African Tour:Pretoria

Pretoria is right next to Johannesburg, so there were no flights or sitting around airports all day. The charter bus took less than an hour. We only did two shows, so there was no hotel. We left our Johannesburg hotel in the morning, drove to Pretoria, had a quick rehearsal, did the first show, took a break, did the second show, and took the bus back to the hotel.

State Theatre
Our very temporary home base in Pretoria was the State Theatre, billed as the largest theater in Africa. It did not seem all that big to us, but we quickly found more than a few places that claimed to be the largest of their kind on the entire continent. My impression was that it is similar to every Ray's in New York that claims to be the original. The theater had a decent stage and sound system, and more importantly, ample restrooms backstage, so it worked for us.

Union Building
With limited time between shows, we never strayed far from the central business district. We did some eating, too much shopping, and went to the Union Building Gardens, a hillside park outside the president's house. You cannot actually go inside the Union Buildings because it is the president's house. The park is nice, and since it sits on one of the tallest hills in the city, there was a nice breeze rolling downhill. That is always a good thing between shows.

Photograph by Clayton Majona
We saw why Pretoria is known as the Jacaranda City. Several streets were lined with Jacaranda trees in full bloom. We also saw why some of the locals see them as a nuisance. When thousands of people walk over the fallen flowers, they create a sticky stain that must be a pain in the ass to clean.