miscellaneous rambling

“ I can’t imagine what you’re gonna bring back from South Africa Jason.”; my cousin said to me before I left on my vacation. To be honest, I hadn’t thought of buying any South African art at all. I imagined a land of ethnic curios and crafts, which although interesting, not really my style.

Then right after that conversation, my friend in Johannesburg emails with a list of art galleries in the city, which she plans to take me to. So I figured, “why not?” It’s good to view local art and see what it’s all about.

That began a long search that I didn’t anticipate. After the first gallery, I was hooked. So was Dallas. We hit gallery after gallery and curio shop after curio shop. Plus a few antique shops. We found some great works by painters, sculptures, and photographers showing themes that expressed SA ( South Africa’s) past, and future. In fact, going to the galleries was an eye opener to the harsh past that SA has had to endure. Still, we didn’t plan to buy, just look..

The second week of our travels brought us to Cape Town, and we spent a full day sightseeing and shopping. Dallas decided that she did want to buy an object d’art as a souvenir of our (awesome) trip. So we went to the same gallery as we did in Johannesburg, but of course the Cape Town location. They had the best stuff we’d seen so far on our search.

However, they didn’t have what we wanted, so we got them to ship the sculpture that we were interested in from Johannesburg to Cape Town . It would only “take a day or two” they told us. Then, we could view it again, and decide if we were really going to take the plunge and buy this piece. ( we also bought inexpensive stuff like wooden giraffe sculptures, from craft markets too. ~ our tastes are varied to be sure )

Day after day goes by and the gallery hasn’t received the piece yet. Apparently it has been shipped, but no one knows where it is.

Later, it’s found out that the piece has been shipped, but the Fedex carrier has screwed up somewhere, and it’s lost in Africa.

Then, on Friday morning, the gallery calls me while I’m en route to the airport. The piece has made it in, and they can rush it over to the airport with a credit card form that I can use to pay. Actually, the piece hasn’t arrived in the gallery yet, but they assure me that they will be able to make it to the airport in time.

Since we didn’t want to risk any last minute check-in problems at the airport, we first checked in our luggage, and got our tax refund on the existing things we had bought.

We waited to see if this deal was really going to come through.

Shortly afterwards, the delivery man shows up. The piece is boxed up, and time is running out before we have to go through customs, so we decide to just sign for it, and then go.

I couldn’t believe this was happening. Last minute art dealings in a foreign country, couriers rushing to meet me, it was all exciting!

Then, after a long 22 hours of travel home, we open up the box in our living room, and find that it was broken in HALF. The delicate neck portion of the figure was clearly not packed and supported well enough, and it didn’t survive the journey.

I used Skype to call the gallery in SA immediately. They didn’t balk at the damage and said that they would not charge my credit card. Given the rush from beginning to end, they know they can’t completely say that it was not their fault or the couriers.

I tried to make a claim from Singapore air, but they said that as China Air was the final carrier on our trip, they would not cover damages. Then China air was on holiday for Chinese new year, and then we had to wait a week for them to come back to work.

In the end, through a series of phone calls with the airline, they would only reimburse me $100 USD for the piece.. but then, since the gallery didn’t charge me, I guess I made a $100 bucks for our stress…

Dallas was very upset, since she was the prime instigator in the decision for the statue. I got some quick drying cement, and glued it back together. It’s not perfect, but it’s still nice to look at..

If you’re wondering what it is, the title of the piece is : Pregnant Woman~ I miss you so much.

# posted by jason @ 6:33 AM