Pretoria

we decided to pick up a car instead of trying to take a bus to Pretoria...good call it would have been impossible to do what we wanted to do otherwise. so we book a car for 230 rand a day which is about 30 bucks US and took a cab to park station , didn't get robbed and hit the M1 for the hour drive to the Afrikaners capital of Pretoria. stopped at Tings and Things ( the rasta reggae restaurant and bar that my old friend Anine suggested to us to eat some food and drink some beers while we waited for my long lost friend to meet us after work. i had no idea but shes a journalist who just returned to South Africa after years of living abroad, which was to our good favour. sat down and had a couple of beers thinking we would move on the next spot sooner then later. wrong. we stayed at tings and had a plethora of wacky shots and 2 for 1 cocktails until close to 730 . i think its the longest we've ever stayed in a restaurant that wasn't blue hills at stone barn. Pretoria is an interesting place, seemingly cleaner and safer then Jo'berg and certainly whiter. the red clay that lines most streets carries over to everything and its almost as if they put a city over a clay desert. we were only approached once for a handout and when we said no he was polite enough to agree to the answer and walked away.

Anine is quite the character and she told us a bit of her story. shes the daughter of an ambassador and what she wants most in the world is to move back to the land of her youth, the good ole US of A. we suggested she marry our friend David and even SMS'ed him with news of his pendant nuptials. awesomely tattooed, with streaks of purple running through her hair she reports for an Afrikaans newspaper as the murder/rape/incest correspondent for Pretoria. after a mix of beer/booze she thought it was best to leave the city center and head up to the 'burbs to meet her friends at a very South African bar. it was totally locals and i would be surprised if any other Americans had been there in the last year, if not ever. meeting some good people with wacky dutch names we had more of the local spirits and shared stories of travel and working lives. asking if we wanted to see some live music we missioned to the cafe Barcelona down the street and were surprised with tequila shots and castle beer as well as some blues in the vain of muddy waters. they still smoke inside here and it quickly got too smokey for my tastes. its weird when you venture out of the big city you end up in all white bars in strip malls with the AutoZone, KFC and a pizza place, seriously did i really have to travel 8000 miles for this.

by now its 10pm and one of Anine's mates decided it was a good idea to take a trip to the local rugby club to pick up a joint or two. well that was quite an adventure we made it to the club no problem but when we got there the kid who they were supposed to pick up from was so drunkhe forgot where he kept his stash, he also forgot how to speak English. that was good time. anyway by the time we got back to the bar anine had been called to a gruesome murder and kim and i decided it was time to head back to Jo'berg. with no real idea how to gt back to the Pension from the highway we took a chance and got off at the road we were told lead to the B&B, with Kim's good map skills and my fantastic driving we made it safe and sound. i love a city where stopping at red lights after dark is optional. more to come