Not lost just off the planet for a while - oh and guess what now we have to pay for the World Cup!

I know I don't have to blog about what I have been up to the past 3 months, it's all duly recorded in my emails and on Facebook.

BUT now I have a peeve, and it's making me lose faith in our government completely. I suppose I should stay away from politics since I am not exactly clued up on the finer points - but I feel safe in saying that we are about to go down the drain - and fast. From the title you may have already guessed what I am about to write about ..... yes now that the successful world cup is over, the bills are piling up and we are being forced to foot the bill - AND don't try and convince me otherwise!

The government is cutting budgets ........................................................ and there I rest my case.

Brazilians, take note, your turn next and you also have the Olympics as well!

The Truth - about that pillow!

I really believed that home was where 'my' pillow is - at least it always was until now!

My Prozac Tour to Stockholm was everything I wanted it to be. Perfect Swedish summer weather with blue skies, sun shine all day, long very balmy nights. Of course there was the shopping - sales start straight after midsummer. Talk about good timing. Traffic was down to a minimum. And of course my instincts on finding my way around were as good as if we still lived there - I drove automatically, could have done so blindfolded! It was all just so easy. Even my little run in with the Swedish Medical system went off without a hitch.

And then I returned to Sampa ..... by the time we arrived home, my eyes were burning (pollution) and by the end of the weekend my bosom buddy the 'headache' was back in all it's glory. So officially I want 'danger pay' for living here! ;-)) ok try telling that to a government that has just cut the budget that language lessons have to be cancelled - so I will now have to try and falo on my own - so if you hear me babbling in Swedish - just ignore me!

When (to the English teachers - I want to start my sentence with this word) Frank and I got married, I knew that we would end up living in different countries and I would never have a career of my own but would follow him around. I made peace with this before we were married as I also love travelling, in fact staying too long in one place is more scary than moving around!

I knew that my 'achievements' would be to raise my kids, support my hubby and have fun. I guess I have succeeded - at least I hope so!

Now after 24 years of marriage, 4 countries, 3 continents, 3 kidz I realize that for the first time my home is not where my pillow is! It would seem as if my European roots seem to have dug themselves in very deep in our previous stint on the continent!

A while back I had hoped that we would end up in Budapest - I dreamed of my 'housewarming' party - my guest list included over 30 people - all family members! These are only the ones that I know of! There was a 'manor' house in a village in Slovakia where my mother comes from that has my name on it - it's on the same latitude at the famous Tokaji wine region. Then there is that village where my grandmother comes from - there were vineyards there one before the communists arrived. And then there is Sweden.......

Alix is a typical teenager with a capital T, but she has said a few wise words, one being that she doesn't want kids because she is too scared they may turn out like her!! Yes! The second is that we need to get a place so that we, the family, can spend holidays together now that we are all going our separate ways! Wow, I was impressed - but then she does miss Carl! So where does one actually start looking for this place where we can all meet up?

Carl will not return to South Africa, in fact he has now been living in Sweden for more than 2 years already! Time has flown. Stephan may spend a little time in SA after finishing his studies but he too will head out. As for Alix, she is already talking about moving in with Carl and studying in Sweden - have to admit that it would be much cheaper for Frank and me! She only 3 more years of school, lets see where her path leads her, but like Carl she also feels 'free' and 'at home' in Stockholm.

It's very obvious that our kids will most probably settle in Europe, although if I can give Stephan some advice- South America, especially Chile is still discovering their best 'terroir' for wine.

Yesterday I spent a few hours browsing through a Swedish property website .........

Prozac Tour & A little Surprize.

I haven't actually been able to write because it's all mushy -

I LOVE STOCKHOLM and SVERIGE!

I am home and every wonderful epiteth you can ever think of. Yes I am a raving lunatic. From the moment we landed, yes there was a gorgeous guy at customs whose eyes met Alixandras and well, all I could do was pray that he would not single us out for a bagage search on the one hand and would have loved to get his telephone number for Alix on the other! Heads down we raced for the exit!

The sun was shining, not a cloud in the sky. It was hot, green and just absolutely magical. As we drove from the airport all my senses came alive, I felt calm. I was home, my roots recognized home ground. Deja vu. Then we ate 'farsk potatis' with gradfil and pannbiff - again home. Midsomer afton we gathered in the garden, cut, trimmed, pulled out weeds (read Dandelions,) ate, drank, talked. A truly perfect Summers day.

Midsomer Dagen - 5am saw me driving Peter and Andra to Arlanda Airport- I had the whole highway to myself! Yes everybody else was nursing hangovers! So far we have been to Barkaby, shopped at Ikea, going to the main branch on Monday ;-))

Last Saturday we were out of the house before 7am and in the city at the harbour by 8am, took the Värmdö 1543 to Puttisholmen, spent 3 fabulous days with Lars, Gurdun, Knutte & Hjalle - and the other inhabitants of the Island! Barnkalas and then Vuxenkalas, with our own 'Allsång på Puttis' What a party! I do have photos of the sunset but no pics of the wild dancing on the pier! Pity! But the pics of the sunset ........

Lars took us to Norra Stavsudde, where we took a stroll, had lunch, shopped and then barbequed. You have to have this picure in your mind - the parking lot is a pier and people pop over in boats on jetskis basically anything that floats to do their shopping! We stayed an extra day, found it rather hard to tear ourselves away at the most beautiful time of the day - late afternoon! Lars and Gudrun were our neighbours in Sjöberg, we 'saw' each other, but as so ofetn happens when people live so close we never got to know each other. A real pity because we discovered that we actually get on like a house on fire! Gudrun and Lars are like the older siblings I never had! We laughed and joked and never had a dull moment!

And then disaster struck - me anyway. I developed a large marble sized 'bump/lump' just above my belly button, it was painful too. In the end I figured it wasn't cancer but a darn hernia - I mean a lump that size does not just pop up! Tuesday afternoon was spent at City Akuten as I wasnt going to the hospital emergency and waste their time. After a sonar which confirmed the doc and my diagnosis - hernia, the doc sent me off to Danderyd Emergency anyway with a 'remiss' that I need surgery stat! I can only sing praises to the all the medical personnel at City Akuten and at Danderyd Sjukhus! They were professional and loads of fun! Oh and sexy and young - the male doctors, of course! A blessing that everyone spoke 'Ingles' However where Ingles wasn't enough I could speak Svenska!

I will also credit my two kids for taking good care of me and especially to my TEEN for being so patient at been stuck at home for three days with me! I hope the Bjorn Borg bag and giant watch- that she has been longing to buy, are in some way going to reward you for our patience!

Tack som mycket min lilla van! I must also mention that this trip would not have been possible if my other kid, Stephan, was not in Sampa to take care of Mika and Frank! I owe u - box of godis will be mailed next week - lotsa Marabou chocs......

Today, barely 3 days after surgery we hit the city again and oh did it feel good! Lunch and more shopping! Tomorrow evening - visit Carmel! Can't wait for that either - will be so good to see u and Anders again - neighbour!!!

I debated on whether to take a cruise on the Sija (Silly) Line, only my little surgery threw a spanner in the works and now we have run out of time, pity - BUT as I believe there is a reason dor everything, good or bad, I am not upset, a bit heartsore, I have however made peace and decided that the cruise will take place on my NEXT/NÄSTA Prozac Tour to Stockholm! So the issue is settled ;-)))

Alix and I are enjoying the shopping, great when u can divide all the prices by 4 to get the Brazilain equivalent in Reais! Our public transport ticket for the monthcosts the same as a good bottle of wine! A Meerlust Rubicon is but RS55 - need I say more! I am also enjoying all my favourite magazines, which, being summer have loads of freebies, books, clinique mascara, sunglasses, t-shirts, beach bags and much more. Another bonus is meeting people in Mörby Centre, it like meeting old friends.

I am sue that by now you want to throw the towel at me! So I am going to leave you with this - I have just enjoyed a huge bowl of fresh Swedish Strawberries and Cream and a few glasses of Kleine Zalze Chenin Blanc!

What a life!

The Prozac Tour and the Nightmare

I am by nature a serious person - seriously, I am not prone to decide to fly to another continent on the spur of the moment!

It's not like I don't like to do things on the spur of the moment - I love it, in fact call me now and invite me for coffee rather than book weeks ahead! Alright - this is a poke at the Swedes!

Picture the scene, Frank and I, no, not on the sofa! Each in front of a laptop in my 'rectangular' office, Frank watching 'Super 14' matches, that's rugby - SA/NZ/AUS teams battling it out and I on, yes Facebook chatting to friends. Out of the blue, I tell Frank that I would love nothing better than to visit Stockholm. He answers that it would be a very good idea for Alix and I to get away from here!! Not the reaction I was expecting! Nearly fell off my chair.

Fate was on my side, KLM have bargain flights SP to Arlanda cost a few Reais more than Stephans ticket from Cape Town to Sao Paulo! KLM is also one of the most user friendly internet sites of all Airlines! So I was a very happy chappy. See Prozac already working and I had even moved from my chair! And the smile became wider as I saw myself walking in Gamla Stan along Västerlånggatan, will pick up a few new 'uniforms' (my signature Indian dresses,) buy curtains for the guest toilet at Indiska, Alix will have an ice-cream at our favourite stall and so much more. The Royal Wedding will be over, so the inner city will be spick and span and I will be able to catch up on all the Royal gossip!

I plan to catch the Arlanda Express into the city instead of the taxi or have someone collect us. The freedom of being able to get around by myself on my own and with speed and efficiency! Alix and I have been invited to spend 'Midsommer' on Puttisholmen with our old neighbours! There is nothing like time-out in the Archipelago. It is a magical part of the world probably made by Fairies and Elves! 'Google' Swedish or Stockholm Archipelago and you will see what I mean! 10 000 Islands many inhabited by their summer residents in 'Falu röd' houses. Being Scandinavia every 'home' has a flagpole and on this day the enormous 'holiday' Swedish Flag will be flying!

I am going to enjoy the wide open spaces in the city centre! Water, boats, trees and a view that stretches further than the apartment across the road! I am going to walk along the Edsviken as far as Edsberg Slott and have coffee at Mörby Centre. Hopefully some of my old friends will still be working in the various stores!

Ooooo the Prozac feel good. We also going to have kanelbulle for breakfast, fika all day and have 'köttbulle och potatis!' Oh yes and it will be 'gravad lax och farsk dill potatis!' Okay, now I am getting hungry!

Now for the nightmare side of the tour! The Schengen countries adopted a new Visa Code last month! Lets just say that it is incredibly racist! The Nordic countries were amongst the 'Anti-apartheid Movements' staunchest allies. Now the government of their choice is in AND now our passports are basically useless!! There is an understanding between governments concerning Diplomatic Passports which made it easier for us to get holiday Visas. Not so anymore - basically what they are implying is that even government officials are no longer welcome!

So figure this out, I will enter on my Schengen passport, no questions asked - in fact it will take less than five minutes at passport control - I have the new Biometric Passport - whoppee. BUT my poor 14 year old needs an invitation (special form now mind you, and my son must get a letter from the Tax office to enable him to invite her), she must provide bank statements, proof of everything - literally! Copies of passport - ALL the pages, 30,000 Euro medical cover and a document supporting stated reason for visit & income tax documents???

HOLD IT - she is 14 years old!! She is accompanying me an EU and Schengen Citizen!!!

At her age she has nothing to her name except a birth certificate - 3 actually and 2 passports!

The joy of our nomadic life is that her Czech Passport arrived at the Embassy in Pretoria just four days after we left for Sao Paulo! Only Frank or I can collect it in Pretoria at the Embassy!

So theoretically their raison d'etre is actually invalid! Alix and I and my two sons and Frank, by virtue of marriage, can settle in Sweden and they can do sweet blow all about it!!

Okay, that felt so good!! Now to the nitty gritty, the Czech Embassy in Sao Paulo has been fabulous! If all goes well Alix will have another passport - don't ask, all perfectly legal.

Lets hope fate remains on my side - our air tickets are booked and paid!

Being Brazilian, Red Wine and Late Nights, or Early Mornings

I survived last night!

I tell my fellow wine drinkers that the best way to avoid a headache or becoming 'tipsy' after a wine-tasting is to actually drink a wee bit more, more often. I don't mean bottles, just a glass. I mean tasting glasses, those small things we use! (Actually I noticed last night that they do make a difference!) I was 'nosing' my vinho tinto numero dois and immediately picked up the most delicious mocca chocolate. My tasting buddy didn't, click - he was using a big glass, we 'nosed' each others and viola - my nose was indeed more concentrated and rich!

So a small glass of wine an evening or every few days will actually help your body to adjust to the occasional 'extra' load. This also has health benefits! The judge is still out there, but a book 'The Wine Diet' by Roger Corder is worth the read! It's based on his 25 years of research. The latest comes from Iceland - and no it's not Volcanic Ash!! As a part of The Reykjavik Eye Study it was found that drinking red wine may help prevent cataracts. According to the report, large doses of resveratrol, an ingredient found in red wine, delayed or prevented many ailments associated with aging in mice who began taking it at mid-life.

I set off for my tasting at 19h35, traffic being a problem on a Friday, well everyday actually. I also didn't want to arrive too early, night life starts late in this country! Tasting started at 21h00 by 22h10 when Frank arrived home from work - we were only 'ripping' apart the second glass of wine! By 0h00 we were actually finished. I had decided to stay for dinner so that I could line my stomach with food before heading home - and because that's what my wine buddies do!

Dinner was delicious! Salad with figs, greens, shavings of parmesan, aubergines ...... for mains I chose the Bom-Bom - it's actually a steak!! Served with a creamy risotto! (Guess where that is sitting this morning! It's going to take weeks to shed!) And dessert .... cream of mascarpone with strawberries, sprinkled with meringue, nuts, chocolate sauce ...... followed by a xicara of strong Brazilian coffee com leite - it's growing on me in a big way!

By now it's 02h15.

The best part, I felt on top of the world! I could have danced all night and still come back for more!

So although I did not see the sun rise, that will still take a bit more training, like a wee bit more wine a wee bit more practice is partying till late, or is it early? Sooner rather than later I may not even need a few hours sleep between one day and the next!

Jonny - thanks for being a fantastic host! To your team at Sao Praca Lorencao, pronounced Prasa Lorensao (sorry, I have a Swedish keyboard!) To my fellow wine tasters, it was great to see you all again, to the special guests, thanks for enriching our experience!

So perhaps I am going to manage and become 'Brazilian' afterall - with a little help from my friends!

PS Vinho nemero dois was actually a Vin nombre deux - yes! Jonny threw in a Bordeaux! Wonderful on the noise and a bit flat on the palate unlike the Brazilian reds which are fruit bombs on the nose and palate! I loved them all! Alright, they were 'fine' wines!

'Lost' Friends Found

For those of us who move around a bit find that as time passes we seem to have lost many friends along the way.

For the younger generation, please note - there was a time when we didn't have computers, internet, emails, Facebook, cells phones, cd's and TV's! (TV only arrived in SA during the 70's!)

BTW I did get my first PC - an Amstrad PCW in 1989! Early days, those PC's were more for programmers, the W part was for the rest of us - it stand for Word-processor. A step up from the typewriter! This PCW was actually just an 'empty brain' One had to 'load' the program needed to do anything every time you switched it on!

In 1990 I got my 'modern' PC an IBM desk top with Windows 3.1! Soon afterwards Microsoft released Win 95 - what a joy that was. Internet followed in1998 - at least for us.

Okay this wasn't supposed to be about computers ..... but it is WWW that has made a profound difference in our lives.

I am sure the younger generation will never imagine a time BI -'Before Internet.' Mind you, now that I really think about it .... I don't ever want to think about it either!

So basically what used to happen was, we communicated by snail mail and telephones. This was very very hazardous. Addresses and telephone numbers got lost. So unless the information was imprinted in your memory, it was gone. Families never got lost as their details were ingrained in one's memory, well or else you would never hear the end of it!

Advent of emails was a major blessing, if you could get the older generation to use it! Yet even those early days information got lost! One computer crash and voila, all gone! Especially for those of us conserving trees by not having hard copies! Moving mean't new email accounts as well. Now one can have an address for life and emails are stored 'somewhere out there.' Computer crashes no longer make me break out in a sweat. I had my first total wipe out in February. No fear hotmail, gmail, Facebook all there safe and sound just waiting for my return.

(I was able to save important data before reformatting and reloading the OS.)

After a few moves, from one continent to another, a few computer crashes you realize that you have lost touch with your friends.

So back to 'lost' friends. Since the advent of Facebook, slowly but surely I have been able to find many of you once again. I am not the only one who seems to enjoy this as I get 'wiser' - note I did not the use the 'o' word! Slowly but surely as memory spews out the names of the kidz of friends, so Facebook presents them to me! (If they are not on FB themselves that is!)

Recently I was found by one of my first school friends! Someone I had though about for years. It made me smile for two solid days! Last week I found another 'lost' friend, via her daughter, today I received an email from her! Now our little 'Windhoek Ramblers/Kekkel/Cooking/Party' group is almost complete - and if life so wills it, reunion next year!! After 12 years!

I am slowly reaching the end of my search now, unless demetia spews out some more names and faces.

PS. I don't every single I ever walked past in school or in my life, just those that really were friends and whom I do not wish to lose again!

Driving in Sao Paulo is going to drive me NUTS.

It's 23h30, Mika, the Poodle is staring at me with her very sleepy eyes. Poor little soul, bed time came and went at 22h00 and will not come until sometime tomorrow morning......

I can't actually believe that I am sitting here in front of the laptop, but I need to stay awake long enough to fetch Alix some time in the early hours of the morning, to make matters worse I have to drive again.

I love driving, probably because I was a very late bloomer. I was finally forced to learn to drive in Namibia. I made Frank buy me a car, got it and started lessons the following day - but I already picked up the boys from school on that first day! Okay - I did drive a few times on some dusty farm roads, but I am a quick learner!

Sweden is one of the best countries for driving in, wait Namibia too! In Windhoek, six cars at a traffic light constituted a traffic jam - not many of those I must say and you were, back in the mid 90's, never more than 7 minutes drive from the edge of town! There were however too many very steep hills for a beginner thought. Okay, Sweden was a dream, alright, I will admit driving in winter was a bit scary, but after a week to polish them forgotten skill one was sliding around as if on a Formula 1 racetrack! Learn't my lesson the first winter by being caught without 'studded' winters tyres and forced to wait 5 hours at the local 'tyre shop' to have them exchanged. Never happened again.

Back in South Africa after Sweden was an adjustment! Whilst I hardly ever had to use strong language in Sweden, I developed a very bad vocabulary of expletives in SA. Managed to have my car bumped twice - whilst stationary in traffic jams! I ask you. I must have had an invisible sticker on my car that said 'Bash me!' Driving home from Johannesburg International Airport on Thursday and Friday nights after 20h00 was a a total nightmare, never seen so many accidents in my 46 years of life as I did in those nine months. Worst nightmare, the burn't out car on the highway with the body of an innocent woman still in it! I guessed that nothing could be worse. At least from my point of view.

Yea and then I started driving in SP. Accidents, I have not yet seen with my own eyes as I never get anywhere near the highways. Band News loves to give a moment by moment account of accidents so yes they do happen, mess up the roads for hours. For my South African friends, imagine a city the size of Gauteng - yes there are more than 10 million people living in this city alone with a total of 20 million in the state of Sao Paulo. Almost 8 million cars, that would be akin to almost every Gautenger having wheels! Yes, scary, I agree.

However my biggest gripe is the fact that the road system is a total disaster! Stockholm was bad with it's one way streets, which had one travelling miles just to get around the corner. SP is a total nightmare in comparison. After four months I barely drive anywhere, rather use the taxi - which is another nightmare - they haven't a clue of the city and none have a GPS!! It's mind boggling! I print a map of my destination from 'Google Maps' and show them where I need to go! It's the only way to prevent them spending hours driving around! BUT using 'Google Maps' and trying to drive somewhere by yourself just doesn't work! On the maps routes look so easy, until you hit the road! For those that know me, my 'Internal GPS' is totally useless here - oh and don't even try and use the map book! There are hundreds of streets with the same name in the city! Two weekends ago we needed to travel 9km to Casa Flora to buy 2 bottles of wine for the Tasting I was presenting. well we never made it and then got lost driving home, took almost an hour and a half driving around down town in heavy rain. I was in tears and ready to get on the first plane out of here!

So back to tonight. I agreed to drive Alix as I know exactly where the Club is, been in that area a few times. BUT, for a journey of 6.3km it takes more than half an hour! Mind boggling but, one has to take detours to get from point A to B. In SP one can not make a left turn at any intersection, note that Brazilians drive on right side as in Europe. One has to make lengthy detours to get everywhere. U turns not allowed anywhere - hahaha - only thing I can do otherwise I would never make it home if I had to drive to Timbuktu looking for a 'Retorno.' Yea they have specific places where you drive around blocks where a u turn would take 5 seconds! Problem is they are usually through dodgy dark areas! Ain't going to find me using those especially not at night.

I have also come to a conclusion that, like Swedish Volvo's, very few Brazilian cars have indicators. And my pet peeve, driving all over the place, each driver drives as if they are the only person on the road and as for lanes - they have never ever heard of them. You drive in the middle of them and where there are two lanes they make four! Oh actually I have two pet peeves. Unlike civilized countries where one usually turns from the lane closest to the direction in which one intends to turn, here if there are 3 lanes, you can turn form anyone! So if you want to turn left, drive in the 'rightest' most lane and then cut everyone off and turn! So far I have seen only one intersection where arrows are used - of course no-one knows what they are for!!

In SA Taxi drives have a habit of jumping red traffic lights, we all know and are careful - here anyone does it! You just never know when someone is going to come flying in front of your nose!

Stephan became rather exasperated with all my traffic stories - until he arrived, his pet story, the Taxi that cut behind my car and the car following me at an intersection. He cut the red light and sped between us! Never in my worse nightmares, not even the SA taxis have done that!

Okay, now it's off my chest. For someone who have driven and navigated around Europe and can't even get around more than her own neighbourhood is no laughing matter. It's no wonder that many International companies supply they ex-pats with drivers, armed ones too.

And one last peeve, our Head Office has 'upgraded' Brazil as being and 'easy posting!' Very obvious that someone lost the plot and Buenos Aires, to which, incidently, ex-pats flee to when they've had enough of SP has retained their 'difficulty' classification.......

I rest my case. It is now 00H30 and I still have a few hours left before braving the roads again!

Time Flies when you are having fun .....

The plan was to blog at least twice a week and now quite some time has passed since I was around here.

Life is good .....

I have met some wonderful ladies and we've had together lunch twice - that is besides all the other lunches organized by the INC (International New Comers Club.) Next week we'll have dinner - a few husbands will be away so the 'Cats' will be out to play!

I have to admit that living in Jardins, surrounded by fabulous restaurants has it's perks! We, the girls had lunch at Chef Rouge, very French and very delicious! I will definitely be back there very soon. Butoh, the Sushi bar around the corner has sushi to die for they have the freshest, salmon on this planet, and I have been spoilt after living in Scandinavia for too long!! Since we a have become regulars, our tempura has become lighter and our portions much bigger. Just have to figure out the Saki, but I don't feel like experimenting. I have done a Saki tasting in Sweden courtesy of the Ambassador of Japan's wife. Now if I could just remember and find that ONE Saki - almost like a cherry liquor, again. Alas I won't as I will never find my tasting notes in the unpacked boxes.

In case you are wondering, Portuguese lessons are great and I actually look forward to them AND I do my homework!! I do the homework for Frank and myself since the poor guy is so busy. It is not as difficult as I originally imagined, but the Muni is a fabulous teacher! Next week Frank is going to galavanting in Rio de Janeiro - okay only the inside of a conference centre, Muni and I will be hitting the field! We going to ride the Metro, haven't even done that here yet after spending half my life on the underground in Sweden. Since Brazilians lunch very seriously I am going to stick her to lunch and perhaps she'll go easy on me. Worth a try. By the way, I seriously doubt Frank will only see the conference centre, I say no more, perhaps I should pack his swim trunks!

Alixandra has been invited to a 15th birthday party - so what's new? Well it seems as if 15 is celebrated like we South African do a 21st and the Swedes a 40th! Party starts at 22H00! That is her bedtime! I believe it carries on till the early hours. I can already hear the boys complaining that we let Alix get away with everything! What can I say - times change. Frank and I also went to a party at 'THE' club in SP also at 22H00. Poor Mika was dying to go to bed and Mummy was heading out! Scandalous. It was fun, but I needed three days to recover.

The other good news is that the agent has informed us that they have new tenants for our house!

Another worry off my back. Only now Stephan has told me what his University fees for this year are .... I think I need to get off the planet. At least he really appreciates that we are paying cash and he will not sit with loan repayments when he graduates. It is and will be our gift to our kids.

Now Alix has happily announced that a teacher is going to organize a ski trip to Aspen! Does it ever end? And we plan to head off to Egypt around Easter next year for a reunion of the old Nambian Group.

Life is good .... but tomorrow I had better get stuck into Lecture 1 of Module 4 of the Cape Wine Academy Diploma Course or life will not be so hot if I fall behind!

Tchau and Beijos

And so we survived the first Portuguese lesson...

Admitting that we haven't started lessons has brought on quite a few frowns, yet I realized yesterday that we will probably benefit from this oversight.

We are fortunate enough to have private lessons, this means I can't hide behind someones back in class though! We discovered just going through the alphabet that we actually already have some basic vocabulary - even if our pronounciation is somewhat awry! After six months you already have an idea of how a language flows, recognize written words, especially me, whilst Frank has picked up many expressions.

Having a hearing disability means that I have a tendency to read subtitles on television, this is a bonus but it is also a barrier. Since I can see the word, but if it's pronounced correctly I don't recognize it!

Learning a fourth or fifth or even sixth language should be easy, sure if you're 10 years old not this side of 50! Fortunately for both of us, we did study French and German sometime during our lives along with Afrikaans and Swedish we actually have a cocktail of vocabulary that made our teacher proud! Until we admitted borrowing words from Swedish, Czech and sounds from Hungarian!

I guess in the end I will no longer be able to speak any one language properly, even my English is splattered with words like 'vanta,' 'va,' 'komma nu' now I will add 'sim', 'tudo bem,' nao' amongst others. Only Alixandra will understand me in a few years time!

Speaking of which, my poor daughter has gone from Afrikaans to English then she had to learn Swedish as a 2nd language, French - 3rd, Spanish 4th, back to Afrikaans as a 2nd language at school in South Africa. Now Portuguese as a second language for IB!

Next lesson is tomorrow, now I had better find my notes because dementia has filed everything I learn't somewhere in a database in the 'grey matter' and forgotten all about it!

Seriously!

If u can't get published then do it yourself!

Over the years I have received and bought many blank books.

Blank pages that were supposed to have been filled with thoughts and experiences, those books still empty - not because of a lack of anything to write but because there was too much to write!

I love writing and living in different countries, alright there are many people who travel a lot more than I ever will, but for those years I am away from home I need to stay in touch with family and friends, even my children are now spread over three continents!

Modern technology has made life so much easier. I can chat to Stephan everyday, 'see' Carl every week. No wonder it's easy to put your kids on a plane and let them carve their own pathways, all with a happy heart.

In 1969 when my parents packed two suitcases and left their family, friends, city and country behind they did not know when, if ever they would see them again. Well Mom didn't ever see her stepmother again! She also saw her sister again for the first time in 1995 only. Okay, I must add, for those that don't know, my parents left Czechoslovakia, at that time a country behind the iron curtain, to give my sister and myself, a better life! And yes, I am very grateful!

Now my kids are leaving home one by one and yet, I feel a great joy as they explore the world on their own, knowing that I am only a second away!

Oh dear, not quite what I intended to write, but I guess that is what happens when it's all unplanned! I was just checking the internet, looking for an easy blogging site to use and here I am! Decided to try it out and will pass by my kids to hear their opinion before I tell anyone else!

Fantastic tool to keep in touch and keep everyone clued up on what is going on in my little part of the world!

So yes, now I am publishing myself! Yippeee. This post may not be the most exciting you will ever read, but it is the start of a fun filled journey on which I hope you will join me!

Feel free to comment, chat or whatever.