I was there

So the month of July is coming to a close tomorrow & the only thing at the forefront of my mind is an official goodbye to the Soccer World Cup. I have to admit that before the whole thing began I was one of the negative ones...I didn't think the stadium would look good, I didn't want the traffic to affect my daily routine, I laughed at the though of South Africa pulling it off...but to my surprise I got SO involved in this World Cup. From day one (the opening ceremony) I proceeded on a month long supporter streak that culminated in me spending a fortune on game tickets and supporters gear. I was there. And I wouldn't have been anywhere else. It was truly one of my best South African experiences. Check out the postcards I made in remembrance of 2010 on my Photoblog.

Swipe your world beautiful

The mailman finally came with my MyPlanet card & I'm too excited to start swiping my world beautiful! (If you have no idea what I'm talking about, please read my post, Pengiun in my Bonnet). Every time I buy something from Woolworths, Engen, Reggies, Waltons, Kalahari.net, Quiksilver, Club Travel, Supa Quick, Bargain Books etc. up to 1% of my purchase will be donated to SANCCOB to help the penguins. I've also recently learnt that I can link my card to up to 4 beneficiaries so I'm considering adding the SPCA to my card as well.

Woolworths just launched the cutest tv ad to promote the MyPlanet initiative. Check it out here.

This has to be one of the easiest ways to make a difference - get a card here, the mailman will deliver it to you within a week, then the next time you're in Woolies or Engen doing some shopping, remember to swipe your card!  

I'm still vegetarian at 35 000 feet

I really enjoyed this article written by iAfrica's Rebekah Kendal on being a vegetarian traveller. I travel quite a bit domestically for business and it's a constant stress...god knows why I stress about eating plane food anyway with it's notorious reputation. But I think it's the expectation...it's part of the flight, and face it, scoffing your face for 30mins does help to pass the time. Secondly, if I've paid over a grand for a flight, I want all the perks regardless.

The best part of ordering the veg option on any flight is that you get served first...waaaaay before all the other passengers who glance over at you and wonder to themselves "what makes her so special?". And generally the veg option is much better than the meat ones in my opinion, but notice I say generally. Once, on a lunchtime flight, I received a sandwich that had nothing more than sauce on it, atchar sauce to be precise. Ever had an atchar sauce sandwich? I do NOT recommend it. I wanted to ask the air hostess to take a bite herself and tell me just how much she enjoyed it.

British Airways gets a big thumbs up from me for their new partnership with Woolworths (Cafe Cloud...cute name as well!). I have to say, the veg omelette they have for breakfast is by far the best omelette I've ever had. And with that you get a muffin, juice, fruit salad and a chocolate. Now that's how plane food should be. They also always offer a veg option or a meat option, so there's no need to request the veg option prior to flying (being veg seems so normal to me, I forget I have to continuosly remind the rest of the world). So thanks British Airways for considering the veggies of the world. To SAA...I'd rather starve than eat your food.

Getting in Shape

I flipping love Shape Magazine's website. I mean the magazine itself is great but I'm not so big on buying magazines or subscribing because they're just too damn expensive and they end up half-read, dog-eared on a rack in my bathroom.

I, like many people I know, battle to stay motivated to exercise. There is nothing more soul-destroying than watching the 20mins count down on the treadmill while you jog, at the same pace, and stare, at the same wall...20mins of your life you'll never get back. Last year, after many failed gym contracts, I resorted to road-running. The last time I did road-running was for cross-country in Junior School, and I was that chubby red-faced kid who complained every few metres that she couldn't breathe. But I was pleasantly surprised at how much I enjoyed it. Don't get me wrong, it was incredibly difficult in the beginning...I think on my first run I did 1km stopping every 50m gasping for breath and feeling like I might die. But after a few weeks of running 4 to 5 times a week, I was up to running 5 - 6 km with ease. And that felt liberating. 5km may not be a lot to all you hardcore exercise freaks but my little legs going continuously for 5km, is a big achievement.

What I realised was what a mind game running is. It's all in your head. You can go a lot longer than you think you can if you just put your mind to it. I really enjoyed the challenge, and I really enjoyed being outdoors on a beautiful evening, running around the Rondebosch Common...it really was refreshing after a day in the office. BUT if you haven't noticed, I've been talking in the past tense this whole paragraph....

Winter arrived annnnnnd the awesome running regime went AWOL. Now, more than a year later, SHAPE Magazine is helping me get back into it (in WINTER, shock horror!). They have this awesome SHAPE Challenge on at the moment where they send you a running plan each friday. It should have you running up to 10km in 12 weeks. Sign up to take part here. Best of all, it's actually free. And for all you lazy sods, the first week is something like 3 minutes of running, 3 minutes of walking, so no excuses...that's really hardly exercising at all.

Close(d) Call

I have to admit...this blog has started off with a rather "Activist" tone. But hey, why stop now.

I guess this is something that I've already written in my Notes on the Book (you know what book I'm talking about). But I think it's worth mentioning again, because IT'S WORKED! To bring you up to speed...

[Posted on 1 July 2010] Today I received yet another annoying telemarketing call. This time, I'd been selected to win a weekend away at any hotel in South Africa...all I had to do was pay R299. Lucky me. Last week in the post I received a pre-approved credit account from Truworths with R300 shopping vouchers...even though I've never signed up for a Truworths account and probably never will. Again, lucky me!

Back to the holiday voucher call: upon asking the caller how she received my details, I was told it's because I'm listed on the National Consumers Database...huh? So I finished ranting at her and got off the phone and turned to my trusty friend, Google. What I found was quite surprising...1 in 3 South Africans are automatically added to this delightful database that is distributed amongst direct marketing companies in South Africa. On top of that, our banks tend to sell our credit history (without my permission as far as I'm concerned) to this database as well. So I thought I'd share this little fun fact with you...

If you would like to ensure that you are never ever contacted by these stupid sales people ever again, you need to deregister yourself from the National Consumers Database. Go to this site and also this site, fill in nothing but your ID and name, and voila! it is now illegal for telemarkers using this database to ever contact you again.

I've now gone almost an entire month telemarketer-free, which is definitely a first for me. Coupled with getting myself off the National Consumers Database, I'm also getting clued up on the Consumer Protection Act, which sounds brilliant. I'm still battling with the random credit accounts in the post though (another one from Mr Price arrived...groan!). If anyone's got some insight into fighting these guys off as well, please do share. For now, go forth and enjoy the fact that everytime your cell rings, it's a worthwhile call (I hope).

Penguin in my Bonnet

So it's not enough that I'm vegetarian. Every now and then I get on this random mission to save some sort of animal. At the moment, the animal of choice is the penguin. I think I can blame this choice on the whole BP oil leakage in the Gulf of Mexico (which currently could be worsened by a tropical storm in the area). It made me want to drop everything, hop on a plane, and go and save the sealife from the horrid fate inflicted on them by a greedy oil company (yes I know we need oil, we need petrol, blah blah blah... call me a hypocrit but back to the penguin).

I heard today that penguins are starving to death in Brazil because of over-fishing; there's just no food left for them (and yes I guess warming ocean currents also have a part to play). But again, in my eyes, humans are to blame, myself included [Insert subliminal message here about not eating fish!]. And lastly, if you really need any more convincing to support the penguin just head on over to your video store and rent March of the Penguin. All of the above sent me on the quest to find out how I can help one of the most awesome animals on this planet.

Something I've always wanted to do is to volunteer at SANCCOB, and I will. Soon. But for now I stumbled across a great initiative called MyPlanet. It's run by the same group as MySchool which most people will be more familiar with. But instead of selecting a "human" charity, you can choose a "planet" to donate to (call me selfish but I prefer to save the animals). I chose SANCCOB, naturally. But there are other worthwhile animal causes i.e. the Guide Dog Association, SPCA...

You sign up on the web and they send you your free card which you can swipe at any of their partners (Woolworths being the most well-known I think). A percentage of your purchase will then go to the charity or cause you have chosen to support, and in my case, it costs SANCCOB R1o per day to feed one penguin, so this is a great way to sponsor them some much needed extra cash. Nifty, methinks.

Get your own card here. DOOOO IT!

I'm starting to remind myself of Molly Shannon in Year of the Dog. Weird movie.

Pre-Dooms Day To-Do List

The other night on Discovery Channel I watched a program that told me the world was ending on 21 December 2012. The end of the world, according to this delightful program, would be brought about by a culmination of economic meltdown, disease and "something" from space. This wasn't the first I'd heard of the 2012 theory (hello hollywood!) but it really got me thinking...and not sleeping.

I guess I'm being over paranoid about the whole thing, but it's suddenly dawned on me that there are really a lot of things that I want to do in life before my world ends. Irrespective of how lame believing this 2012 thing might be, I think it's a damn good excuse to get me off my arse and find time for the more important things in life. So here's my to-do list...

• 
  
  Work part-time (so that I have time to do the rest of the things on my list)
• 
  
  Volunteer at SANCCOB
• 
  
  Adopt a penguin from SANCCOB
• 
  
  Travel the world (starting with Bali, Thailand, Phillippines, then Canada, Sweden in winter, and the States)
• 
  
  Donate blood
• 
  
  Join the bone marrow registry (and hopefully save a life)
• 
  
  Take more photographs
• 
  
  Get a nose ring
• 
  
  Fly a plane (or sit in the cockpit while someone else flies it...this might be a safer option)
• 
  
  Learn to snowboard
• 
  
  Eat dinner at the revolving restaurant at Top of the Ritz (which I only found out existed in 2010 after 24 years of living in Cape Town - shocking, I know)
• 
  
  Paint more
• 
  
  Visit the town of Paternoster
• 
  
  Swim with dolphins
• 
  
  Wakeboard more
• 
  
  Get engaged to Nick
• 
  
  Run more

I know there's more, but those are obviously the most important because they're the only ones I can remember right now. I'm planning on doing posts for each of these as they happen...before 21.12.12 that is. And if on that day I'm still not complete, you can find me in the middle of the Karoo, because I think that sounds like a safe place to be if the worlds going to end with waves etc. (que Hollywood).

C.