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HELEN ZILLE - MAYOR OF CAPE TOWN
FIRST HIV-POSITIVE ORGAN TRANSPLANT
BRIGITTE RADEBE
PRESIDENT-ELECT BARACK
OBAMA
|
We are
pleased to present you with a limited edition calendar
for 2009, featuring photography by Michael Jackson –
President of African Classic Encounters. (if you have
not requested
your copy - click here - stocks are
limited)
2008 IS OVER! AND NOT A DAY TOO SOON!
Bombarded with political anecdotes, declining economy,
an exciting presidential campaign is a year not easily
forgotten!
WE HAVE MOVED!
After 15 years of AFRICAN CLASSIC ENCOUNTERS's office at
50 East 42nd Street, we
made the big move to .........
60 East 42nd Street - the lovely Lincoln Building.
Although change, NOTHING has changed. The
telephone numbers and email addresses remains the same.
Consultations for travel to Africa are welcomed by
appointment and we look forward to seeing you at our new
abode. Please update your records with our
address listed below.
********************************************************************
AFRICAN CLASSIC ENCOUNTERS
have been nominated the best tour specialist for Africa.
Please vote for us at
www.worldtravelawards.com
On the home front in South Africa,
South Africans have been making
their mark internationally in 2008.
-
The mayor of Cape Town Helen
Zille won the
World Mayor Award
-
Jacob Zuma and Oscar Pistorius
were named among Time Magazine's
Most Influential People
for 2008
-
Paralympic star Natalie du
Toit made history by becoming the
first amputee to qualify for the Olympic Games
-
Marlene Dumas became the
world's most expensive female artist
- South African born
artist Marlene Dumas set a new record this month for
the most expensive living female artist, when her
painting The Visitor, fetched £3.1 million (R47
million) at a Sotheby's auction.
-
Tech entrepreneur Elon Musk
launched the first
privately developed rocket to orbit the Earth.
-
Alex
Harris and Sibusiso Vilane made history when they
became the
first team to walk unsupported and unassisted to the
South Pole
-
South African surgeons carried
out the
world's first organ transplants from one
HIV-positive person to another
-
Lewis Gordon Pugh completed
the
first long distance swim in the North Pole,
in order to draw attention to the effects of climate
change.
-
Mining entrepreneur Bridgette
Radebe won the international
Business Person of the Year
Award,
-
Architect Kevin Fellingham won
the
House of the Year award
-
Telecommunications innovator
Rael Lissoos was named
Social Entrepreneur of the Year.
-
It was
a big year for science and technology, with the
unveiling of Africa's
first all-electric vehicle
-
A locally-produced Aids
vaccine
made medical history,
becoming the first African vaccine to undergo human
clinical trials in the United States.
-
In a real David and Goliath
story,
Mark Shuttleworth's Ubuntu computer operating system
beat Windows Vista and Mac OS X at an international
hacking contest.
-
South Africans have excelled
in the arts.
Flat Stanley,
Goldfish,
BLK JKS and
Just Jinger signed
international record deals in 2008, a South African
theatre production - The Magic Flute / Impempe
Yomlingo - won the award for the 2008
Best Musical Revival at
the prestigious Laurence Olivier Awards and Brent
Stirton won a first prize in the 2007
World Press Photo Contest.
-
In
education, the University of Cape Town was named as
one of the
Top 200 Universities in
the world for the first time, an
African Leadership Academy
was opened in Johannesburg and
four South African business schools
were voted among the world's best.
-
A report released in October
said that South African
schools are making notable strides in fostering
racial harmony among their
students.
Despite a disappointing performance at the Olympics,
South Africans have excelled on the sports fields.
IN TOURISM:
IN OTHER NEWS:
***********************************************
What else was there?
In what has been labeled America's Mandela Moment,
Barack Obama took to the stage on election night to
address America as their 44th elected President, the
first African-American to ever do so.
The build up to this landmark occasion was also
historic, in that the contest between Obama and
Republican hopeful John McCain captured the imagination
of a jaded public and attracted a record 130 million
American voters to the polls.
Obama's politics of change has had a wide reaching
effect. His praises are being sung as far as Asia, and
already a score of Kenyan newborns are carrying his
name. Obama's victory has inspired national pride
and belief in a better future and across the world it
has signaled the dawn of a new era in foreign relations
with the USA.
Obama's global popularity reflects the emotional,
sweeping power of the politics of change, a politics not
new to South Africa, being the custodians of the
original Mandela moment.
It is the politics of stirring words and moving
speeches, leaders that inspire, of hope and change, of
patriotism and of a vibrant, living democracy.
It is the politics borne from the people's frustrations,
the politics through which a nation can evoke a new
vision of themselves and their future, the politics
that creates the opportunity for nations to move closer
towards the goal of a better, more just world.
But today we can
say that history and old loyalties are being challenged,
new voices are offering alternative leadership, there is
a bigger and more vociferous opposition, the voting
public is taking an interest in politics and questioning
existing structures such as our electoral system and
others. There is a new energy in politics.
As Obama has shown, the politics of change is immensely
powerful and intoxicating. Whether Obama or South
Africa's new political party are able to deliver on the
promise of change is another matter entirely and will
only be revealed in due time.
The front-on gales and strong
winds will come. For now, let 's enjoy the fair wind of
hope that is blowing on our backs.
It’s been quite a year!
60 East 42nd Street Suite
449 New
York NY 10165 Tel# 212 972 0031 |
