Tag Archives: Angelina Jolie

WhaleTales Tourism, Food, and Wine news headlines: 31 January

WhaleTalesTourism, Food, and Wine news headlines

*   The African Nations Championship 2014 will come to an end at the Cape Town Stadium tomorrow, with a closing ceremony, followed by the third and fourth place play-off, and the Final thereafter.   The Closing Ceremony is themed ‘Celebrating Africa’s Home Champions’, explained City of Cape Town Councillor for Tourism, Events, and Marketing Grant Pascoe to The New Age.   Ghana plays Libya in the Final, while Nigeria and Zimbabwe will battle it out for places three and four.

*  American air travellers would ideally like a passage that allows free baggage, confirmed seats, and security fast passes.  They do not want to pay for baggage.  They are however prepared to pay for overhead space for hand luggage, for their luggage to come out first at Baggage Claim, to have comfortable seats, to have extra legroom, complimentary meals, and to not have a reclining seat in front of them!

*  South Africa ranks 29th out of 140 countries on the World Economic Forum Travel & Tourism Index, and third in Africa (after Seychelles and Mauritius) on this Index.

*   Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt, with their family, are said to live in Johannesburg for a few months, while Pitt works on a  movie Continue reading →

COP17 Climate Change Conference 2011: Lots of ‘hot air’, but good for SA!

It was hard to get a grip on the deliberations of the United Nations COP (Conference of Parties) 17 Climate Change Conference, which took place in Durban over the last two weeks, and ended a day late with a last minute agreement reached yesterday, but it certainly placed Durban and South Africa on the world news map.   It also had a magnificent tourism benefit, the Durban hospitality industry saying that it was bigger and better than the 2010 soccer World Cup.

Close to 15000 delegates from 200 countries met for two weeks, and agreed in the 11th hour to one global law regarding greenhouse emissions.  The Durban Platform for Enhanced Action is a bundle of agreements, which extends the Kyoto Protocol by five years, establishes a Green Climate Fund, looks to transfer clean technology to poorer countries, seeks the protection of forests, and addresses further technical issues, reports the Cape Times. No specific deal has been made yet regarding greenhouse emissions, but the principle is that every nation has agreed to reduce these, a first as it includes the worst greenhouse gas offenders USA and China too.  The agreements will be finalised in 2015, and enforceable from 2020.  President Zuma had asked the delegates in his opening address to ‘save tomorrow today’.

Reaction to the outcome of the conference has been mixed, some saying it was a lot of ‘hot air’, was ‘too late’ and ‘too vague’.  Scientists have said that global greenhouse gas emissions must peak by 2017, to avoid dangerous climate change.   Greenpeace International said that ‘the new accord could take the globe over the 2°C threshold at which we pass from danger to global catastrophe‘, according to a report in The Times. At the Conference, ESKOM and Sasol were named South Africa’s most heavy polluters, reported Business Report. ‘Green bank’ Nedbank funded the Eskom Medupi coal-fired power station, which violates World Bank environmental regulations.

Durban is expected to have generated R1 billion in revenue, having received R200 million from the government and utilising R50 million of its own funds to stage the conference. Accommodation in the city was fully booked, reports The Times, with 160000 bed nights and 495000 meals sold. Delegates supported local restaurants, tourist shops, and transport companies.  Durban was highlighted as a city with good organisational skills and infrastructure.   Critically a delegate commented about the non-climate friendly 5* hotel changing towels every day, and not requesting the guest to indicate when this should be done, a lesson for accommodation establishments to demonstrate their contribution to going green.

Glamour VIP visitors to the conference, including Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt as well as Prince Albert and Princess Charléne, attracted further media attention to Durban. The Jolie/Pitt couple rented a villa at Zimbali Coastal Resort, at R8500 per day, reported the Sunday Times. Oprah Winfrey and the President of Panama have previously rented the house. The Monaco royal couple stayed at The Oyster Box again, where the princess had stayed during their South African honeymoon.

At least one COP17 Conference delegate found time to extend his visit to Durban to fly to Cape Town, and is staying at Whale Cottage Camps Bay.

Chris von Ulmenstein, Whale Cottage Portfolio: www.whalecottage.com Twitter:@WhaleCottage

‘Invictus’ a victory for South Africa

When leaving the cinema after seeing ‘Invictus’, I could not come to a conclusion about my feelings about the movie.   While it has a star cast of international actors (Morgan Freeman and Matt Damon) and a star director in Clint Eastwood, and is set in Cape Town and Johannesburg, which bodes well for the country’s awareness and visibility, there was a nagging question as to which movie-goers around the world would be interested in a movie about South Africa’s transformation into a democracy almost 20 years ago, and more particularly, the country winning the Rugby World Cup in 1995 against all odds.   

Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt and one of their adopted sons were at the premiere of the movie in Los Angeles a week ago, and one wonders what would have made them see the movie, other than respect for their fellow-actors and the producer.

The filming is mainly concentrated on the rugby field and in Madiba’s official residences and offices.  Cape Town features in the scenic shots, one being a magnificent shot of a SAA aeroplane flying in front of Table Mountain; various shots of the V&A Waterfront, including a trip to Robben Island on the ferry, and a number of rugby match celebrations at Ferrymans; and a run on Beach Road in Mouille Point, the lighthouse forming a dominant backdrop.

While most would say that Morgan Freeman was the star of the movie, playing the role of the magnificent Nelson Mandela, who sees the Rugby World Cup as a way in which to unite 42 million South Africans, it is Matt Damon who is the real star.   Matt Damon IS Francois Pienaar, and speaks with a most believable South African accent; Morgan Freeman is Morgan Freeman in voice, and is Nelson Mandela in looks only.

Nostalgically, the movie was interesting to see, in observing how much and yet how little has changed in South Africa in 20 years.    Long-forgotten brand names, such as Volkskas, Xerox and Iscor, and old logos such as those of SAA and Coca Cola, were visible around the rugby fields.

One error was that Madiba was seen to be reading the Cape Argus for breakfast!   Some characters had too pronounced an (unrealistic) South African accent, including Pienaar’s mother, and the white security men.   Pienaar’s wife Nerine, played by local actress Marguerite Wheatley, was very real in acting and speaking.  Both Freeman and Damon have been nominated for the Screen Actors’ Guild awards, as best actor and best supporting actor, respectively.

The name of the movie comes from the Invictus poem by William Ernest Henley, which Mandela had in his prison cell on Robben Island, and was the mantra by which he survived:

It matters not how strait the gate,

How charged with punishment the scroll,

I am the master of my fate:

I am the captain of my soul.

Given the 2010 World Cup, and a similar scenario of only a particular section of the South African population enjoying soccer,  ‘Invictus’ may hold clues as to how President Zuma and FIFA will get all South Africans behind the spirit of the world’s biggest soccer event.

Chris von Ulmenstein, Whale Cottage Portfolio: www.whalecottage.com