Finally got to see P.S. I Love You with Gerard Butler and Hilary Swank. Of course I knew it wasn’t going to be a great film or anything, but it’s with Gerry so that was all that counted. Went with friends Ray and Mireille. Verdict. He’s (still) hot! Review to follow. The best thing I’ve seen him in remains Dear Frankie.
Watched the Oscars yesterday evening, a day late here in SA, but still got to watch them. As is often the case with me, I hadn’t seen a lot of the nominations. In fact, I think the only one I saw before the awards was Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, so I’ve got a few films to look forward to seeing.
As we all know, the writers recently called off their five month or however long it was strike, and as far as I’m concerned, they’re well rusty. I didn’t really find any of Jon Stewart’s jokes funny.
Been involved in quite a few funny incidents lately.
Last Sunday, Egypt beat Cameroon 1-0 at the final of the 2008 Africa Cup of Nations in Ghana. Watched it with four other adults and a four year old boy, who’s a Chelsea fan, and decided he wanted Egypt to win right from the start. Anyway, at the award ceremony, the refs and players were given frayed ribbons which held their medals, and it was really an embarrassment. In the end, those presenting them got handed the medals with the ribbons tied at the back to present to players, which was really naff. One of the adults joked that the ribbons were probably bought in Woolworth’s in the UK, rather than the SA one.
Went to a hairdressers where the stylist tried to fleece me to the tune of R30 (about $3). He’s from Congo and his boss is Cameroonian. Anyway he didn’t know I speak French, so the whole time he’s doing my hair, he’s telling his boss that when I go to pay her, she should add on R30. His reason? When I first walked in, apparently I didn’t look like I had money, but as time went by, he figured out I had money, and so basically they shouldn’t pass up the opportunity. In between telling her to get the extra R30 off me, he’s telling me how some hairdressers like to stiff their clients by selling them expensive products, when I told him another hairdresser I went to told me my hair was damaged and sold me an expensive conditioner.
I played dumb when it came time to pay and just told the boss lady (who to her credit felt uncomfortable asking me for the extra money, so didn’t) I was paying the amount I’d been told to pay in the beginning. Of course if it had been a movie, I would have said “by the way I understood every word you said”, but it wasn’t so I didn’t. People I told the story to said I should have said that, but I’ll save it for another time. I think I wanted to hear what other gems they could come up with when next I visit. He’s a great hairdresser so I’ll be going back as haven’t found too many other great hairdressers here.
Yesterday, went to Kirstenbosch National Botanical Gardens with a friend where we walked around the beautiful grounds and had a spectacular view of some mountain — not Table, though. Then we sat on the lawn (kind of like at Wolftrap in Virginia) and listened to this Cape Town ska band called The Rudimentals. The day was kind of spoiled by a dumb argument we had in the car park while waiting for a taxi, but we tend to have quite a few dumb arguments. As I get older, I realise that you just have to let some things go.
Too, too cute is this YouTube video of Charlie biting his little brother. I’m very late since it’s been on YouTube since May 2007, but got the link off Dooce, a site I love.
Just had a fab driving lesson with Yaku, and only stalled once, and that’s ‘cos I could! There was a lot of traffic on the streets today for some reason at 5.30 so it took us a half hour to get anywhere. I told him I want to also get the SA license eventually so I will need to do the K53 driving skills. However, I decided not to start today as I wasn’t in the mood.
As I said, there was a fair bit of traffic so got to ask Yaku a lot of questions today. His mother tongue obviously is Afrikaans, and I asked him what language he thinks in. Again, Afrikaans, but he said that he’s starting to think more in English now, but when he gets stuck for a word in English, he obviously reverts back to Afrikaans.
He also learned another language that’s spoken north of Gauteng; the name of which I can’t remember right now, but it’ll come back. He thinks English is a more expressive language than Afrikaans, which was interesting. He also agrees that Paula on 7 de Laan gets crap story lines, as basically does everyone on that programme. Interestingly, he had to get home in time for the new season of Gray’s Anatomy at 19.30. (He doesn’t necessarily look like a Grey’s fan).
He asked me what the medium of instruction is in Nigeria and I said English, even though over a hundred languages are spoken there. He said that’s much simpler, and that here, if everyone had to be taught in one language, let’s just say English for example, there’d be war.
Oh, am getting used to the 24 hour clock now. Before I would have to count on my fingers against the 7 hour clock to know just what the heck 20.30 was, but now, no sweat, it’s 8.30 dude!