Train to Jo'berg

The train arrives very slowly into Jo'burg. Much of the 27 hour journey from Cape Town is through desert and scrub country, ostriches running alongside the train. The dining room serves custardy babootie and rich malvo pudding.

There's not a lot to look at outside. Arriving in the great city is a thirty minute pass through more garbage/litter along the train tracks than Plotnik has ever seen anywhere. A white South African school teacher talks about how the city has deteriorated since '94, but he punctuates it with his index finger touching his opposite wrist. After seeing him do this a few times, Plotnik realizes it is a signal about race -- the city has deteriorated, but not because of the speaker, and not because of Plotnik, but because of those whose wrists are a different color. Get it? There is so much that is convoluted here.

it's only two days since traveling to the Cape of Good Hope. Plotnik and Ducknik stood on the point where the oceans meet -- the warm Indian Ocean Current flows into the cold Atlantic Ocean current. Huge, rocky cliffs, blue-green water, baboons lurking across the road, great seabirds scooping fish from the sea. If there are more beautiful spots in the world, Plotnik is unable to say where.

Tomorrow it's on to see the African Big Five -- hopefully -- lion, leopard, water buffalo, rhino and elephant. Woo hoo hoo.