ACSian Theatre South Africa Tour 2006 - Day 1
"Good morning ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to Johannesburg, South Africa. The local time now is 6.50am, and the temperature outside is 13 degrees Celcius...," says the friendly SIA head stewardess moments after the jerk of the plane signalled our touch-down on South African soil.
The actual work of transportation of equipment to the airport started almost 17 hours ago at Anglo-Chinese Junior College in Singapore. Thanks to an abundance of helpers, we moved all 32 items owned by the crew onto the waiting truck, and at about 7.40pm on March 10, we set off from the school to Changi International Airport. Upon arriving at Terminal 2, we set to unloading the things. My parents were already there waiting with my luggage. Once we had moved the things to Row 11 for checking-in, I changed out of blacks. After that it was a long wait as people started streaming in with their luggage, and for each of them the procedure is the same: assign a tag number for their check-in luggage, tie another tag stating the owner's address, and sending it off for check-in. When the last person finally arrived a few minutes before check-in time was over, we hung around to say our goodbyes before entering the customs.
Boarding time was 1.05am at gate E4. Between midnight to 1am, we were free to move around the airport. My time was spent eating something, walking around with different groups of people and getting entertained by Disha, Ben and Maggie. (It seemed that Ben was trying to sap his energy out so that he can sleep on the plane.) After a 10-hour flight where Hansel made his surprise appearance on the plane closer to Johannesburg (effectively freaking his sister Deanna out), we have landed in Johannesburg.
While clearing customs and baggage, we somehow lost LC's check-in luggage. A check revealed that the luggage has gotten onto the wrong plane and landed in Brisbane, Australia. It will take one or two days to get the luggage back, so in the meantime LC received R300 to get some necessities for these few days. Once we had loaded everything onto the coach we would be travelling in, we were greeted by our tour guide for South Africa, Cecil. After giving a brief introduction about South Africa, we made our first stop at the school of our hosts, Jeppe High School for Girls. Its principal, Mr. Berry Robinson has prepared a welcome tea for us in a beautiful little park across the road from its main school building. That period of time became a huge photo-taking session by little groups of people around the area.
After receiving gifts from Mr. Robinson, we transferred to our hotel and residence for the next 8 days, Mecure Bedfordview. The usual routine of boys moving equipment followed, after which we were allocated our rooms and given some time to settle down before continuing on our itinerary. This gave time for the madams to take LC and some people to Eastgate (a big shopping complex just across the road) to get his necessities and other people's groceries. My room was 704, a second-storey apartment, and I shared it with Dinesh, Krishmen and Noel. After picking our bedrooms, I went around to each apartment containing ACSian Theatre members to collect US money to change for Rand. Ms Wong was a little overwhelmed by how much money people were changing, but nevertheless she would get more Rand from Mr. Robinson (who's supplying the Rand we will be using in South Africa).
In the afternoon, we set off to Lesedi Cultural Village. According to Raeza, one season of The Amazing Race was filmed there (and I found the page - click here and look under Detour: Tribes). We were supposed to walk around the village on our own, but a few minutes later, Cecil suggested we change the programme a little and we took the change: first we went on a guided tour of the five different tribes in the village; following that we had dinner there; then we joined a big group of Americans in the theatre to watch a video on Africa's cultural history; this was followed by the Americans' guided tour, during which we slacked around. Finally the day at Lesedi Cultural Village ended with an energetic performance in the theatre.
And with that, 1 down, 7 to go.
To be continued
The actual work of transportation of equipment to the airport started almost 17 hours ago at Anglo-Chinese Junior College in Singapore. Thanks to an abundance of helpers, we moved all 32 items owned by the crew onto the waiting truck, and at about 7.40pm on March 10, we set off from the school to Changi International Airport. Upon arriving at Terminal 2, we set to unloading the things. My parents were already there waiting with my luggage. Once we had moved the things to Row 11 for checking-in, I changed out of blacks. After that it was a long wait as people started streaming in with their luggage, and for each of them the procedure is the same: assign a tag number for their check-in luggage, tie another tag stating the owner's address, and sending it off for check-in. When the last person finally arrived a few minutes before check-in time was over, we hung around to say our goodbyes before entering the customs.
Boarding time was 1.05am at gate E4. Between midnight to 1am, we were free to move around the airport. My time was spent eating something, walking around with different groups of people and getting entertained by Disha, Ben and Maggie. (It seemed that Ben was trying to sap his energy out so that he can sleep on the plane.) After a 10-hour flight where Hansel made his surprise appearance on the plane closer to Johannesburg (effectively freaking his sister Deanna out), we have landed in Johannesburg.
While clearing customs and baggage, we somehow lost LC's check-in luggage. A check revealed that the luggage has gotten onto the wrong plane and landed in Brisbane, Australia. It will take one or two days to get the luggage back, so in the meantime LC received R300 to get some necessities for these few days. Once we had loaded everything onto the coach we would be travelling in, we were greeted by our tour guide for South Africa, Cecil. After giving a brief introduction about South Africa, we made our first stop at the school of our hosts, Jeppe High School for Girls. Its principal, Mr. Berry Robinson has prepared a welcome tea for us in a beautiful little park across the road from its main school building. That period of time became a huge photo-taking session by little groups of people around the area.
After receiving gifts from Mr. Robinson, we transferred to our hotel and residence for the next 8 days, Mecure Bedfordview. The usual routine of boys moving equipment followed, after which we were allocated our rooms and given some time to settle down before continuing on our itinerary. This gave time for the madams to take LC and some people to Eastgate (a big shopping complex just across the road) to get his necessities and other people's groceries. My room was 704, a second-storey apartment, and I shared it with Dinesh, Krishmen and Noel. After picking our bedrooms, I went around to each apartment containing ACSian Theatre members to collect US money to change for Rand. Ms Wong was a little overwhelmed by how much money people were changing, but nevertheless she would get more Rand from Mr. Robinson (who's supplying the Rand we will be using in South Africa).
In the afternoon, we set off to Lesedi Cultural Village. According to Raeza, one season of The Amazing Race was filmed there (and I found the page - click here and look under Detour: Tribes). We were supposed to walk around the village on our own, but a few minutes later, Cecil suggested we change the programme a little and we took the change: first we went on a guided tour of the five different tribes in the village; following that we had dinner there; then we joined a big group of Americans in the theatre to watch a video on Africa's cultural history; this was followed by the Americans' guided tour, during which we slacked around. Finally the day at Lesedi Cultural Village ended with an energetic performance in the theatre.
And with that, 1 down, 7 to go.
To be continued
yours truly, tobias at 10:52 pm
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