After reading all of the gang rapes and murders I am in tears!! I too, have a story to tell. Neil, my oldest and he would say, favourite was killed while having supper at the Ball and Bucket on the 10th of september 2003, yesterday, to me. The "ball and bucket" is a driving range in honeydew, Roodepoort. Neil had just moved over the road in one of the townhouse complexes from Pretoria. While he was there he did enjoy it so. I know how the other people who have written out sentences that are so hard to form are feeling, and it brings it all back to me. Neil lay on the floor, just as the armed robbers told him to do, but one of them tripped over his friend's feet and in anger he shot - that bullet fired hit Neil in the arm, severed his jugular and went through both lungs. Not at all as it's supposed to be if you go by hollywood standards. Well Neil, 25, and my friend, died. My husband and I were in Botswana when Jason (Neil's friend) phoned to tell me he was shot. At that time he wasn't dead, but my cellphone was. How I managed to charge it with their strange plugs is quite a feat. It took about 7 phone calls to tell me that he had died. My daughter was in jhb and my son at a friend's house. It took 12 hours to get home as they wouldn't open the border for us. We went to lay flowers there after six months and the blood stains were still there. Inspector Pretorius, a good man who is overworked and underpaid is doing the best he can still. But this is South Africa, miracles don't happen here. I am at a loss. Yes, I want the criminals caught obviously, but it won't change the life we are all living now without Neil. As they say, God Bless Africa!! and the poor morons who choose to live here.

17th. May 2005 update from Esper My maid's nephew was found after being missing for three weeks in a dam somewhere. The funeral is tomorrow (not the usual week later)as they can’t have the body at home as is their tribal tradition, before the funeral. This is the third family member she has lost through crime since I have been here and we only arrived here in August last year. They are resigned to living with the crime, though. As she said, it's not only the "HIV" they have to worry about.