IMAGES OF SOUTH AFRICA

Deep red/orange earth
wild, untamed both the bush and Jo'burg
pain, and heartwrenching poverty
joyful worship full of song and hope
friends just like you imagined and knew they would be
penguins huddling in the shade of shrubs seeking relief from the heat
waters emerald green and deep, deep blue crashing onto shore, lifting spray in praise
2 oceans meeting where the cape juts out in a craggy mountain towering over the waters
Table Mountain with its incredible views and flat top that by afternoon wears a white vaporous tablecloth of clouds
The amazing beauty of God's creation and creatures - the far reaching roar of lions
interrupting sleep, the dainty grace of impalas, the sweet eyelashed face of giraffes,the crunching munching of white rhino, double rainbows arching over the African veld-
how hard can it be to see an elephant? Pretty darn hard, when they're amongst the trees.
Camouflaged waterbuck and kudos who blend into their surroundings until they simply just disappear from sight.
Cape Buffalo who know you are there among them long before you even see one.
Bee eaters, ibis, spoonbills, lorries, black eagles and guinea fowl fly, soar, sprint away and rest in trees
The beauty of the bush full of millipedes crossing the road and chameleons hanging on trees. Flowers blooming and the flat top acacia trees, purple jacaranda and birds of paradise blooming prolific like petunias.
The red/orange sun rising to greet the day and the warm yellow orange glow as the sun kisses the day goodnight.
Cool breezes that refresh and heat that burns in the midday when the lions lay around deceptively tame as house cats.
Food that explodes with flavor and becomes a symphony in your mouth.
Music with steady rhythms and drum beats that resonnate in the soul.
Hawkers plying their wares on the street and in lanes of moving traffic.
Houses surrounded by concrete wallls topped with coiled barbed wire, electric driveways gates and spiked fencing that discourages even the most determined to break in. Barred windows and doors and these are the middle-class living in a wideopen prison of everyday Johannesburg.
Tightly knit Soweto that stretches far and wide not merely a neighborhood, but a large town. Squatter boxes of corrugated metal, cardboard and plastic - room enough to sleep, to be somewhat sheltered from the rain. Cooking happens outside, and the clothes dry on lines strung at the back of the shack, if you can even call it that.
Refugees from all over Africa find their way here, to make a new life, escape from bloody wars only to fight poverty, to fight for a job and food for their children.
Grapevines standing in rows upon rows of the many vineyards and wine estates, green, lush and hilly.
European architecture and church bells that peal and ring.
A land of great and many contrasts - beautiful and wild.