The Afrikaans is “Suid-Afrika” but the Dutch is indeed “Zuid-Afrika”. The ZA abbreviation was first adopted for South Africa in the 1930s as the car registration code (for those oval stickers you see on the back of cars). At that time “SA” was used not by Saudi Arabia, but by the autonomous Saarland Protectorate. The transition from Dutch to Afrikaans was still underway in South Africa, so using the Dutch abbreviation was not unreasonable.
On which note: misconceptions about South Africa. Yes, there are white South Africans. On the other hand, the country is not majority white. Remarkably, I have heard both of those ideas from foreigners. Similarly, while we don’t all live in shacks or mud huts, there are still a lot of South Africans who do. I guess there are two opposite ideas which are both misconceptions: either “stereotypical Africa”, or “outpost of Europe in Africa”.
Yes, the Cayman Islands is a sunny tropical destination with sunny beaches, warm breezes, and tons of banking. Visitors want to soak up the sun, sip cheap rum concoctions, walk along the beach, and perhaps hide away money from the tax man.
But rum (or any other booze) is decidedly not cheap, much to the surprise of visitors. It is heavily taxed here by a stiff import duty and on-island production is highly limited.
That bit of land you see in the distance? That is the other end of the island, not Cuba. You are looking across the North Sound which is only 7 miles wide.
Speaking of 7 miles… world famous 7 Mile Beach is actually 5.5 miles long. Still makes for a nice long stroll along a white sand beach.
Finally, no, people are not shuffling off the planes with suitcases full of money to hide in the banks. Cayman has stringent compliance standards for financial institutions and does report account holdings to the relevant tax authorities in other countries. John Grisham’s The Firm was a work of fiction! :smack:
I’m surprised that people wouldn’t know this. The fight over apartheid should have made this clear. Even if people weren’t alive at the time, I’d think news coverage of Nelson Mandela’s death just a couple of years ago would have clued them in.