Little things about SA

[dryfter]

This is a collection of mini-rants about South Africa:

Spelling:
The official customs/entry-to-country form we were given on the plane into South Africa contained three obvious spelling mistakes (or possibly more.. I didn't read the fine print). And since then, I've seen terrible spelling every day, often in places that should really know better. Government documents, art galleries, every menu in restaurants, newspapers, magazines, etc etc etc. I don't know why it's so prevalent?
I saw a car the other day for a driving school. On the back it said in big letters something about "please be patient, as you were a leaner driver once, too." Heh.
You probably already saw the photo of the Joly Bar, which proclaimed itself Joly on one side, but Jolly on the other; The mistakes in Bargains/Bargins were reversed though. WTF?

Anyway, I won't go on. But seriously, it's everywhere. Why?

Number plates (or lack thereof):
Loads of cars here drive without number-plates. Some are crappy old bangers, some are posh sports cars, but most are just average cars. I'm told they do this to avoid speeding fines. So obviously enforcement of /having/ a numberplate isn't too harsh. (Liz thinks it's R500, which is less than higher speeding fines.)
This annoys me - if you can afford a fast car, you can afford the speeding fines - take it like a man!
Although I suppose they feel like, why should they pay, when obviously the everyday people aren't paying up either. Weird - I'm sure if you drove around without a numberplate, you'd get chewed up and spat out in so many little pieces by the Aussie cops, in no time. I suppose the cops have higher priorities here though.

The internet:
I've used a couple of different ISPs here so far, and they've both had decent speeds to sites hosted in South Africa, but horrendous speeds to the rest of the world. I'm talking rates that are slower than dial-up, and with huge latency. What the hell? Is this normal? Why can't someone setup some new satellite links to take the load off whatever is carrying the traffic currently?
This probably explains..
Online information:
.. is very sketchy and/or inaccurate or downright wrong. Trying to find information on restaurants, accommodation, bars and clubs, entertainment, etc is really hard. Emailing a bunch of places that were listed elicited no responses from any. A couple of places I wanted to visit turned out to be long closed, despite numerous references.

I guess those two things are just signs that South Africa is still developing, and hasn't quite hit the find-everything-online-society that I've become accustomed to.

Comments

[trencavel.livejournal.com]

Hey Toby,
Sorry to have missed your leaving et al! Hey if you are still around in SA , maybe some of my rep may be handy http://trencavel.livejournal.com/81528.html?nc=10
Have a great trip!
M

[wintrmute.livejournal.com]

Cheers, am trying to look at it now! The internet connection is terrible today so I'm having trouble with the photos :/

[nassus.livejournal.com]

I've poked my SA friend for some answers - I've got an idea of some but not totally sure. I believe a lot of the vans without plates are driven by people without licenses as well.
As you said - it's still developing - they've come a long way very fast but there's still a lot to do.

[she-rambles.livejournal.com]

Meanwhile it's still being touted by Australian travel programs as THE place to take your family on holiday.

[wintrmute.livejournal.com]

That is kind of scary.. WHY? Is it because it's one of the few places where people speak English, but the exchange rate is in favour of the aussie peso?

[squirmelia.livejournal.com]

Spelling - Could be due to poor literacy? Apparently, only 86.4% compared to Australia and UK's 99%? (Although 86.4% is quite high really!)

Wikipedia says "Written Afrikaans differs from Dutch in that the spelling reflects a phonetically simplified language, and so many consonants are dropped. The spelling is also considerably more phonetic than the Dutch counterpart."

So, maybe it's that they are used to just spelling things phonetically and don't so much care about the spelling, even if they're using English?

I'm just trying to guess really. :)

[wintrmute.livejournal.com]

I'd guess it is related to poor literacy, but it's just silly that it appears in important government notices as much as restaurant menus and advertisements. Most are the sort of mistakes that a simple spell-checker would pick up.
Eg. Aquisition, similtaneous, previus..

I'm still giggling at the leaner driver, though. It looked like the sort of notice they would have had on the back of every one of that company's cars.

[squirmelia.livejournal.com]

Important government notices, oh dear! I've been embarrassed enough when I've been at conferences and had to give out leaflets that haven't been proof-read before printing.

Were the drivers leaning? :)

On-line stuff

[schedule5.livejournal.com]

For Joburg stuff you can try http://www.joburg.co.za, I've found it to be quite a good resource listing what's on, where to go etc. Takes a loooong time to load though (and I'm talking from an office in one of the premier research institutes in SA, so you'd think we'd have a decent net connection, wouldn't you?)

(found you via Strawberry Frog's comment on the Cape Town highway!)

Re: On-line stuff

[wintrmute.livejournal.com]

Cheers - I'd seen that already, for joburg - is there an equiv for cape town?

Ironically

[lizbonline.livejournal.com]

in your rant re spelling you had your own. We are seriously assimilating you into our borg... moo hoo hah hah hah!

"fine print). A since then"

It gets worse - the book I'm reading (a local writer) had a spelling mistake. A big bad one... Also, I've plowed through several marketing docs this morning waiting for my sign off, and every single one had at least two mistakes. These things come from professional copy writers! I mean, REALLY!

I think most South Africans regard traffic fines as a reward for not driving Miss Daisy. I know I do... But then, I very rarely seem to get them because although cops have higher priorities they seem to "give me a chance" every single time.

Re: Ironically

[wintrmute.livejournal.com]

I've fixed the mistake I made. That's so bad that I'm hypocritical though! (Although at least it's just a blog.. not some government leaflet that's handed out to every visitor)