Pretoria

Here I am now, with 30 degrees and my winterclothing for the mountains that are going to come later. But believe me it is enjoyable nevertheless. Pretoria is a good place to get adjusted to the weather and the mentality in the sense of people are just doing everything with a bit more "Gemuetlichkeit" for those who understand German :-) What I notice with myself is some anxiety about "being a target" as being a white tourist which must have come from having read tooooo much of "take care" literature, so far people are friendly, if contact is there.

I am staying in a hostel here until Sunday and from there I go with Bram (the PhD of the VU) to Lesotho, first the capital city: Maseru and then to the research location around Butha-Buthe. I am just about making those decisions concerning renting a car or not and how all I do eventually influences my research outcomes and how people perceive me. On the other hand it is just so much handier to have a car especially in this remote area I am planning to go, as you see I just need to make some decisions...

Bram will stay with me two weeks to do his own research that he still needs to complete in the same area. It will be (and already is) of a great help to have him round, knowing some people and places.

Today I spent some hours online to contact some more NGOs, I hope to have some responses soon, otherwise I will just "fall with the door in their house" (very German expression...) and try to get contact directly when I am there. And I had a very interesting talk with a girl from Swaziland that is staying at the same hostel as I. Swaziland is as well totally surrounded by South Africa so I tried some of my interview questions on her, and I already noticed that I need to make some adjustments.

More at a later stage, all the best to all of you