Duxbury visit

I visited the Imperial War Museum at Duxbury. This museum hosts one of the biggest collections of war planes in the world and it was amazing to see all these warbirds. It took me the best part of six hours to walk through most of the exhibits. I saw a lot of planes: from old WW1 planes like the Bristol Fighter to modern planes like the Phantom (picture) and the huge B52 (eight engine bomber). This was a very memorable day.

My "pocket" hotelroom

This is something that one must really complement the English on. The hotel that I picked on "hotels.com" had everything that one could expect of a four star hotel, including free broadband access, plasma screen television, hairdryer and iron. Carpets were of good quality and a lot of wood was used in the fittings. But space available was still what one could expect of a one star hotel. In a way this is quite ironic.

Back in London

People getting off the train on the Circle line and walking off the platform up the stairs. This is not peaktime so not a lot of queues. I am back in London!

Paul Eilers

Annelie attended a Poet workshop in Wellington this weekend. I joined her for the Friday night. We listened to a famous South African: Paul Eilers reading some Afrikaans poetry and prose and then sat down for a special dinner. The evening was full of experiences that is difficult to describe- Afrikaans is an amazing language, so simple, but so powerful.

Sentient five year birthday

I attended the fifth year birthday party for Sentient (our PR company). This is me and Derek (the CEO of one of their other clients). We had champagne and pop corn to celebrate. Just look at the amazing backdrop.

Spending time with my kids

This weekend was such a special weekend: Ernst and Catherine spent special time with us. It started off with the two arriving at de Wijnlanden with a freshly baked bread that Catherine baked from freshly milled wheat. Me and Ernst watched rugby and chatted, while Annelie and Catherine worked on photo-albums. The kids stayed over Saturday-night and we were treated to lunch on Sunday at the Binnenhof in Stellenbosch. We are so blessed.

Great to be Back

We had dinner at one of our favourite restaurants tonight: Pomegranate at Vergenoeg. Annelie had the Cob with Thai spices and I selected the Eland steak with red-wine extract. It was so great to be back in the Cape. I once again realised how blessed we are with the life that we have here. Such good food, beautiful surroundings, wonderful friends and of course my family. It is even more abundantly clear to see the contrast between this and London and Cairo where I just came from. I just thanked the Lord for all of this, again.

Heathrow terminal 4

Here I am at Heathrow terminal 4, on my way home on a Friday evening. I don't know if it is just me, but I really think that the service-orientation is slowly collapsing at Heathrow. The way that I was treated just now at a restaurant and at one of the lounges, made me feel very un-welcome. I can't wait to get out of here and back to Cape Town.

Mobile Money Summit

Just arrived during the early morning in Egypt, showered and had breakfast. As I walked into the conference hall of the Summit, I had such a positive experience. I have been working on this dream of mobile payments being available to all for so long. Sometimes, I almost got despondent, but this morning I knew: Mobile Payments have arrived. The level of interest and the seniority of the participants was an indication that this is now real.

Terminal Five

I left for Frankfurt from Heathrow departing the (in)famous terminal Five today. It is an impressive building and one must compliment the English on this engineering marvel. Now that they have finally sold Jaguar to the Indians, at least they can be proud of their terminals. What I could not understand is that they still only announce the gate 45 minutes before departure. Surely with the new technology and everything they could have tried to remove this biggest stress factor of any traveler commuting through Heathrow.

Audi like Annelie's

I just arrived at the Hotel after an overnight flight from Cape Town to London. This Audi was parked in front of the hotel. Also black just like Annelie's car. When I saw it my heart was back in Cape Town.

Rugby at the theatre

We joined Dirk and Marieke for a most enjoyable evening at a local theater-restaurant. What was (for me) so typical of the Northern Suburbs is that we watched the rugby game on a large television screen before the show started. Nevertheless, the the show was excellently performed by a famous acapella group... after the rugby match.

On the way back from Mariet

It is Mariet's birthday today, so me and Annelie drove over to her apartment for "koek-en-tee" (cake and tea) that turned out to be quiche and coffee. It was great to see where she live while finishing her Architect degree. Izak was there too, so we had a nice chat about life.
On the way back as we were approaching the airport, we witnessed a SAA Airbus A340-600 on final approach for runway01. It was the most amazing sight: full flaps and under-carraige extended, right here in front of us. I was so excited, so I tried to quickly take a photo. I ended up with this photo of the Audi's dashboard (Annelie was driving).
For good measure, here is a proper photo of a SAA A340-600:

Marketing Brainstorm

This is Debra and Cedric on the blue couches at work thinking about our marketing approach. We are starting to improve our brand positioning in the market and Debra (who joined us recently) is doing a great job at getting this done.

Cold and Wet Richmond

On our way back to Cape Town, we stopped at Richmond (in the middle of the Karoo). It was raining and quite cold for early in May. We decided to have a quick lunch and popped into this little restaurant run by a retired couple.