Day 6 of RTW in 11 days

Posted on by stephen

This morning I was cursing when I alarm went off at 6am.  Not only was I having a really good dream (yes it involved you Helen), I was fast asleep and had slept solidly from immediately after sending my last days news.  Jet lag definitely beaten and now I traversing who knows how many time zones and no doubt I will be totally jet lagged again.  We had a meeting with the whole of Europe over breakfast.  Yes I know you think I am crazy but that is what we did.  All the Europeans have formed an organization called the Group Consultatif which is made up of 33 EU based actuarial organizations.  So instead of negotiating and talking to each EU country’s organization separately we could just speak to this organization.  So we had breakfast with a Frenchman (who was late of course and it didn’t really matter because every time he spoke no one understood what he was saying anyway), an Englishman and a Swede (who spoke like an Englishman, looks like an Englishman and if I had to bet was probably born in England, lived in England for most his life etc and add to that his name is Campbell which might make him Scottish).  It was a very good and productive meeting again even if it had to start at 6:30am.  We finished just before 8am which gave me enough time to go and pack (which I hadn’t done yet).

I packed, phoned the family (and spoke to Chloe as the boys would never have answered the phone of course), packed some more, sent a last few emails and by that time it was time to leave for the airport.  Checking out was even quicker than checking in – all he asked was whether the account should go on my credit card and when I said yes he handed me a copy of the bill and that was it.  The taxi ride to the airport took about 25 minutes along a 8 lane highway (that is 16 lanes in total i.e. 8 both ways).  That was the highway that was totally at a standstill last night (you can imagine how many cars!).  This morning of course there was no traffic.  I am traveling on Cathay Pacific to Hong Kong.  When I approached the check-in counter the check-in lady stepped out from in front of the desk to welcome me.  Seriously  … which other airline does that in the world?!  I had been pre-seated in 1A but they told me the TV was broken and so gave me 2A.  Given the flight is 15 hours, a broken TV would have been a TOTAL disaster.  What would I have done for the whole time.  At least that disaster was averted.

Security at any US airport is generally a mission and today was no different.  Even though there was no one in the queue it still took me 10 minutes to get through security.  You have to pretty much take everything out of your bag that might be electronic.  And you definitely have to take off every item of clothing pretty much down to your underwear.  And they now have body scanners anyway which you have to step on the shoe markings on the floor and then raise your arms like you are being arrested.  I was just waiting for the handcuffs to be smacked on and taken away for some questioning when the guy said thanks I could do through.

Given I have done zero shopping (and I owe Chloe a present at least), I thought I would do some terminal shopping.  Terminal shopping can be fatal.  And it was in this case because there are only 2 shops once you pass security in the International Terminal at LA.  No, not kidding.  In the land of consumerism, LA International Terminal has two shops.  And they are both the size of a shoebox.  There was also a See Candies stall – I say stall because it wasn’t a shop just a display in the passageway.  See Candies is another Berkshire Hathway company which Warren Buffet owns.  It is probably the best chocolate in the US (but still doesn’t come near to Cadbury according to Helen’s estimation).  The shopping will have to stand over for HK airport it seems!

I am now in the OneWorld Alliance (BA, Qantas, American, Cathay etc) lounge.  As I walked in the smell of Asian food hit me.  They have noodle boxes, sticky rice, chicken and beef and vegetables all done Asian style.  As it is 11am I am resisting the smell at the moment but I can feel my resistance waning by the minute.  The flight leaves at 12:55pm and so I doubt whether they will serve us anything on board until about 3pm so a mid-morning snack would be appropriate I think.  As I land at 7pm on Sunday (get your around that … I still haven’t figured out how many hours time changes are involved) this will be my update for today and I will email on Sunday evening from Hong Kong again.

So what is my summary of LA.  As city it is pretty boring (sorry Rachel … I know you live here).  It is very flat.  The downtown area is really not great.  I can think of numerous city that have much nicer downtown areas including Cape Town, London, New York, Washington, San Francisco, Chicago (for you Helen), Sydney, Auckland, Bloemfontein …. And it is a pretty risky place to visit – probably up there with Johannesburg (though I have never seen an arrest in Johannesburg yet – might be because they aren’t any police in Jhb to make any arrests  and those that are around have been bribed not to arrest one).  And the meetings were generally boring too.  I will definitely have to learn to manage my attendance at these meetings in future (especially since I have another 3.5 years to go of them).  Fortunately the next one is in Nassau, Bahama’s and my beloved is going to be with me.  The meetings might hold even less attraction there.

Enjoy the rest of your Saturday.

Day 5 of RTW in 11 days

Posted on by stephen

I seem to have finally beaten the jet lag.  I slept from 11pm until my alarm went off at 6:15am this morning.  Even the 3 missed calls on my cell didn’t wake me up.  It was another early start today as we have a 7am breakfast with the Institute & Faculty of Actuaries from the UK.  It was another very productive meeting & discussion which will hopefully have direct benefit for every member of ASSA (Actuarial Society of SA) who is also a member of the Institute & Faculty (my rough guess is that is probably about 60% of our fellow members).  I was planning to go to a session after breakfast but I got an email from Paul that distracted me and we ended up sitting at the coffee shop in the lobby.  Paul was eating and I was watching (not sure if that was his breakfast or his early morning snack).  We did something we seldomly get to do in SA – discuss SA business for an hour or so uninterrupted.  Coming to LA to do it was probably a little extravagant but it did help that we were out of the office with no one to distract us in any way.

We (ASSA) then had lunch organized with the Australians to discuss subjects of mutual interest.  Unfortunately one of our delegation didn’t pitch up and so had to proceed without him.  It was still a very productive discussion and again one that should bear fruit and value for our members in SA.  I had the afternoon free as there was nothing I either wanted to attend or had even the remotest interest in.  It did give me some time to work and clear emails though.  I realized I have failed to mention anything about the weather.  So far it has been relatively mild.  Most days it is around 22-23 degrees C but today was overcast in the morning and probably slightly cooler than this.  It had cleared up by the evening.  It was ‘wear your pastel colored jeans today’ at the Guess event.  I needed my sunglasses on for some of those jeans!  Lime green was probably the most hideous I saw.

During the afternoon I was watching the traffic backup on the motorway (I can see the motorway from my hotel room).  It is Memorial weekend in the USA and so everyone was heading out of LA in one direction or another.  They were expecting 2.4m people to be leaving LA this weekend!  We had the official convention dinner with buses departing from 6:45pm to go to the Hollywood Museum.  The traffic had still not dissipated even at that time yet and so it took us about 35 minutes to get there.  We had some time to wander around the museum before dinner.  Not really my type of museum given I seldomly can remember the name of the movie let alone who were the actors in it. The whole 2nd floor of the museum was taken up with an exhibition on Marilyn Munroe (including the famous Playboy centerfold spread) – R rated!  I suspect I spent the least time of anyone looking at the exhibits (Paul was also pretty disinterested but even he spent more time on them).  They finally served dinner which was (in my view) rather bland/boring.  A variety of lettuce leaves with (in my case) ¼ of a baby tomato (must be the recession effects on America) and two 1mm crumbles of cheese.  That was followed by the main course of chicken breast with mashed potato (and asparagus which I don’t eat).  I like bland food generally but this even was a stretch for me.  The service was so bad that I only managed to get ½ glass of wine the whole way through my starter of leaves and main course of boring.  Of course I don’t eat the desert but Paul tells me it was very good (chocolate cup with mousse inside).  Paul then almost broke the chair he was sitting on (BMI issue again I would say).  Of course he is again disputing my BMI and he now reckons he is finally lower than me.  He probably weighed himself immediately after spending 3 days on a mountain bike and sleeping in a tent.  What does he expect his weight to be after that.  It make it a fair comparison I reckon I need to take off 5 kgs from my weight.  Paul wanted to add 2 kgs on because he says people always lie (he never learns – been through this once before and all we discovered was that I overstated my weight and he understated his).  Nuff said.

It was a pretty boring evening and so Paul and I were the first two people on the bus to get back to the hotel.  We are probably also the two youngest people here (by around 20 years I would guess).  Andrew Gladwin was the 3rd person on the bus (another South African).  It seems these 70 year old American Actuaries really know how to throw a party!  Marcus would have loved it.  The bus trip took 25 minutes to get back and I am just finishing off this email and going straight to bed (it is now 11:45pm).  I have another 6:45am breakfast tomorrow before I leave for the airport to catch my flight to Hong Kong.  So good night (and for the most of you good morning).

Day 4 of RTW in 11 days

Posted on by stephen

No PG rating today but some action movie stuff included today.  I managed to make it through to 2:30am this morning before I woke up so things are slowly improving.   Once again I was woken by my vibrating cellphone (it was the bank this time – Helen buying something as per usual).  A few minutes later and it was vibrating again – a number I didn’t recognize and it turned out to be the bank (I didn’t answer but they called Cecilia straight afterwards).  I managed to fall back to sleep again until 4am and then was awaken by another text from a SA client thanking me for the way the UK office treated him (they were hosting him).  Managed to go back to sleep again but at 5am I was wide awake and so got up and cleared the 55 work emails that had come through while I was sleeping.

It was an early start this morning as we had arranged to meet up with the leadership of one of the American Actuarial Associations (they have 6 in total).  We had breakfast with them at 7am.  The meeting over breakfast went extremely well and far exceeded our expectations.  They were also very nice people and clearly want to try and work closer with us.  A great start to the day and I was hoping that the rest of the day would continue in that vain.  I then had my first official committee meeting that I was a member of (the Professionalism committee).  It was a 4 hour affair and it was actually quite productive and well run.  Might have something to do with the fact that the chairman is a South African!  It did give me some thoughts about things we can do in SA.  Just as I wasn’t paying attention (and replying to a work email on my blackberry), the chairman kindly asked me to comment on an issue.  Not only had I not been listening but I only got the bit when he said “Peter Temple might like to comment on that.”  I am not sure if he did it intentionally because he saw I was on my blackberry or whether it was just timing (my suspicion is the former) but I think I commented on the right thing and everyone seemed accepting of my comments (or they were just being polite).  I was much more careful though after that when I looked at my blackberry.  The guy next to me (from Holland) was playing cards on his iPhone (with the shuffling sound on) and he got away with it throughout the whole meeting!

I skipped lunch because I had a large breakfast and need to maintain my athletic physique.  I don’t want my body to end up with Paul’s BMI.  After lunch was the President’s Forum and while I am not President yet I am allowed to backbench in the meeting.  It really was just a series of presentations.  The first one was from a professor from Wharton.  I thought it would be good but he actually didn’t really say anything I didn’t know already (and hadn’t been practicing for 10 years already at Gen Re).  I was quite surprised that everyone else thought what he was saying was groundbreaking.  He talked on managing risk and unexacting the unlikely.  Not really earth shattering stuff.  His best line was “It is a great being a pessimist because your expectations are always exceeded”.  I looked at the other 2 presentations while he was speaking and concluded that I wasn’t going to learn anything new from them either so I did a ’Themba’ and ditched the meeting at the tea break.  Paul went to the education meeting and he did the same thing at the tea break.

This evening I had arranged to have dinner with my sister, brother-in-law and niece.  My niece is graduating this week so my sister & brother-in-law were here for that.  My brother-in-law is also in fact graduating from another California based college (he is getting his masters) so it was good timing to see them all.  Only my niece actually lives in LA.  She decided that we should go to Little Tokyo for dinner to a restaurant called oomasa (I didn’t forget to make the o big, it is meant to be small).  I agreed to meet them their.  When I went down to take a cab, all the Guess delegates were waiting in reception to take buses to wherever they were going.  Of course they were dressed up ’to the nines’ (whatever that means) and I had to (slowly) weave my way through them.  Marcus would describe them as ‘beautiful people’.  Even the cab driver was intrigued and asked me if I knew them!  I gave the driver the address (he was Asian) and he told me that he didn’t know it.  How can an Asian cab driver not know where Little Tokyo is?!  I suggest that maybe he use the GPS that was attached to the windscreen in front of him.  Fortunately he took up that idea and we got there relatively easily.

I got there about 20 minutes before my family arrived so I planned to walk around and see what I could see.  However, before I go even a few steps down the road came a LAPD car chasing after a guy on bicycle.  He then cut off the bike, jumped out and jumped on the ‘American American gentlemen’ and proceeded to handcuff and arrest him.  During the process the gentlemen tried to palm off a package to another lady who the LAPD cop also then arrested.  The security guards from Little Tokyo also then got involved (they were Latin American) and they started yelling at the cop and telling him off for arresting the guy.  Then other people from the shops were coming out and giving their opinion on the matter.  Here I stood pretty amused.  I don’t think I have ever seen anyone arrested in SA and here I see it happen in downtown LA.  Dangerous place based on my experience.  The cop was still there with his two handcuffed suspects (only suspects because you’re innocent until proven guilty – I know my law) when my family arrived.  I think he was waiting for backup which was taking quite some time to arrive (especially since the LAPD office was only about 500 yards up the road).

We went into oomasa for dinner.  As you might have guessed it is a Japanese restaurant and so I headed for the sushi.  It was a nice meal and we had a good time catching up on various bits of family news.  (@Helen – I will fill you in when I get home – I don’t want to consume everyone’s time with all the details.)  The meal also cost us a fraction of what Paul and I paid the first night and I got a lot more sushi tonight.  But then the venue was much more high risk!  Fortunately they offered to take me back to the hotel (I had visions of wandering the deserted downtown streets looking for a taxi and getting mugged by one of the gentlemen’s friends).  And as it is now 11pm I think I might have beaten the jet lag problem.  Off to bed now so that I can get up early again tomorrow for another full day!

Day 3 of the Round the World in 11 days (PG rated including Helen and my parents)

Posted on by stephen

Of course the inevitable happened.  Went to sleep at 9pm and I woke up for the first time at 1:45am.  The fact that was phone was vibrating because someone was calling me from SA didn’t help but I suspect I was waking up anyway.  I forced myself to try and sleep for another few hours and dosed on and off until at 4am I eventually gave up and started clearing emails on my blackberry.  It was going to be a long day because I had meetings until 7pm and then a dinner straight after that as well.  At 7am I was starving and so headed down for breakfast.  Of course breakfast choices are unlimited.  You could do an a la carte breakfast (with about 20 choices) or go buffet (with 3 choices).  I must have looked confused because the waitress made a suggestion what I should do and that is what I did.  And you never have to worry about going hungry in America because you know that whatever choice you make, the plate is going to big and full.  The best part of breakfast was the bacon (Apple smoked) – I just had visions of Michael loading up his plate and only eating bacon.  At the end of breakfast the waitress said that I could have a “coffee to go” if I wanted it (that was after I already had 2 mugs).  I declined but I probably should have accepted as I needed all the caffeine I could get.

I had the rest of the morning free as my first meeting was at 2pm.  I spent the morning working but at about 11:30 I had such a splitting headache I took some painkillers and lay down and got an hour’s sleep (which I reckon was a real winner to enable me to get through the rest of the day).  I had my first IAA (International Actuarial Association) meeting at 2pm.  Half way through the meeting a sent a text message to one of the other South Africans at the meeting which said “If I have to attend these meetings twice a year for the next four years I might commit suicide”.  It was incredibly boring and tedious.  Think of the worst meeting you have ever been to and then multiply that by 2!  It started with a spanish speaking person presenting telephonically from Washington.  That was followed by a presentation from a French speaking gentlemen from Togo.  As French is an official language of the IAA (who knows why), the chairman repeatedly invited him to do his presentation in French.  I thought once was being polite but he almost insisted.  Fortunately the man didn’t take him up but one of the other members did the presentation in English.  It was still bad and I caught myself wondering what it would have been like in French.

I was sitting next to a gentleman from Japan who slept though the whole meeting.  At once stage he was so deep in sleep that I thought he was going to fall off his chair and against me.  Fortunately he woke up and caught himself just at that moment.  I have never seen anyone sleep through a meeting like that before.  I had a lot of respect for him at the end of the meeting because if I could have fallen asleep as unashamedly as that I might have made it through the meeting a lot less painfully.  I have made a mental note not to ever attend that meeting again.  Themba (the President of the Actuarial Society of SA currently) left at the tea break and afterwards told me that you only make the mistake once of staying after tea!  I thanked him for warning me (I will get him back still).

After that meeting we had a 6pm meeting lined up with the Canadians.  Fortunately they didn’t speak French through that meeting (though 3 of the 4 of them were French speaking).  After that we had dinner lined up with the other South Africans present in LA.  We went to ‘The Farm’ which advertises itself as “Innovative American Cuisine” and “the food is like Mom would make, only better”.  I haven’t yet figured out what American Cuisine is so it was hard to place what was innovative about it.  And there definitely was any aspect of the menu that was ‘food like Mom would make’ let alone the ‘only better’ part (see Mom … still prefer your cooking to a restaurant … looking forward to my next meal at your home …).  Hopefully that bracketed bit will get me another favorite meal of tripe and onions when I next eat at my parents place!

So it is now 9:10pm and so I have made it at least to the same time last night.  I feel like I can go for another one or so before needing bed which is a good sign.  I have a 7am breakfast meeting tomorrow (for those of you who think international travel is glamourous).  What I haven’t told you about is that the hotel is not only hosting the IAA meetings but all a Guess conference (Guess of the jeans brand).  It looks like a much more interesting conference going purely on looks.  (This part is the PG rated part including Helen and my parents).  90% of the delegates are female and 89% either are or could be models.  If I wasn’t married to such a beautiful and lovely wife I might get distracted.  Paul (on the other hand) is constantly drooling.  I need to speak to Tina when I get back.

Until tomorrow.

Day 2 of Round the World in 11 days (PG rated)

Posted on by stephen

If you are wondering what happened to Day 1, well that was spent in London doing my usual thing in the office so nothing really exciting or interesting to mention.  However, I did think it might be interesting to ‘blog’ the rest of the trip especially since I am heading into unchartered waters for me next week.

Today I left London at 12pm on British Airways heading for Los Angeles.  The flight was full (from what I could see).  My first taste of America was actually at the gate as we were boarding.  An American lady had taken it upon herself to instruct and organize the boarding of the plane.  She wasn’t a BA staff member – she was a passenger like the rest of us but I think she just couldn’t help herself.  Even the BA staff were amused.  She announced loudly that the flight was boarding and that first and business class could board on the right and the plebs (her word not mine) could board on the left but only rows 39-55.  It was quite amusing.

Once on the plane I realized that I had the unfortunate privilege of being in a cabin with at least two couples who had never travelled outside of the US before and they were now returning home.  They talked so loudly it became evident that they also had not travelled in that class before either.  So every new discovery was announced not only to their partner but also to the whole cabin.  They also shared their trip details with all the other passengers even if you didn’t want to hear them (like me).  I fired off a Whatsapp message to the family complaining about them (it was cathartic) and also asked the kids to predict how many movies I would watch and in return for the one who got it correct I would buy a present from LA.  Fortunately after we took off the champagne kicked in and the couples quietened down and went to sleep so that I could watch my movies in peace.  Having said that, they might have continued talking incessantly but my Bose headphones (the best thing I ever bought for myself) blocked them out.

After take off I stretched out and prepared to get stuck into the movie selection.  Of course I had already watched about 50% of them but I had cleverly held back on flights recently knowing I was going to need a store for this trip.  I selected ‘Girl with Dragon Tattoo’ (see S, M & C I remembered the title) and settled in to watch Daniel Craig in action.  I am probably one of only a handful of people that never read the book so I didn’t know what was coming.  It was a 2.5 hour movie and while I was watching we were served lunch (scallops to start, chicken-ala-king as main and ice cream for desert).  Lunch ended before the movie.  When the movie was finished we only had another 8 hours to go.  Everyone was by this stage asleep in the cabin but it was mid afternoon so I got down to reading some of the papers for my meetings in LA (Cecilia kindly printed them for me and gave me a stack 10cm high as I left the office last Friday!).  I managed to get through about 60% of them before getting bored (and I still have to get through the meetings this week).  Played a game or two on my iPhone and then decided I should try and get some sleep.  Managed to get about an hour before the chainsaw snoring from across the aisle woke me up and there was no way I was going back to sleep again.  It was 10am LA time so another 5 hours still to go.

I went to the toilet (this is the PG rating bit) and walked past one of the couples.  She was lying VERY close to him and he had both his hands under the blankets on her side of the seat.  She blushed profusely as I walked past.  I didn’t even need any imagination to know what was going on there….  On the way back I noticed they were still awake but very much watching out for my return.  I settled into movie number 2 – ‘We bought a zoo’ – which is a Hollywoodized version of a true story of a Guardian journalist who bought the Dartmoor Zoological Park in the UK.  It was quite good (Matt Damon and Scarlett Johannsen) – a warm, feel good movie.  After that I still had about 2.5 hours left so I watched another rubbish movie whose title I have already forgotten and the only reason I watched it was to consume 90 minutes.  We were then served English ‘Afternoon Tea’ – Scones with clotted cream (of course).  Some reading fitted in between, some more games on the iPhone and we were starting to descend into LA.  Passed the Grand Canyon (nice view from the air), over Las Vegas and lots of desert and then down into LA to land on time at 3pm.

Fortunately LA on the international side is not very busy and we were the only flight landing at that time.  So I managed to get right in front of the queue.  But of course the weren’t ready yet for passengers so we had to wait another 2-3 minutes while the guy unpacked and set up and placed everything in precisely the right spot.  They really do have to be the world’s grumpiest passport control people.  The guy just said “Why do you want to be let into the USA?” in a very demanding tone.  I wanted to reply “actually I have just changed my mind, I don’t want to come here” but instead just said “business”.  This was followed by “when will you leave” and I wanted to say right now but actually said “Saturday”.  Fortunately he didn’t read my thoughts and so he let me in.  My luggage came off almost immediately and I was through customs and out quickly as well.  Paul had arrived 40 minutes earlier (he came on Emirates via Dubai) and he didn’t want to pay for the taxi fare (those of you who know him will know he is a cheapskate) and so he was waiting at the coffee shop in the arrivals hall.

We got a taxi to our hotel which is in downtown LA.  It is a standard USA type hotel (Marriott) and is situated at the Staples Centre (sports arena) and there are a whole lot of restaurants, movie theatre’s etc in the area (called the LA Live area).  My room is on the 13th floor (I hope the fire alarm doesn’t go off).  The check in procedure restored my view of American service.  It was the slickest and quickest check in I have ever had.  Very pleasant and helpful.  It was 4:30pm when we arrived and Paul and I decided that an earlier dinner at 6pm was the way to go.  Given my head was already pounding I was wondering whether I could make it to 6pm but after a shower and starting to type this email the time vanished.  Paul and I headed for the Japanese restaurant which is famous for it’s sushi (meant to be the best in California).  American Idols have a set up in the square today and tomorrow and all “your favorite idols stars” are on hand.  Given neither Paul nor I have watched American Idols, we had no clue who were the stars and who were the help.  People kept cheering (or rather shrieking) and hold up their phones taking photos.  I felt like I should have joined in but I resisted.

Dinner was ok – tasted better sushi in SA.  At the price (R850 for the 2 of us), our whole family could have had sushi back home.  Just another reminder of how cheap eating out is in SA.  Paul wanted his mandatory after-dinner ice cream (hence why he has so high a BMI) and so he got 3 scoops in a waffle cone from some New Zealand ice cream shop.  I restrained myself and had nothing.  We walked around the block and tried to look impressed at the Idols people again but when Paul had consumed sufficient of his ice cream to ensure he wouldn’t drop it on the lobby floor of the hotel we came back to our rooms.  It is now 8:00pm and I can hardly sit upright and have no idea how I can keep going for another hour or so.  I know if I go to sleep now I will be awake at 3am or 4am so I really have to keep going for awhile longer.  Excuse any spelling errors or typos or missing words (my kids always critique me over those) – put it down to the jet lag.

Feel free to forward on if you know someone else might like to read it too (and let me know if they want to be added to the distribution list for the rest of the updates).  Until tomorrow.

Day 15 of Trip to Land of Free

Posted on by Peter

Day 15 was our last day in the US. We had to wake up early to get our flight back from SFO to Chicago. Of course it was still foggy in SF. I remarked to Helen that I would be very grumpy if I lived in a place where it was cold during the middle of summer. Even England isn’t like that. We had to leave for the airport at 7:00am. I hadn’t told the kids but I had actually booked a stretch limo to take us to the airport. It was only $10 more than a standard taxi and as Michael and Chloe had been counting the ones they saw during the trip, I thought it would be a good experience. They were really chuffed but it wore off quickly especially when we were driving on the motorway and it felt like we were on a boat. Helen couldn’t look out the front window as she was getting so car sick (or maybe boat sick would be better) and Michael was totally pale by the time we arrived. I don’t think the end came quickly enough for them! The long wheelbase and suspension does make you feel like you’re on a boat. I have been in one a few times before and I remember this from every time I have driven in one. On the way to the airport I remembered another observation from the trip – Americans love outdoor sculptures. They are all over Chicago, LA, SF and even St Louis. Some are weird and some are fine but it is just incredible how many they have.

We were able to check our luggage through to London so that worry was gone and all we had to do was to wait for our departure. We were able to use the Admiral’s Club lounge which is the American Airlines lounge. Who knows why they call it the “Admiral’s Club” – do they not realise you’re taking a plane and not a boat?! The flight left on time and we had breakfast on board. The flight was quite comfortable again except that the airhostess was relatively “grumpy” though I think it was her mannerism. Helen said that if that is her manner then she should find another job! It really wasn’t that bad though and as they don’t give much service it didn’t really bother me. We actually landed early. The temperature at Chicago was 30 degrees so a little shock to the system versus the cool SF. We had a mammoth walk as we had to change terminals (and Chicago is the biggest airport in the US) and there are no walkways or escalators. We also had to take a small people-mover train to go from Terminal 4 to Terminal 5. We again managed to check-in easily and as we were travelling on British Airways we were able to use the lounge (with, mostly importantly, free wifi, as we had 4 hours to kill). The duty free shopping is the most disappointing I have ever seen. It is just a small series of fold-up displays which stretch over about 20 meters and that is all there is. Quite amazing for America as (as you should know by now), Americans take every opportunity to sell you something so this is a bit of an anomaly.

As the flight is was a sleeper flight (i.e. they don’t serve dinner), we ate in the lounge. After we got on and the plane took off, it was 8pm and we all put our chairs down and went to sleep straightaway. Unfortunately none of slept brilliantly. I woke up at 11:10pm and pretty much didn’t get back to sleep again before about an hour before we landed. Michael woke up at 11:30pm and also fell asleep around about an hour before we landed. Stephen seemed to sleep the best though he also slept in fits and starts and both Helen and Chloe woke up early and didn’t get back to sleep again. I reckon I never got more than 3 hours sleep. Factor in the change of time and we landed at 9:30am after taking off at 8pm and with just 3 hours sleep it doesn’t make for the easiest of days.

We went and had breakfast (after landing) at the British Airways arrivals lounge. They have a great breakfast including even pancakes which Helen felt she should have just for old time sake. We then took a taxi into London to spend the day at the flat. Helen had a shower and immediately went out to do some shopping (like she didn’t do enough in America). The rest of us stayed in the flat. Stephen spent the whole time on his laptop (and I probably did too besides the odd phone call) and Michael and Chloe mooched around. Stephen went with Chloe to Pret to buy us lunch (oh the pleasure of letting your kid out in a major city without the fear that he will get mugged or nabbed). After lunch Michael fell asleep on the couch and Chloe joined him just after Helen got home. By that time it was time to finish the repacking of the suitcases and adding another bag for Helen’s purchases in London today (and our internet ones that I had sent here to the flat). Only Helen, Michael and Stephen are heading home as Chloe and I are still in London for another week. Helen and the boys left in a taxi at 4:15pm for the airport and at 6pm Helen SMS’d to say they were in the lounge and at 7pm they SMS’d to say they were on the plane. They should be over mid-Africa by now.

Chloe and I both fell asleep for a hour and a half and then at 7pm we went out for dinner. This is the first time ever that Chloe and I have been alone together. We went to a Spanish tappas restaurant for dinner. Over dinner we chatted about this and that including remarking about well dressed the women are (and no very short pants though some short skirts were evidenced but everyone I saw wearing one had the right to wear one – don’t tell Helen I said that). I love London and being here now feels like a second home to me so I feel very comfortable here. I have managed to stay awake until 11:10pm tonight and now I am going to bed. Tomorrow Chloe and I go down for the weekend with my parents in the New Forest and then on Monday it is back to work (though my first meeting is in Bournemouth which is very close to my parent’s home).

This is the last you will hear from me from this trip. Hope you enjoyed getting the updates. Thanks for everyone’s comments over the last 2.5 weeks. I know that I didn’t respond to everyone but it is enjoyable getting comments back from you to!

Until next time, that’s all folks ….

P, H, M, C & S

Day 14 of Trip to Land of Free & Wealthy with Lots of Choice

Posted on by Peter

We were up early today (7:30am) as we had to catch a specific boat to Alcatraz Island. We walked down to Pier 33 which was about a 20 minute walk and picked up our tickets. We had about 40 minutes to spare so we grabbed some pastries and juice for breakfast and then got ourselves into line. Americans take every opportunity to make money off of you and so at every tourist attraction they take your photo against a fake backdrop and then you can purchase the photo when you come back, get down, finish the ride etc. If we had taken it up we would have had photos from about 10 different places so far! It does slow the lines down though and today was no different. We just skipped the photo shoot today but they looked at us strangely because it clearly isn’t something that is usually done.

The weather today was pretty much the same as yesterday – fog & cold. That didn’t stop us from getting onto the top deck of the ferry (it had 3 decks). It only takes 12 minutes to get out to Alcatraz but a lifetime to get back. The island is now a national park and apparently the biggest urban national park in the world. The brochure and also the national parks guide that spoke to us as we got off the ferry, tried to dispel some of the myths about Alcatraz including the one that it is impossible to swim to San Francisco because of the tide/currents/cold water. Every year they have the Alcatraz to SF swim and this year it was won by an 11 year old. So much for prisoners not being able to make it! From all the attempts though over the years, only 3 people were unaccounted for. The official line is that they drowned but the prisoners who were on the island at that time all believe they are in Latin America as they were all learning Spanish before they escaped.

The walk from the ferry dock up to the prison is quite steep – the equivalent of climbing up a 13-story building. We all made it relatively comfortably which speaks to our superior fitness and agility as a family. Of course my atheletic build gives me the edge in these sorts of walks. Inside the prison you pick up an audio tour which is done by previous inmates and prison wardens. It takes 45 minutes and guides you around the prison. It is by far the best audio guide I have ever heard. It is entertaining and filled with interesting facts. Chloe didn’t want to listen to the audio guide but we told her to take it anyway and she was very grateful we told her to as she really enjoyed it too.

I have visited a few prison’s now and every time I do I am struck but how uncomfortable and unpleasant it must be. Just seeing a prison is enough to put me off doing anything that might get me into one. Hopefully it has the same effect on the kids! At the end of the tour they take you through the gift shop (another American tradition of making a few extra $ from the sightseeing trip). One of the previous inmates had written a book of his experiences including meeting notorious criminals such as Robert Stroud – better known as the Birdman of Alcatraz. I glanced through the book and it was interesting to note that he had become a Christian after completing his sentence. He was actually in the gift shop doing a book signing and so Michael went over and asked him what made him rob a bank and he said “The Money”. Alcatraz had numerous other infamous people including Al Capone. They only accept high risk prisons i.e. those likely to cause trouble or likely to escapees. The prison was closed in 1963 mainly due to the cost of upkeep (they have no sewage on the island for instance) but also partly due to the fact that SF residents weren’t comfortable with a major prision on their doorstep and they became even more uncomfortable about it when one of the prisons actually made the swim over the bay (even though he was recaptured).

We took the ferry back to the mainland and picked up hot dogs on our way back to the room. We got back just in time to watch the end of the first half (and the rest) of the Spain v Germany game. I had a splitting headache (probably the thought of going back to work did it) and so had a short nap in the afternoon. As it was our last evening here we found a more upmarket restuarant for dinner. SF is a crab area and every meal I had been tempted but hadn’t taken the plunge but today both Michael and I ordered crab. In fact Stephen and I agreed to split 50/50 – he had a steak. However, it turned out Michael only managed to eat half his crab so we got the other half of his crab as well. It was a good final meal in the USA for us. The setting was particularly spectacular as well – the setting was over the water looking over the fishing boats. Helen and I got some last minute shopping in while the kids decided to head back to the hotel.

The rest of the evening was spent packing and watching TV. It is now 12;14 and we have to leave tomorrow at 7am to catch our first of 3 flights back home so I need to go to bed now! Enjoy the day – when I write next we should be back in London.

P, C, M, H, S

Day 13 of Trip to Land of Choice

Posted on by Peter

We have settled it now – it is fog and not cloud. The tour guide today said you only get it in the summer months and it never rains. The weather was exactly the same today as yesterday – about as cold but maybe slightly less windy. The sun tried to peak out a few times but never really came through with any force.

We had another late start today. I eventually got tired of being awake alone and so woke up Helen and the kids at 9am. It turns out the kids were awake to after 12 last night! Hopefully they will get to sleep a little earlier tonight. We had walked past Ihop (International House of Pancakes) yesterday and already designated that as the place for breakfast. We couldn’t come to the USA and not have breakfast at Ihop and so that is where we headed. Of course there is a myriad of possible choices of breakfast – pancakes of all sorts, with or without eggs, bacon etc. They had a special on – kids eat free with any adult purchasing a breakfast off their main menu so Chloe got her breakfast at cost. She had the kid’s pancakes with scrambled egg and bacon. She had 5 pancakes sort of the size of a flapjack. It would have been enough for me actually. The rest of us had pancakes of some sort or another. Helen and Michael had chocolate chip pancakes and they each got 4 and only ate 2. IHop seems to be more health conscious as they kindly put the calories of all the breakfasts on the menu so you can see how much of your daily allowance you are consuming on breakfast. One of the breakfasts (the steak, egg & pancake option) was your entire days allowance in one sitting! Not surprisingly we were all full afterwards and lunch became incidental.

After breakfast we strolled past some of the shops and headed for Barnes & Noble (a US bookstore). We did some browsing but ended up purchasing a whole lot of DVDs as they had a buy 2 get 1 free deal running. We did a bit more shopping and then headed back to the hotel to watch the soccer – Uruguay v Netherlands. After watching the game the plan was to catch another tour (we had a multi-day ticket) that took us west and then north and over the Golden Gate bridge. It took us through the some of the wealthy suburbs of SF. Small, semi-detached houses go for between $1m and $2m (and I mean small). We then headed over the Golden Gate Bridge and on the Northern side we stopped for a few minutes to take some photos back towards SF. As you already know it was foggy so not the best view or photos but still quite impressive. The tour then continued on into the town of Sausalito. The price of these homes is slightly higher and you can see it not only from the houses (some of which were massive) but also by the Ferrari’s, Porsche’s & Mercedes parked outside. In fact the poorer homes only had a Mercedes parked outside. We had a 10 minute stopover and then we headed back across the bridge and back to SF. The wind was blowing so hard (open top bus of course) that I couldn’t keep my cap on and in fact could hardly keep my face on. I had to close my mouth otherwise I might have expanded up like a balloon and floated off the bus. My face felt like it was getting a workout.

When we got back everyone wanted something to drink to warm up and we ended up at Ben & Jerry’s again. Michael had a milkshake and the others had Warm Shakes while I had an Espresso. It was late afternoon already so we came back to the room and the inevitable happened – Helen fell asleep. Eventually at 6:30pm we got a call from Chloe saying she was starving and in fact so was I and we agreed to leave for dinner at 7pm. We found a local Italian restaurant on the Pier and had another good meal. Helen had a Crabmeat Pizza – only in SF have I ever seen that. There was so much crab on it that Helen couldn’t finish eating it. After dinner we all felt like a walk to get the food settled and so we walked along the Pier and popped into a few stores as we walked. Stephen (the frugal family member) has managed to buy two T-shirts for $4.99 each which is (quite honestly) ridiculously cheap.

And that was the day. A nice relaxing day especially since we know we have a full day tomorrow (with the trip to Alcatraz) and then early up on Thursday as well to catch the first of 3 flights to get home. We have had some amusing moments so far that are worth sharing. The first was in St Louis when Stephen flatly denied that the only pair of shoes in the room were his. He said they looked like his and they were the right size but the tread was different. As no one else had the same shoes or size the rest of us quickly figured out that they were Stephen’s shoes. He might still be denying it but that is just so we can rag him a little more about it. Helen then dreamt that my parents set her up to meet the Pope. Mom & Dad – Helen wants to know why on earth you arranged for her to visit the Pope and whether you have converted to Roman Catholicism. The worst thing is that she never got to meet him because when she arrived he was too busy playing with a skull! What is amazing is that she shared this with us (I would have quite frankly kept quiet). The on the evening of the fireworks in SF (that would be July 4), Michael comes in from outside and proudly says someone left there drink outside and so I brought it in for them. Everyone said they had their drinks and so we quickly figured out that it was actually Michael’s drink! So you can see, that leaves two sane people in the family only – Chloe and me! Please remember us around the loonies….

Until tomorrow.

P & C H, S & M and the loonies (H, S & M P & C)

Day 12 of Trip to Land of Free

Posted on by Peter

For those of you back in Cape Town envying us because we are enjoying summer when you are enjoying winter – don’t. It was like a winter’s day in Cape Town in San Francisco today and this is mid-summer for them! Helen remarked yesterday already that there are a lot of people in SF wearing SF branded merchandise. I speculated that it was because people came here expecting warm weather and they ended up having to buy a jacket of fleece. I am now convinced that is the reason especially after we have now bought 3 ourselves! It was a grey day the whole day. We never quite worked out if it was mist or cloud. Around lunch time it cleared slightly in the South but within an hour or so it was covered up again. It was also very windy and that bit through any clothing you wore.

None of this prevented us from taking an open top bus tour though. As I only managed to rouse the rest of the family at 9am (I was awake from 7am working on my laptop in the dark!), we only had breakfast at around 9:30am. We then got our tickets for the bus tour and as we were first on we got the front row seats. We were fortunate in that our tour guide told us we had the best driver in the fleet (amazing how lucky we are because every time we have had a tour of some sort we have been told we have the best driver). The tour guide was actually quite good and without a doubt the best we have had so far. Stephen remarked that he was good despite not being able to speak English. Everyone who seems to run anything in SF seems to be of Asian descent and so you can guess what descent our tour guide had relatively easily now. There are 860000 people living in SF (all of them were on the Pier yesterday to witness the fireworks) and it also has the biggest Chinese population of any city in the US.

The tour takes you along the Bay (pretty much where we had walked yesterday) and then turns into the City itself taking you the financial district and continuing up to the shopping area, City Hall and then back down again through Chinatown, North Beach (which isn’t on the beach), past Lombard St (Paul has walked up to that because it is his nickname – you can ask him what it stands for) and then back down to the Pier again. As an aside, Lombard St is amazing in that it is the “crookedest” street in the USA and tourists come just to drive down it. It is one way and it is pretty much one hairpin to the next, each hairpin being about the length of a car. As I mentioned the tour was very entertaining (even though a tad cold) as the tour guide had a good sense of humour and he gave interesting information. For instance he told us that last year there were 4 incidents in SF where people shot at the cars in front of them because they were driving to slowly (not kidding!). What also made it entertaining was that our ‘excellent’ driver almost managed to knock down 10 pedestrians (on separate occasions – Stephen was counting), came very close to taking off a car door and almost rear-ended two cars parked at the traffic lights. No one got the least bit excited (except Stephen, Michael and me) each time of these events occurred so it is obviously standard driving technique in SF. I would hate to know what the damage would be by the other ‘lesser’ drivers!

We got off the tour at Pier 39 and managed to actually walk down the Pier this time. There were quite a lot of people still but nothing like last night when you just couldn’t move it was so packed. We did a little tourist shopping and then found a place to have lunch. 3 of us wanted Clam Chowder for lunch so we found a suitable place and enjoyed our Clam Chowder in a Sourdough Bowl (which you can eat once you have finished the soup. After lunch we ambled back to the hotel and stopped in at a luggage shop to buy another suitcase as there is no way we can get everything we have bought into our current suitcases.

This afternoon we visited Ghiradelli Square (Ghiradelli is a chocolate based founded in SF) which is just a few blocks from our hotel. We then walked back again and did some more shopping on the way back as well. The plan was to take the Night Tour departing at 6pm and then get off in Chinatown and have dinner there. However by the time we got to the bus the line was so long it was clear we weren’t going to get onto the bus. We decided rather to take a taxi up to Chinatown and got a restaurant recommendation from the concierge at the hotel (who of course is Chinese). The taxi drive was probably the most entertaining thing we have done. We had an Italian taxi driver and he tried to persuade us that Little Italy had good food and restaurants. I nodded and said thanks. He was an extremely aggressive driver and as it was rush hour we weren’t moving much. He shouted out the window and honked constantly as if by honking (hooting for the SA people) the cars would miraculously move out of the way. The poor guy in front of us (who in my view wasn’t doing much, if anything, wrong) took the brunt of the honking and abuse and pointing. Half way through the trip the taxi driver turned on the radio and what channel did he select – the Classical music channel! It was a clear antithesis. Every time I looked back (I was in the front seat) everyone in the back seat was grinning. I really had to contain myself. I reckon an outbreak of laughter might have gotten us thrown out of the taxi.

He did get us to the restaurant safely though but he was quite disdainful of the restaurant. We gave it a try and really enjoyed the food. We had some excellent, tasty dishes including Peking Duck. It was probably the best value for money meal we have had so far. We then decided to walk back to the hotel. It was about a 20-25 minute walk. What is noticeable is that SF could do with a wash. It is quite grimy especially when you compare it to other major cities like London. Even Chicago was cleaner than SF (though SF is much better than LA). There also seems to be more vibrancy about SF in comparison to LA (even though SF has far fewer people living here). When we got back to the hotel we nipped into Ben & Jerry’s for a quick Sundae to round off the day.

It is now 12:15am and I need to go to bed and to sleep. Helen (of course) managed to squeeze in another few hours nap in the afternoon today so she will be up for another hour or two reading!

Enjoy your day.

P, C, H, M & S

Day 11 of Trip to Land of Free

Posted on by Peter

I had to put the ‘Land of the Free’ in the header today because it is July 4. There is a lot less patriotism on the West Coast than the East Coast (or at least in Helen and my view). I suspect that it might have something to do with the demographics of the population in California.

We decided to leave the hotel slightly earlier than necessary and rather have breakfast at the airport. The taxi ride was about 40 minutes back to the LAX airport and the check in process was relatively painless again. Security was much tighter though. They took longer to screen our bags and the visible presence of police and security staff was increased. They frisked search Helen because she was wearing a dress and they said that even though she had gone through the scanner there was a risk she was concealing something. By the time we had cleared security it was 9:55am and the restaurant we wanted to go to said they only serve breakfast until 10am. I pointed out that it was 9:55am and so they should serve us breakfast and they looked most disinterested. I was up for an argument but Helen just walked out and said their loss. We won’t hurry back to that chain anytime soon and I hope they feel the pinch! American service is generally quite good but this was the 2nd ridiculous bit of service we had in 2 days (we had an incident at the Rite Aid as well). We ended up just getting pastries & fruit from the bakery take-away and eating them at the gate.

Our plane left on time with no issues at all. We flew on American Airlines again and I have to say that we have now had 3 flights on them and all 3 have been really good. I am probably tempting fate by saying that and no doubt I next flight on them will be terrible (let’s hope not!). We arrived in San Francisco at 1:20pm and we collected our bags and headed into the City. We were at our hotel by 2:00pm which shows you how quickly everything went. Our hotel is the Courtyard Marriot at Fisherman’s Wharf right near the Pier. It is a newly renovated hotel and probably the nicest room we have had out of all the hotels we have stayed in. We are also in walking distance of everything.

We immediately went out to find a place for lunch and ended up at Denny’s which is a Wimpy type restaurant. We all had burgers (what else could you have?!). The service was terrible which is also not something you generally experience in America. It was so bad that I never bothered to tip at all. I hope they got the message. I think they sensed our irritation in that when they did eventually come to take our order they apologised for not coming sooner but they were very busy. There was only one other table of people in the restaurant so I would hate to know what they would have done if there were 3 tables! They must have been busy doing their nails or something that kept them that busy because it was noticeable what they were doing.

After lunch we went for quick walk around the Fisherman’s Wharf area much to the general & loud complaints of Michael & Stephen. The reason being they were in short sleeves and it was freezing cold. The weather in San Francisco was beautifully clear but a cold wind is blowing off the Bay and so it is quite chilly. The temperature is around 17 degrees but it feels more like 12-13 degrees because of the wind. Of course this encouraged us to look at sweatshirts etc and I ended up buying a really nice jacket and Michael got a San Francisco tracksuit top. The shop assistant wanted to put it into a bag but Michael said ‘No, No’ and grabbed it out so he could wear it. We got back to the hotel at 4pm and enquired about his evening and we were told that the Pier would be choatic so we should try for a restaurant at around 8pm so that we got a table by 9:30pm for the fireworks over the Bay.

We followed their suggestion but they were totally wrong. There were about a million people in the Wharf area. The line for the toilets were the longest I have ever seen (maybe 50 people in line outside the toilets). I gripped Chloe’s hand as there was a real risk we would not see here again otherwise. The Pier area was just teeming with people and we very quickly figured out that we were not going to find a restaurant at all. After trying one in the Pier area we thought we should try a few in the roads behind the Pier but those also were totally jammed full with waiting lists of 20 groups. We found the grocery store and found ourselves cheese and cold meat and biscuits and salad and fruit and just had that instead in our hotel room and we watched the fireworks from our balcony of the room. The check out clerk was an education for the kids. This being San Francisco you get all types and I am not sure he/she knew what type he/she was. We think she was a he and is now on his way to becoming a she. Very wierd – I would have preferred to select another check out till if I had noticed earlier. I almost made Helen pay so that I had the minimal amount of contact with he/she.

The fireworks started at 9:30pm and probably weren’t as spectactular as they could have been because it was quite misty tonight. However they were very loud (probably because of the mist) and we could feel some of the booms from some of the fireworks going off. The fireworks went on for 20 minutes and it must have cost them a few million dollars. In Chicago they told us that they had cancelled the July 4 fireworks this year as it cost the city $30m each year. I wondered why they just didn’t rather down scale and spend say $3m instead? Surely you can get an amazing display of fireworks for $3m (that’s over R20m in fireworks). I have no doubt we (South Africans) could have easily put on an excellent show for that money and still have managed to expropriate a few Rands to smooth things for those in decision making positions! The display was quite impressive here despite the misty conditions. At the end we could smell the fireworks even – Helen said it was the smell of burning money!

We also discovered today on checking in that the Alcatraz Tours were fully booked until Thursday (and we leave on Thursday). I came straight up to the room and checked online and fortunately found a multi-island tour that includes Alcatraz and we could get on it on Wednesday at 9:30am. It was double the price of Alcatraz alone but we couldn’t come all the way to San Francisco and not go to Alcatraz. We are hoping tomorrow is a little calmer in the Wharf and Pier areas and that we can get to see them without risking our lives by being squashed by 1 million people or risking losing one of the kids (though Stephen is hard to lose now that he is bigger than Helen it is more likely we will lose Helen first).

As the kids only went to their room at 10:15pm this evening I doubt that we will be up early tomorrow. We will no doubt take a City tour tomorrow (Monday – today for most of your already as my computer clock says it is 8:30am in SA – and I have just spoken to my PA who is already at work when I am about to go to sleep!).

Enjoy the day!

P, H, M, C & S