Kurma

The house that is my 'home away from home' for the next ten days is warm and snug, despite the near-freezing overnight temperatures outside. I'm settling in well, and rested better than I have done for the last few weeks. Travelling can be SO tiring and disorienting, so a good night's rest is quite important.

This building is roofed with a South African grass called Cape Thatch. Apparently during the hot summer the breathing quality of this material can maintain a daytime temperature many degrees lower that non-breathing products. Wetting the roof yields an even more effective 'evaporative cool' effect.

In these cold winter nights African Thatch has greater insulation properties, keeping the warm air inside. It looks attractive, it's environmentally friendly and it's harvested from a renewable resource.

Here is a view from inside the kitchen, with Gladys the maid preparing breakfast as the winter sun blazes through the windows. The high ceilings give a fresh, airy spaciousness.

Discuss Comment [0] Trackback [0] Thatched & Dispatched

I'm here in Johannesburg. One very nice family, Krishna Dasa Naidoo and his wife Sharma and three kids have made me their house guest for the next ten days in the suburb of Glen Austen, Midrand. It's a beautiful, traditional African house with high thatched roof. Tomorrow I'll take some pictures.

There is no dial-up facility for internet where I'm staying, and I was wondering how I was going to do my daily email and blogging. But thanks to this little doo-daddy (pictured below) complements of my host, all is well.

It's one of the coldest days so far this winter in Johannesburg. It even snowed yesterday in some places! As soon as I got off the plane and started walking down the ramp, the cold hit me - I was very surprised to see frosty plumes issue from my mouth as I breathed. It's a bit of a shock to my system after heatwave Europe and warm and pleasant Durban. I'm rugged up in my room as I write this coddled in woollen wrapper and blankets with heater blasting. It's about four degrees outside.

Anyway, enough weather talk. Today is day one of a three-day cooking extravaganza for 50 students at The International Hotel School, Sandton Campus.

We're still chasing up some missing ingredients, so I better get on the phone and do some fine-tuning. Speak with you soon.

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