Visiting a small town I've never been to before

On the 3rd of July, 2017, my mom, sister and I were in the Mpumalanga region for a week. We visited God's Window:

Blyde Rivier Canyon:

and more, but on the 3rd of July, we went and explored a variety of waterfalls in the area, and stopped over for lunch in the iconic Pilgrim's Rest.

Some of the water falls we visited: From Top to Bottom - Horseshoe Falls, Lone Creek Falls, and Lisbon Falls.

Our view from the little restaurant where we had lunch in Pilgrim's Rest - The Vine Restaurant and Pub. Their bobotie was to die for, so rich and tender... yum.

Outside The Vine looking out to the mountains

One of the shops in Pilgrim's Rest

Some more shops and overall beautiful scenery in Pilgrim's Rest.

Again, I did not take a selfie in the area, neither did I check in on a location site. For me and my family, we like taking pictures of things, and not joining in the picture.

We didn't stay very long before we had to leave to continue our tour of the waterfalls, but it was interesting to explore an old town that's very much a part of South African history, and continues to be even now in the modern age.

Sometimes it doesn't hurt to return to our roots and just spend some time among history. It's good for the soul.

Try spending no money for three days in a row

Hey guys.

So, without really meaning to, I successfully went three days without spending any money, whatsoever.

From Sunday 12 November, until Thursday 16 November. No money was spent between those two days, neither cash nor card.

This is a tricky challenge to proves, especially because so many transactions nowadays are electronic, and there's no way I'm sharing banking info on the internet.

Nope. No sirree.

So this past week, I ended up squirreling away in my apartment in order to work on and finish up projects. Thanks to a stash of frozen food and long-life milk, I had no need to leave the apartment for any reason.

Except Monday to write a test and see a lecturer. But I didn't go shopping. Which is good.

Flip, but it's difficult to try and not spend any money for longer than a day. There's always something that you need to buy: medicine, toiletries, food, clothing...

And there's no real way to try and budget and prepare for these kinds of situations. You can, but life has a way of taking all your plans, throwing them out the window, and then laughing obnoxiously in your face while you panic and try to salvage what you can.

But for those three days... it felt glorious, not having to worry about how much money I had to buy food or petrol, or that I wouldn't be able to buy something because I wouldn't have enough money...

Just, it was a pleasant experience. Granted, I was still stressing about projects, but money became a non-existent problem for me. To not have to worry about something like that and use that energy elsewhere, it's incredible. It feels as though more is getting done, and it feels absolutely amazing.

Make a sculpture

Hello again all.

So, today I am sharing with you the sculpture I made for a project in the previous term.

That's my sculpture.

For the project, we had to represent the idea of sacrifice without directly referencing images that relate to sacrifice or saying the word 'sacrifice'.

This was trickier than I first thought.

The sculpture came about as my original idea, and in my head, it looked a lot more better and elaborate.

I guess it holds some truth to it though: how in your head, everything looks amazing and good, but when you try to bring it into the real world, something goes wrong and it comes out looking similar to what you imagined, but not quite what you imagined.

Still, the process of sculpting the figurine was a lot of fun, even though I may have done it wrong.

Building the figure from wire was tricky, because you had to hold the wires together while you use a pliers to bend them together so that they stay put.

Then comes the task of building the clay figurine. But you gotta go fast, before the clay dries and becomes hard and unusable. Even while you're working, you need to sit with some water nearby to wet your hands and the clay you're working with.

That's what I found, at least.

Still, it was fun to just get dirty and use my hands for a change. I might just try and make another sculpture again in the longer holidays for fun, and see if I can make a better looking sculpture that's more similar to what's actually in my head.

Watch a Film from before 1940

Hello again guys.

So, this is another blog that I wrote up ages ago, and yet am only posting now because #issues.

So, recently, a TV series came out that was basically the Wizard of Oz, except it was set in the modern world and wasn't as family-friendly as the original movie. It was called Emerald City.

It was really interesting to watch, and I'm so sad that it's not getting a second season because it really went a completely different direction than what you would expect, and it was a lot darker than you'd believe it to be.

I love dark fairytales, to be honest with you.

In any case, there's now the original Wizard of Oz, the TV series, and the prequel-sequel 'Oz: The Great and Powerful'.

So I decided to go back and watch the original Wizard of Oz, and return to my childhood.

Watching it, the distinctions between the differences in technology between 1939 and 2017 are quite visible, but the original is still a good film.

I can see where and how the prequel-sequel 'Oz' ties in to the original, and how the writers of the TV show got their ideas and incorporated them into the basic plot of the original film and extended it over a series.

I remember how, as a child, I would always skip to the part of the film where the colour came in and Dorothy was in Oz, because I couldn't stand the sepia colouring or the beginning and the end. Ah, how times have changed.

It just goes to show how even something that's old and regarded as a classic can be changed and become popular for its differences and relativity to the modern world.

Spending a day at the Johannesburg Zoo

Hello there, you beautiful people. Long time no post, apparently. I have some serious issues when it comes to posting and updating my blog, apparently. And apparently, I use the word "apparently" a lot.

However, my use of the word "apparently" and my inability to keep a decent upload schedule are not the reason I am here today.

Today, I am here to chat about my visit to the Johannesburg Zoo, which happened on the 21st of June, 2017. While it did occur a few weeks ago, the trip has remained in my mind, mostly because it was such a fun experience.

So, where do I begin?

Perhaps I should start with how excited I was to visit the zoo. I could vaguely recall visiting it on a school field trip one year, and when I was much, much younger. My mom had also told me that the Johannesburg Zoo had been renovated, so I was also excited to see how it now looked.

And so, I set out on my adventure.

Which was almost thwarted by traffic.

I swear, traffic in the big cities just seem to have their own sets of rules. And the traffic I experienced on my way to the zoo wasn't too bad, until I reached about a kilometre before the off-ramp I was supposed to take. Then, the traffic slowed to a crawl - roadworks.

Still, I eventually reached the zoo, and parked my car and bought my ticket.

Here's the ticket.

And off I went.

I found it very strange to be at the zoo in the middle of the week, mainly because it was so quiet. There were only a handful of other people there, but more often than not, I found myself alone.

Other than the emptiness of the zoo which was vaguely unsettling and felt like some post-apocalyptic world, it was a very enjoyable day. To just spend some time strolling around and looking at the animals in their enclosures was a refreshing change of pace.

I also had the honour of one of the zookeepers keeping me company throughout my visit there, but unfortunately did not take a picture with him. He shared many interesting facts with me about the animals, and was overall a very friendly guy.

The aquarium side of the zoo had one of those really cool tunnels where you can walk through the tunnel but around you is fish tank. Little catfish decided to take a nap on top.

Tigers are actually the biggest cats in the world, not lions.

(Kindergarten lied to me.)

Hola guys! I was actually here and not bluffing.

Is it a swan, or a flamingo? The world may never know.

Guys, guys, guys! I found Master Shifu! I guess Po being the ultimate Dragon Warrior finally took its toll on him and he decided to retire.

Yummy munchies...

HAHA, we can reach the food. Your ploy to starve us has failed you.

Sleepy kitties.

The zoo is just one of those fun family-bonding places that you need to go back and visit every now and again. It's just amazing to see how humans have come up with this concept of holding nature in the middle of the city, available for everyone and anyone to experience.

Spending time with a very small child

Hello all.

So, since I've moved up to Pretoria, I've been able to see my dad more often, which means I've also been able to spend time with my baby half-brother, Shaun.

I received this picture from my step-mom a few months ago, after I had spent the day with her, my dad, and my little brother.

This was from an outing we took to Cullinan on the 18th of June, Father's Day. This was late afternoon, after lunch.

There's just something fascinating about small old towns with railroad tracks that used to lead somewhere but now lead nowhere.

I guess Shaun doesn't like me. I mean, I'm 19 years old and I live on my own, so I don't spend that much time with them and around them, which is a pity.

From the few interactions I've had with Shaun, he's more interested in staying near our dad, or his mom, and not in interacting with me.

But from what I've observed from the few times we've spent together, he's really energetic and fun-loving, not scared to have fun and take risks. Perhaps I need to start thinking like a child again in all aspects of my life at times, and not focus too much on the future and what I can't really change or influence by myself.

Do something on a rooftop somewhere

Hello again.

So, it's reached that point of the term/year/life that everything is crazy, projects are due and anything that could go wrong does go wrong.

From out-of-control controlled fires messing up plans to work on a project, to the electricity cables for my complex being stolen and leaving us in the dark for just over a day and a half, this past term has been hectic.

It doesn't help much that I'm a procrastinating perfectionist scared of failure. The logic behind this definition is pretty impressive, and no, I didn't think of it by myself. As a perfectionist, you want everything to be perfect. As a procrastinator, you wait until the last minute to do things.

Combine these two together, however, and you get the theory that you procrastinate because you believe that currently you do not have the required skill-sets to successfully complete the assigned task in order to successfully soothe your perfectionist tendencies.

A similar theory is that you procrastinate because you are scared of failure. And wow, this just got deep super fast.

In any case, at this point I decided that I needed to just take a minute and breathe. The stress of everything was getting to me, bringing me down and rendering me almost incapable of working. The voices in my head weren't much help either.

Standing on ground level, I felt as though I was being suffocated, so I decided to go to the top floor of my apartment building, as I unfortunately do not have access to a rooftop near me. Thank goodness the building is open plan of sorts, and I was able to breathe and watch the sunset for a little while.

Proof that I was, in fact, on the 6th floor of my apartment building, which just so happens to be the highest floor of the building.

In my few minutes up there, I breathed deeply and just let the air fill my lungs. Somehow, it felt cleaner, fresher.

My mind felt refreshed when I eventually came back to my flat, and I was able to continue working on my projects.

All-in-all, if you need to take a break, go for it. Sometimes, all you need to feel better is to just stop, take a minute, and breathe. It does a world of good.