Bizarre objects on sale like silicone spatulas specifically made for turning flapjacks; rows of eerily identical box houses called lifestyle complexes, shimmering against clipped, grassy green hills and outlined by stylishly built fences; white-skinned people wearing impractical clothes, sitting at pinterest restaurants, waiting for someone to take a photo.
As bizarre as travelling in Africa has been at times, coming back has to be twice as strange. At least, the upper class Northern suburbs of Durban where we are at the moment seems quite foreign to anything we've seen in 6 months.
Apart fom the 'neatness' and 'containedness' of everything (and so much else), we seem to be transitioning from a human-sized environment to a car-sized one (Bill Bryson talks about this in his book about growing up the 50s). Modern life is designed around motorvehicles, how they drive, where they can park, how fast they can move. Buildings and roads are scaled accordingly, and walking can feel like a clumsy and dangerous activity.
As Lindie and I were walking the short distance from the mall to the car wash yesterday my heart was buzzing like a bumble bee, with cars the size of monsters coming from all directions. The side walk stopped at one of the intersections, and we found ourselves frantically crossing the curb of a fast-food-drive-thru just to be barred by the garden hedge around the parking lot. We felt out of place on our feet. We felt 'naked' compared to the robot shuttles whirling around. And everyone else was in a rush, going faster than humanly possible.
Everywhere August and I traveled, with the exception of the major cities, pedestrians still dictated the environment's form and function, and the motorvehicle driver must adapt to the pace, and scale, of life on foot, frustrating as it may be. Now we enter a maze of robotesque machines, whizzing people from their home to the shops and back, with people never seeming to touch the earth, never walking on uneven terrain, getting muddy shoes or having to share the road with grazing animals or meandering plants. Modern people 'hover'.
Maybe that's why at home our clothes and shoes seem to last years but on the trip they deteriorated within months. We touched the world a bit more.
From Durban we plan to escape the malls and its madness, driving up to the beautiful Drakensberg area before cruising down slowly towards the Cape. It was super great to meet up with Michelle Duncan, a friend from Stb, and Chris and Lindie van der Burgh (our wedding photographers) in Salt Rock. And of course the modern world has its perks, we've had our first gloriously tumble-dried clothes and towels in months (aaah the softness), and we've been gorging ourselves on gourmet cheese, rusks, sushi and water (from the tap!). Greetings from the future, Y&A
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