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Showing posts from January, 2009

Touch of China in RSA- Year of the Ox celebrations

Today we celebrated the Chinese New Year with what seemed to be the entire Chinese population of Gauteng! The celebrations were held at the huge Nan Hua Buddhist Temple which is around 1hrs drive NE of Joburg. The celebrations included fireworks, dragon dances and lots of food stalls. The traditional chinese food was delicious, especially the dumplings & lemon jelly drink.

The last hoorah.... Pete and Jen (+ one) in Jordan & Egypt!

On Saturday, 20 December we flew to Amman, capital city of Jordan, to commence our Middle East/Northern African holiday (2 weeks returning 3 Jan '08) . First impressions of Amman, the only major developed city in Jordan included: - hustling men wanted to 'help' with anything for a small fee; - stark landscape of limestone and sandstone rubble; - minimal vegetation except for the dust covered pine trees; and - bland white square apartment blocks. I guess this impression doesn't paint a pretty picture of the country, however we soon learnt that the people are incredibly friendly & helpful... and it was the middle of winter! Amman We saw the sites of Amman including a Roman theatre built in the 2nd Century AD and the Citadel which sits atop the highest of 20 hills in town. Of course we decided that it would be good for us to walk around the city to see the sites. Only later did we realise that Amman is built on 20 hills, so the walking involved a lot of up & down! ...