KZN#21.indd

Travel
What SA Expats Miss Most
About South Africa
There are few South Africans
who emigrate without missing
South Africa. We are quick to
complain about our country’s
ailments, but take us away
from our homeland and we’re just as
quick to yearn for South Africa’s wide
open spaces, friendly faces and traditions.
We chat to a few South Africans
who have moved abroad about what they
miss most.
Saffa Living in Taiwan
expat-living-in-taiwan-ozlouw-2-600-x-800
Profile: Chris Louw; Age: 39;
Present Hometown: Taoyuan
City, Taiwan; Former Hometown:
Cape Town.
When & why did you leave
South Africa? I left SA in 2000
to teach English in Taiwan. I
had no plans about how long
I’d stay in Taiwan, or when or
if I’d return to SA. I’ve now
lived in Taiwan for 15 years.
What do you like about
where you live now? I’m
happy where I live now.
This city is not a quarter as
beautiful as Cape Town (few
places are), but less than an
hour away (even on a bicycle),
I can be in tall, vast and
beautiful mountains. Besides
that, Taiwan is safe (very little
crime), a good life is affordable,
and for almost every service
imaginable you just have
to walk to the corner of the
block (Taiwan convenience
stores are a miracle of supply
and service and they don’t
even close during typhoons!).
What do you miss about
South Africa? Without doubt,
the things I miss most about
SA are family and friends. I’m
sure my last decade and a half
would’ve been much more fun
if I’d gotten to spend more
time with my SA friends.
I guess the other thing I
miss is the environment (the
game reserves and Table
Mountain stand out), but I’ve
also fallen in love with the Taiwanese
environment.
Saffa Living
in Australia
32
Profile: Anton Van den Berg,
Age: 31, Present hometown:
Sydney, Australia; Former
hometown in SA: Cape Town
expat-living-in-australia-antonvan-den-berg-2
When and why did you
leave South Africa?
April 2011. The timing
just felt right for me
to get out of Cape Town
and do something new. I had fi nished
my studies and had worked for just over
a year in Cape Town during which time
I managed to save a bit of money and
gain post-grad experience. There was
also nothing tying me to Cape Town so I
decided to take that opportunity to see a
bit more of the world and get some valuable
experience working in a different
country.
What do you like about
Kzn Lifestyle Magazine • Issue 20
where you live now? Sydney’s
so similar to Cape Town
in that the climate enables an
outdoor and active way of life
here. The coastline is central to
living in Sydney, so living on
or close to the beach is pretty
accessible. The people you
meet and the friends you make
also help make a place familiar
and comfortable and I’ve been
pretty fortunate in that regard
over here.
What do you miss about
South Africa?
The mountain – I know it’s
Cape Town specific, but the
way that the mountain creates
a backdrop to almost anything
you do and the way it holds the
city and then drops off to the
beaches make for a pretty surreal,
dramatic and beautiful
place to wake up to each day.
I miss the colorfulness and
edginess of South Africa. It’s
hard to describe, but there’s
a buzz of ‘survival-ness’ in
South Africa that I haven’t
necessarily felt in developed
(sometimes over-regulated)
countries. There is a lot of economic
uncertainty in South
Africa, which can be incredibly
frustrating and challenging,
but this forces people into creative
ways of making a living
around the fringes of more traditional,
developed economic
models. That’s where the buzz
lies, away from the regulated
and sterile.