Have a little faith please !

One of my biggest gripes since living in this country, has been that South Africans are not proud enough of the country they live in. It is often those that have not been fortunate enough to travel overseas that just assume that the grass is greener there! Sure there are serious problems here, like extensive Crime and Poverty to name just a couple - but there is also a lot right with the country too. Now if Sepp Blatter can see that, why can't everyone else?

Every where I go, whether it be the traffic department (don't ask!!)a braai with friends, in a queue at the bank ... I meet people who have already made up their mind that 2010 FIFA world cup is going to be a shambles. One almost gets the feeling some times that they would be upset if if isn't! Well listen up all you pessimists, I have some bad news for you ...

At the weekend, we saw a great example that all is on track .... After five long years of renovations and extensions, as well as roadwork and carpark-related frustrations, Cape Town International Airport's new Terminal 2010 has been hailed as a truly international airport.

Yesterday was the first day of operations for the brand-new Terminal 2010, and passengers and staff said everything had gone smoothly. The multi-billion-rand Central Terminal Building has 120 check-in counters, 20 self-service check-in machines, eight air bridges, 11 bus gates and an automated baggage-sorting system.

This Terminal has been compared to that of the infamous Terminal five at London Heathrow. You only have to google the words "Terminal 5 chaos" to truly find the definition of the word 'shambles' ..... but again, the complainers I refer to may be totally oblivious to this, perhaps not having had access to international news at the time? What ever the reason, we owe it to ourselves and to the success of 2010 and beyond to politely correct these kind of people and point out the bigger picture to them. It would have taken another 25 years to get this wonderful new airport - the fact that it works without a hitch on the first day is the icing on the cake!