Saturday April 18,1981

8:10PM, Wednesday, 20 May, 2009
Twenty eight years,one month and two days ago I arrived in South Africa at what was then called Jan Smuts Airport in Johannesburg. It was a life-changing experience.

On the previous evening I had boarded a Swiss Air flight in Zurich, Switzerland. I was flying first class and enjoying all the best. The plane stopped in Geneva. We then lifted off for Africa. I was full of expectation and curiosity.

The first-class section was full of former Rhodesian elite soldiers from organizations like the Selous Scouts. Being a Vietnam war veteran, I hit it off with them. As we drank more alcohol and the night wore on, we got into a giant pillow fight and made a lot of noise. A couple of wild rowdies started touching the stewardesses in personal places. The plane also had armed air marshals. As things started to get out of hand, they came up and convinced all to return to our seats and rest. No guns had to be drawn.

Early in the morning the plane landed in Nairobi, Kenya. As the door opened and the air poured into the cabin. I began to sense the special timelessness of Africa where we all came from. I read the local papers and saw another aspect of Africa, violent crime.

Around nine in the morning Johannesburg time, the plane began to circle Johannesburg. I had expected to see a wild and verdant jungle below. Instead I saw a modern city high on a plateau with many reflections from swimming pools. It reminded me a lot of Denver, Colorado.

My heart beat fast as we landed. I was finally in darkest Africa! We deplaned and headed for passport control. I came face to face with a huge man of Dutch ancestry. He looked at my passport. He asked e to produce a return ticket to the United States. Another American named Jerry Walker was with me. He stepped forward and put together a lot of my old tickets. He convinced the immigration official that I had the required return ticket.

I was relieved to clear customs. I walked with my baggage out to the front of the airport. I expected to see elephants about and Rama of the Jungle (a 1930's series of movies about Africa popular in the USA.) I expected to see men with elephant rifles and women in jungle clothes all about. Instead I saw a very modern city not very different from the USA. The only difference was that people drove on the wrong side of the road.

I didn't have hotel reservations. On a whim, I caught the Holiday Inn shuttle and went to that hotel. Soon I was checked in and in my room. I was relieved to have made it safely and almost exhausted. I went to dinner in the hotel and met a nice couple named Graeme and Sue Harris from the UK. They talked about the 200 hangings per year and the hard side of Apartheid. They invited me to come to their house in Benoni on Monday evening for dinner.

In the 1970's I had plenty of experience with violent and repressive military dictatorships in Latin America. I had been in Chile on September 11,1973 when General Augustin Pinochet came to power in a military coup. Many people had been herded into the soccer stadium in downtown Santiago and many had been shot including two unlucky Americans. I went on to spend two years in Peru and five years in Brasil while military governments were in power.

After all of the bad publicity about South Africa, I was expecting something just as bad as what I had lived through in Latin America.

I left my hotel and took a room in the house of a wonderful lady in Northcliff. My worst fears never came true. I began to feel that I had climbed into a time machine and gone back to the 1950's in the USA. There was a sweetness and innocence about the place. People left their doors open. There was a wonderful social life and friendly people. Apartheid and the bad way black and Indian people were treated was always in the background. But there wasn't the fear and violence one found in Latin America. My first stay in your country turned out to be one of the happiest times of my life.