South Africa

So I'm back from South Africa, straight to the chills of New York. It was a magnificent trip. South Africa top ten:

1. As the picture above shows (you can click through to the Flickr photos), there were a ton of animals to see. For those that care, I saw four of the big five, missed out on the leopard (apparently they are quite rare in the area I was staying at).
2. Things only in the wild, including baby hyenas and dead elephants.
   
3. The lodge was fantastic, and there were days when I was the only guest at the lodge. Plenty of time to relax and think things through on what I want for next year and beyond.
4. Catching up with Chester and Ka in Cape Town, who were wonderful hosts. Thanks to Chester for lending me a pair of pants (that actually fit me better than him :)) and t-shirts when my luggage got misplaced for two days.
5. Realising I had 30 min to spend US$200 of "delayed luggage allowance" before the luggage arrived! Only got time to buy one t-shirt. Unfortunately Ka was not able to find some sandals.
   
6. Table Mountain and Camps Bay are pretty spectacular, and Cape Town in general. Check out the pics here.
7. The lack of Crackberry access in the safari lodge made it very difficult to think about work, which was a blessing.
8. Interesting converstations about how the country is trying to address the inequality of the past by pushing for "positive" discrimination in all areas (business and government). However, the lack of education of those lower classes makes it quite difficult for blacks to fill certain technical roles, even though they have to allocate it to them. Hopefully continued education will address this issue.
9. Strangely enough, Asians get to benefit from this "black empowerment" policy (as we are considered a minority), so if I needed a job, I should go to South Africa!
10. Yes, I did see lions having sex.