Our town is quite quaint, complete with a town hall. The only time I’ve been in there is for Carols by Candlelight around Christmas. They often hold Afrikaans concerts there; no thanks, I’ll pass.
The post office ALWAYS has long lines. The usual slow service is combined with an assortment of services and items for sale that should not be available in a post office. You can play the lottery, do your banking, send faxes, purchase school supplies, pay your speeding tickets, and make photocopies. So those who are there on legitimate post office business (you know, buying stamps and mailing packages), are stuck waiting in line behind everyone else who’s there to do any number of things. Fun times.
Shopping is fairly limited in Harrismith. We have a few grocery stores, two video rental stores (who have slowly been building up a selection available in DVD format), and probably 9 furniture stores. Pretty much every small town in SA has a ton of furniture stores; unfortunately they all sell pretty much the same junk. (Funny enough, one year a furniture store advertised a free sheep with any purchase over R2000. Only in Africa!) No Lowe’s or Home Depot, just lots of small hardware stores. Most of the stores close at 5:00 during the week, at 1:00 on Saturdays, and don’t open at all on Sundays. I think they even roll up the streets after 9 PM.
It is an unwritten law that it’s okay for a woman driving by herself to not wait at a red light after dark. Because of the high rate of crime in SA, a woman can come to a stop and then just continue on if there are no cars going the other way. I like to make use of that whenever I can; not because I feel unsafe, but simply because I’m impatient!
We do have some restaurants in our fine city. Our eateries include:
- KFC - they are everywhere in Africa, are much better than the American ones, and are affectionately called “Kentucky”
- Nandos - yummy grilled chicken, from mild to extra hot
- Spur - steaks/tex mex with an odd Native American decor that you need to see to believe!
- Juicy Lucy - smoothies and sandwiches; a fun new addition to our town
- Wimpy - burgers/breakfast; not too high on my favorites list
- Debonairs Pizza - twenty minutes out of town, but worth the drive when we have time to make it
The restaurants are typically “open till late”, meaning they’re open until they decide to close or everyone has left. This could mean 9:00 or 10:00, you’ll just have to wait and see!
We live 15-20 minutes outside of town (the opposite side than that of the pizza place). The dirt road leading out to our base is really bad right now. All the rain we’ve had in the past few months has left it looking like Swiss cheese (which, by the way, is not available here; Amers, remember how badly we wanted it so you could make your yummy Swiss Chicken?!). So the drive is a bit longer than usual since we have to drive a bit slower than usual. We’re not that far from town, but we’re far enough that sometimes weeks can go by with me not ever leaving the base! The lack of a personal car is the largest contributing factor to that; we’re believing to be able to buy something next year. With gas currently at over $4 a gallon, it’s a challenge to pay the expenses for all the ministry vehicles right now, never mind throwing another car into the mix.
Well, that’s a glimpse of good ol’ Harrismith. All you need to know and more! Now you need to come see for yourself, if you haven’t yet, or come see how it’s changed, if you’ve been here before! The welcome mat is out; come on over!
very cool!
By: danielle on May 20, 2006
at 3:09 am
Awww good ole’ home sweet home! You are making me miss it even more :) Can’t wait to be back in our quaint little town we call home!
LOVE YOU
By: JenJen on May 20, 2006
at 8:47 pm
CAN’T WAIT!!!!!!!
Oh, and if you change your Feedblitz account a bit, your subscribers can see the post in the e-mail they get… comment me and I’ll tell you how if you want.
I just figured that out. :D
By: rebecca on May 21, 2006
at 6:42 am
*grins* It makes me want to visit! Maybe in the winter (that is, summer … let’s keep it warm year round). ;) $4 a gallon, huh? Wow.
By: annie on May 21, 2006
at 6:41 pm
Anneth — Yeah, $4 a gallon - pretty crazy, eh? (And we thought it was bad in the States!) Then join that with the fact that cars cost typically twice or three times the price of what they do in the States! YIKES!
Ruwe — I just emailed you to ask you about that… I thought I had it set up that way. Oops!
Bobber — It warms my heart to hear you say “home sweet home”! I’m stoked that you’ll be back in 6 weeks! It’ll be here before you know it!
Yeller — Thanks for all your faithful commenting! :-) More pics of our property and base coming soon… I’m curious to hear how it lines up with what you “saw” in your dream!
By: Alece on May 21, 2006
at 9:22 pm
We drove by a Hummer dealership today and I thought about Niel…
By: Natalie on May 22, 2006
at 3:19 am
:-) A used one here in SA is being advertised for 1.4 million Rand - divide by 6 = $230,000! WOWZERS! You can see used car prices here on http://www.autotrader.co.za; it’s unbeleivable!
By: Alece on May 22, 2006
at 11:42 am
quote:”They often hold Afrikaans concerts there; no thanks, I’ll pass”
Not sure what you mean by this?
1. You don’t like Afrikaans?
2. You don’t like Afrikaans music?
3. You don’t like Afrikaans people?
4. Combination of the above?
Please explain.
As a resident of Harrismith myself, I must say, I enjoyed your little virtual tour here, very good described!
By: Just Visiting on December 10, 2007
at 11:56 am
“Just Visiting” - not sure if you’ll check this again, but I figured I’d comment back. I certainly don’t dislike the people or the language. I’m married to an Afrikaner and my (spoken) Afrikaans isn’t too shabby. The music, though? Woah. Whole different ballgame. Not a fan.
By: alece on December 12, 2007
at 4:38 am
I don’t get it. You say your ministring in Harrismith? And you’re calling it a gritty glory journey?
I lived in Harrismith for a very long time. I went to school there. I became a person there - with values! Sounds like you’re a foreigner who doesn’t appreciate farm life.
If is is so gritty, go home. I am Afrikaans by the way.
By: Mignon on April 3, 2008
at 8:16 pm
Mignon — I tried emailing you back, but it bounced back. The email address you left isn’t valid. Sigh. Hopefully you’ll return here and see my response…
I apologize if I’ve offended you in any way. I love living in South Africa, and think the Harrismith area is beautiful. The “grit” I refer to has nothing to do with the town. It refers to my life as a missionary. People tend to think that there’s all this glorious hoopla about being a missionary, but really it’s just normal life (the grit) that has moments of glory. That’s what I’m referring to with that phrase. And life is gritty everywhere, so if I took your advice and just “went home”, I’d still be blogging about having grit and glory… it would just look different.
I do come from a city, so it’s an adjustment living in a small town, in a farming community. But I don’t despise it by any means. And I’m married to an Afrikaner, so I have nothing against the people or the language. I’m pretty fluent in Afrikaans myself!
I hope that sheds some more light on my perspective on all this.
By: alece on April 3, 2008
at 8:25 pm
I guess I’ll eat humble pie then and leave it at that. I must admit that I happened upon your site and didn’t read everyting in depth.
I am also sorry if I had offended you. It must be hard leaving everyone and everything you love behind and do what you do.
So now I know that first impressions are not always correct and that hasty assumptions are potentially a killer to some else’s dreams and asperations.
I wish you all the best for the future and may you be blessed there in the State of Freedom.
Mignon
By: Mignon on April 3, 2008
at 10:47 pm
thanks, mignon! and let me know if you ever find yourself back in the Free State.
By: alece on April 3, 2008
at 10:55 pm
I live in a City - Perth ( Pop 1.5 mill and counting) Australia ( see photo’s on blog :-) )
Our shoping times are virtually identical to yours and gas here is almost US$6 a gallon!
The world is becoming a smaller and much less varied place it seems - sigh.
Oh - it rained here 3 days so far this year - for a total of around 2.5 inches.
Next time i’m in Africa (never been) I’m taking you both out for Pizza! - do they do Hawaiian? I suppose home-delivered is just too much to ask? ;-)
love <B
By: lovewillbringustogether on April 4, 2008
at 8:14 am
Heard of Mr Delivery? So did we…
By: Mignon on April 4, 2008
at 1:52 pm
I guess I shouldn’t visit again… the comments and stuff seem to push every button and get a bad reaction out of me.
Totsiens, goobye, cheers!
By: Mignon on April 4, 2008
at 1:57 pm
I love this idea of a virtual tour.
By: Simone's Butterfly on April 12, 2008
at 7:22 am