would want to live here!

December 1
- WHAT!!!! The FIRST day of Summer!!!!
You are f..... kidding me …
: clap2:

Here's the diary of a South African living in the U.K

7 am Wake up after an uncomfortable nights sleep (you try sleeping in a tin foil hat). Set the snooze button. Just 10 more minutes of dreaming of the happy days when I lived in South Africa before I have to deal with reality…..please.

7 :15 am Creak and shiver out of bed. Take a quick look outside at the weather. Predictably miserable as usual. Mutter something sarcastically about “just another day in paradise”.

7 : 30 Get under the shower and barely manage to prop myself up against the wall as the water thaws out my bones. I soon find myself in a hypnotic daze. A distant voice in my head whispers of happier times in South Africa. Why did I leave that paradise for this nonsense ? What the hell was I thinking ? How stupid ! Stupid! Stupid ! It’s all a blur as I gain consciousness and find myself weeping in the fetal position watching the water flow down the drain like the joy has from my soul.

8 : 00 am Decked out in my industrial overalls I make it out of tiny inner city flat I rent. I don’t have time to consider the irony of how much more dangerous , ugly and dysfunctional the neighborhood I’m living in now was compared to the glorious luxurious suburbian lifestyle I had as a middle classed South African. But there’s no time for quiet reflection as I hurry to catch the bus.

8 : 30 – 5pm Join my fellow ranks of working class nobodies. They entire day moans by in one long monotonous torture. One moment is indistinguishable from the next. Nothing happens , nothing changes. My fellow workers have long since tired of my negative and bitter victim mentality and aren’t interested in my crying out for attention and lies about South African anymore. When they used to feign interest when I told them of genocide being carried out in South Africa and how I am an exile/refugee from my own country….now….they just roll their eyes. They’ve seen through my racist agenda and hyberbole and instead now just see me for the talentless loser I am who holds everyone in the world responsible for my problems but myself.

5 : 30 pm Get home. Scrape together the energy to put some baked beans on toast and open a beer. The days of cheap dining out and braaing mountains of meat with glasses of excellent cheap red wine, under the warm evening skies are over The days of heading down to the pub for a few beers (and to spread the latest urban myths about crime and the A.N.C) are also sadly over. Nothing interesting happens here anyway. Nobody runs around digging for any half truths and sensationalistic rubbish here , except in the context of football. There’d be nothing to talk about even if I could afford to go to the pub.

6 : pm With each bite of toast I can’t bare it any longer. There’s an itch I know needs scratching. I head for my computer. Before you know it I’m off surfing all my popular sites (like South Africa sucks) in the hope of finding some bad news to validate this personal hell. It’s not long and I’m reading about how children in South Africa do drugs and rape their pets. How black people on a daily basis boil alive white babies to make potions (but mostly just for fun). How the A.N.C are really in fact either run by the zionist bilderburg group , or are in fact Reptilian overlords who feed on our young (I choose to believe both). How the Crime rate in South Africa has finally broken the 1 billion murders per day rate , but the government is covering it up (and that’s only white people). How Jacob Zuma , the Yeti and loch ness monster faked the moon landings to cover up the fact they shot John F Kennedy from the grassy knoll.

8 pm My search for anything to affirmate my stupid decision to leave South Africa continues. As the beer kicks in and I feed on this information choosing to ignore and deny it’s absolute absurdity , I start to feel pretty good about my decision to leave South Africa. I trawl youtube , forums and blogs looking for any signs of South Africans pretending they are living normal happy lives. I berated them for their delusions and ensure them that they were probably murdered and raped already but they just didn’t know it. I tell any other foreigners who are thinking of visiting South Africa about how they will get killed before they even leave the airport.

9pm : Still pretty much spend my time spreading about as much negativity as I can about South Africa. It’s with more than a little spite that I wish to ensure that if I can’t enjoy South Africa , then no-one else can either. They might think they’re doing pretty well over there with their thriving economy , high standards of living , social upliftment and the likes….but I won’t allow it. I’ll sabotage South Africa’s future in anyway that I can , even if it involves lies , manipulation , sensationalism , scaremongering and hyperbole. I’ll teach these uppity blacks for thinking they could run a country using liberty instead of sticks and guns.

10 pm : a little tipsy now Find some pictures of gruesome farm murders. This scat stuff gets me really hot. I can't get enough of it.

11 pm : Pass out in a drunken stupor , but not before I’ve spread a great deal of stupidity and ignorance around. I’m a real winner.

dont give up the day job, Samsing, comedy is a tough one.

I spoke to a lad at work last night who was originally from Zimbabwi, but grew up and lived in Pretoria until 2 years ago when he came to the UK to study law and politics. His cousins and extended family are still there tho. He says that SA is dangerous! He says the reason for that is that black SA are inherently lazy and a jealous people, who are brought up to feel oppressed, eventho apartheid no longer exists on paper. They dont understand the work ethic or that they can change their lives. The government, he says, altho are black are in the hands of the white people and altho pay lip service to their black countrymen, realise that its far better to keep in the pockets of the west and to keep the black people uneducated, poor and oppressed! He says that its not unusual for a black people to walk up to others (white or black) and to simply take their property, be it a car, a mobile phone......... and if they cant take it nicely then they'll take it violently, Alcohol and drugs are a serious problem too?!

Apparently there are beautiful places in SA, there are areas that are safer, but they are in protected zones. For those who live in these areas (predominantly white), its as safe as anywhere else in the world and a good life can be had, but this element of the blacks and their greed is an underlying factor. But he recommends people go there, its beautiful and maybe if enough good go and live in SA then the tide will change????

I MUST ADD THAT NONE OF THE ABOVE ARE MY VIEWS - I DONT KNOW. AND ALSO THIS YOUNG LAD IS 21 YEARS OLD, LOVES HIS COUNTRY AND IS BLACK
........ and I cant argue for or against what he's said, because I dont know. Also, this is a subject close to his heart and he spent most of the evening talking about it - I've just written the jist of it


Jo xxxx

__________________

What a load of alarmist Cods.... and offensive at that ! Black people are all lazy ? I've seen black people lining up at 5am on cold winters mornings by the hundreds to try get a job picking oranges for 5 quid a 12 hour day. Blacks don't know how to uplift themselves ? Tell that to the 7 million black who are now middle classed.

What an offensive and ignorant thing for someone to say about an entire group of people. The bit that would be funny, if it wasn't so ironic is that he calls blacks entitled. You'll probably never meet a group with more entitlement issues than white South Africans of a certain age. Because they used to get everything on a silver platter and now they have to join the que like everyone else, they think the sky is falling. And greedy ? What was apartheid about if not about greed and not wanting to share ?

But then that's just my opinion from literally knowing thousands of South Africans. But feel free to listen to your Zimbabwean co worker. That's your prerogative.

I also find this type of conspiracy stuff that the government is trying to keep people poor and uneducated baseless. If anything the government engages in populism by trying to give the people opportunities to uplift themselves. I don't even like the government (or the opposition) but this stuff about willingly keeping the people uneducated as if to imply if they were more educated they would not vote for the black government is also offensive. As if people don't know what's best for them.

I take it you speak from experience given the cliched comeback.

I have to agree with what you have written samsings
So many Zimbabweans live in SA as they cannot survive in Zimbabwe, as do many other people from countries ( not just African countries)
Please keep your postings calm, do not become abusive towards other members or me.
Thanks

Its far easier to believe a lovely, bright, educated chap who I know than an abusive and aggressive poster who we have to keep banning and who I dont know from a bar of soap!

That said, I'm simply relaying a conversation that you yourself suggested I had - I think you told me you'd bet me a tenner that this young lad would do anything to go back to SA - well that is true-ish, he wants to go back - either there or Zimbabwi, but he's of the opinion that SA needs educated and innovative people, not propaga from within!!

He has views on the politics in the Uk that I dont necessarily agree with, but he does talk with knowledge and understanding. What I'm saying is that he's obviously researched and understands his subjects. A very interesting chap - works his butt off too

Jo xxx

__________________

He's right there. S.A does not need needlessly negative alarmist propaganda scaring away skilled people. People need to know the objective facts and risks and how it relates to them. Information I have researched and am happy to supply when requested.

How many innocent people come here after having a nice holiday in S.A, to get some info about emmigrating here only to be bombarded with scaremongering and hyperbole by the usual crew of 3-4 South Africans who left South Africa ?

Yes, they deserve to know the risks. But when they exageratte the risks it's proaganda, nothing more, nothing less. They go too far when they suggest something bad is likely to happen to you or your children because you are moving to South Africa. That's nonsense. Information needs to be given in perspective and context without hidden agendas, half truths, and sometimes flat out lies.

why does SA need skilled people?
is it only the skilled ones who have left because of Racism according to your posts
that need to be replaced?
as to your objective facts and realism, someone coming from the UK, do they need to tke any additional precautions, and what are they specifically?
saying use your common sense, is not the same common sense that Sussex or Norwich requires?
and saying that 95% of violent crime happens in "Black" locations, how come there are so many incidents in nice suburbs?
the expats you are trying to recruit are unlikely to be living a in a squatter shack?
not so?