#GCSLIVE| FLYOVERS, PAYWALLS & TUPAC| GARETH FROM MALTA AND BEN FROM HIS COUCH

0:00Yes, yes, yes. Yes, yes. Yes. Yes. All right, good morning, everybody. Is there something going on in the background there been that we need to know about? You looked around as if there was a ghost or something in the room. Well, the intro music is still playing. Yeah, that was James. James sometimes presses the wrong bath medication in the right one sometimes as well. All right, good morning, everybody. I mean, it's almost like, did you give James a compliment this morning? I know. That's the problem. I told them he'd done well this week. And then, you know, there's brain fucking short circuits. And suddenly we're back to square one. I'm like, you're telling me. What did the killer, the Emperor of Rome say? He said, let them hate so long as they fear. I don't think James should ever be sort of associated with the Roman Empire. Listen, if the Roman Empire doesn't come up once a day for me,

1:02I know I haven't been fully conscious. Every single day there's some reason to think about Rome. Just not James. No, definitely not. All right, good morning to everybody in the comment section, which is alive and well. During this point, I thought you'd be greeting us in multis. What happens to your visa decline? Oh my god, did I tell you this story, Ben? This is so stupid. It's very quick. I want to bore you with the details. Now, I went to the Italian consulate to go apply for a visa for this trip. And I went through the process, filled in all the forms. You know, it's quite laborious. You pay your money up. Anyway, they take away your passport, send it in. About two and a half weeks later, very efficient. I get it back, but there's no visa in it. So I thought, oh, fuck. You know, what's going on here? I'm now in big trouble. There were like three or four days before I was due to leave. And there was nowhere we'd be able to get a visa in that amount of time. And I'm looking through my passport.

2:03You know, when you kind of go page by page and you check that you haven't missed a page, and you really, you feel free. You're concerned, you're nervous. And I sent an email to these people. I'm like, what did I do wrong? Is there a problem? Did you forget to include the visa? All kinds of things are going through my head. And then I stupidly realized that when Zif Hunch gave me the last visa, it was a five year one and it only expires next year. So I didn't need another one. But because there was no explanation given in there, I thought immediately I thought I'd done something wrong. So it just shows you. You've got to actually read the fine print. Well, yeah, I mean, I thought that was going to be a catastrophic story. It really wasn't, huh? No, there you are. Over now, you're going to hold your place. I mean, you even looked like you've been spending three days with Julio Iglesias. You look bronze. Let me tell you. I got some beautiful Mediterranean sun. I've been telling everybody who is prepared to listen

3:05that I'm doing a dress rehearsal for a South African summer. And I do find that this climate agrees with me. Now, for people who don't know where Malta is. And there are lots of South Africans here. I bumped into someone on the street in Beleta yesterday. Who knew me? And who listens to the show? So we really do have people all over the world who listen to this show. This place is just phenomenal. I mean, it is hot when we'll talk about this a little later. I've got some of the people that I'm here with joining me on the show for the last hour. But what a wonderful place. I mean, Malta is really, unless you are here for tax reasons, which is probably the reason most South Africans know about Malta. But this amazing tax regime, which South Africa could learn from, they have 1% unemployment, 1% unemployment. They have 15% overall tax no matter what.

4:05And you don't pay rates in taxes. So once you buy your house, you own your house. The government has no more claim on it. And it is in the middle of the Mediterranean. It's about 90 odd kilometers south of Sicily. And about 300 kilometers north of Tunisia. And it's just beautiful, very dry. They only get, they've had thunder showers in the last couple of years. But those don't turn into a full, you know how we have rain. Or they haven't had rain here for 15 years. Wow. But how did this survive? Because it's not like they can just steal from the suit, like we do. Yeah, and they don't have rivers. There are no rivers and there are no dams and lakes. So they have to have to have a pool of water or desalinate the sea water. Right. Population probably around, I think, is 500,000 at this point.

5:08And it's three islands that they're six altogether, but three of them are tiny, tiny, tiny little islands. But it's an independent place. It was the British owned, well, in the very beginning, the Phoenicians owned it. There are human settlements here that are older than the pyramids. The Romans, again, they come up all the time. The Ottomans, the knights, well, the Ottomans never actually owned Malta because the knights of St. John put on a famous siege in the 1560s, which I think Mel Gibson is making a movie about. So you know that's going to be epic. And I believe, because Yonder says here, Bulello lives here now. And I don't know. I don't know. I didn't see. I mean, there are black people here. I would have seen Bulello, you know? Well, it's the black guy that's running that that's some Bulello. Yeah. People, Ben, you're going to love this. The people here are fit and healthy.

6:10There are no obese people. The women are beautiful. They all have a magical tan. It's just wonderful. I've had, it feels like I've been here for a week and a half, but it's only been four nights. And I'm heading back today. It sounds amazing, man. There's always great hearing travel stories because just what you think that you used to travel, just what you think is like, ah, how do I read these other places? Then another place gets you and it's like, wow, this is great. Yeah, no it is. It's very, very good. But let's say we've got so much to talk about because the obvious story that everybody seems, not just South Africans, but internationally seem obsessed with it at the moment, is this the flyover that was done by AirLink at the rugby game, the greatest rivalry us in New Zealand in Cape Town. And it just seems people have lost their fucking minds about this thing. It's a real reflection on people here. We saw it with COVID, everybody wants to be the point

7:10to figure like, oh, that person's doing something wrong. There must be punished. Look at me, I'm so good. It should be a word for it. Safetyism. Safetyism. Yeah, it's safetyism. People now think this is like a social currency. It's absolute nonsense and just proves that you're a loser. Because I think the greatest rivalries had the greatest flyover. And sure, I mean, if you lost someone during 9-11, there might be some PTSD, but also then, like, this is our rugby, guys. This is what it is. It's a bit of a leap to go, oh, so excellent, where it happened. When you're very good at something, like very good, like those A-Link pilots are very good. They're so as they're playing, it's a very well-run shiptist to put it into like, absolutely. In fact, even if you get the other airlines to be honest, they will tell you that A-Link has the best pilots and they train them better than anyone else. So when you, when you're that good, right, you can do amazing things, not OK things, not tick box things, amazing things.

8:11Like, this is guy, the guy from the UFC who won the main fights at the UFC White House, right? He had been an absolute war with the guy. As he finishes, he gets on top of the cage and does a backflip, a backflip and lands on his feet. He could blow a knee out, he could land where his head, whatever it is, he might be concast while doing it, but he's very good at it. So therefore, he has the right to do something so spectacular. And not ever else the right to say, ah, you should have taken the risk, be careful. Shut up. Well, now because of all those fucking moaning, safetyism, arseholes, these people who have spent their life trying to cotton wool, everything that they love and care for in their lives. I'm sorry. These are kind of people, if their parents, they never let their children do anything fun or dangerous at all because they're so scared something terrible could happen. These people live in constant fear. And they have ruined it now because they will not be a fly

9:11over at FNB Stadium this coming weekend. These people, these people, they ruin everything. I just want to say to anyone who was going, ah, that's so dangerous, it's so terrible. And who got themselves into a froth over something that they had nothing to do with. You were maybe you were not even in Cape Town, little one in the stadium. You were not in the plane. There was no danger. Those are the kind of people who have reported air link to the Civil Aviation Authority and now this FNB flyover is canceled. These people will take away the fun out of everything. Everything that humans want to do, they will stop all that fun. No, that's not. And they just don't know what being excellent to anything is. Yes, that flyover was unnecessary low if you want to put a plane over at stadium, but you want to feel here, right? You want to have feeling. You want to have emotion. And every single person I knew there was in that stadium, it was like what are the greatest sporting live moments because those planes got so low.

10:12So yes, there was a risk involved, but not with those guys when you're that good. So this weekend would have been amazing, but two things. Because of all the sort of fanfare around this, is an investigation into the stuff. I mean, air link gave the black box and everything and the little wild plan. But there's also a bit of a, there's also a bit of inclement weather around. So they've actually, they've said, look, we're not doing it this weekend because there is a chance of poor weather that would basically hamper the kind of flyover they want to do. So between those two things, they're not doing it. And well, I think also just, you know, for all those people who are in marketing and they're a dime a dozen in South Africa, you guys spend your entire lives trying to get a moment of virality and a moment of newsworthiness. And air link have done that this week. I think they've won on every front. So even if they, they, you know, some people think that they've won because they've managed to make it less dangerous.

11:14I've got to remind you that this is probably a marketing kuda grá, which other marketers wish, hope and pray and every day just desperately wish that they could have themselves well done, air link. And the moral of the story is here. Fortune favors to brave. If you've got balls, you make profits. People only care about you. If you significantly risk taking, it's always goes back to is that, you know, there's a couple of things here. Like, you know, Alex is going to save money tomorrow. They don't have to fly over those things. Okay, I'm not saying that was also a ploy, but there's people who are still going to be talking about the whole time. It's like, oh, no, there's no planes, not the same. But they're not even the official sponsor of the spring box, right? They're sponsors for this series. So fly, fly, fly, fly, fly, is the airline of the box. So what these, what these are trying to do, and I feel, I don't know if I should feel sorry for them or just dislike them, but every Saturday, they're posting pictures of when they fly over stadiums. And it was like, yeah, it's not your time for sort of the ring.

12:14Yeah, the, the, the planes here. And then the elite thing would have been here. Yeah, yeah, it's, it's, it's really funny. But I mean, yeah, moral of the story is guys, take risks, be exceptional at something. That's all that people really care about. And the people who mount about you are losers who are never going to buy your product. 99% of people who are money by a link, kind of forward a link. So yeah, correct. Yeah, exactly. All right, so there was that to talk about, but the greatest rivalry again, I've spent a little bit of time with, with serious sports fans in the last few days. And this is what people are interested in. I don't know a whole lot about it. You don't, you're not surprised by that at all. But tell me what I need to know so that I can have some interesting conversations in the next 24 hours. Yeah, I think I'm, I touched on it a couple of weeks ago, although I always forget when I'm actually on the show. It's, you know, it's so hard to quantify a greatest rivalry. You know, if you look at English Premier League, you know, you could argue that Man United Arsenal, stuck up there, Man United Man City because localized, or the greatest though,

13:15and then Liverpool striker claim as well. So over the years, there's always going to be people who want to claim something. You know, if you look at football, you know, there's a classical, the Real Madrid Barcelona, but the greatest rivalry in the sport is quantified here as in, I don't care who, how much of a one-eyed support you are of your own nation, New Zealand, South Africa is the final of finals, it's the thing. And this test series has been there, too. I mean, the All Blacks have played so incredibly well. Like, they all knew the box were going to be the big Ford pack, dominate physically, and then the All Blacks have run it around a bit. And the dynamics have been so good because the All Blacks have been the first team, basically, to nullify the Bum Squad. Now, the Bum Squad is what this Buc team has been renowned for, you know, it's what's given us an extra edge of everybody. But somehow, these guys are beating us in the last 20 minutes. They physically beating us in the last 20 minutes, which meant that the hammered us in the first test and they came very close in the second. So all the rivalries and all the rivalry talk, it's really, really ramped up to be something

14:15that's quite spectacular. As in, the Bucs were huge favorites. The All Blacks are one-one going into the third test. And many say they've got the edge because on the harder, faster playing fields of the high-felt, the way that they can score tries out of nowhere really comes back and gives them that edge. So, yeah, it's a weird one because the third test is here. So whoever wins this test can't lose the series. And then the fourth game is next weekend in Baltimore. So then whoever is one back has the opportunity to draw the series. So, yeah, it's weird. I mean, I look at this as a three-tier series and then the fourth test is purely so russier and then can make money so they can just keep having big squads. A friend of mine just actually moved to America. Clint, he's a long-time listener. And the tickets are like $1,300 to watch the box next week. It's available. Wow. It's literally 15 times more to buy a ticket to watch the box. I mean, if you're moaning about particular prices here,

15:17he feels, that's crazy. I think it's been a major success. And again, it's bold, right? Right, B's got out and said, look, these are the two best teams. Every four years, we are now doing this. And the rest of the rugby world can stop and stare at narration because these teams have earned it. And this series has proved it. They really have. Another warm-up games were ornamental at best. But these test matches have been the real deal. People are losing their shit about going to these games. And it's fun. I was at a spark game. Last week's game was incredible. This weekend's game is going to be again, amazing in soccer city. You know, 90,000 people, their ability to sell this out, and it's just been very, very good. I think it really has been. There's been niggle between the coaches. The games have been interesting. It's not predictable. And at the bottom of all of this, if you take away the shit that you normally see on X, the respect for the nations is there, which just goes to prove it is the greatest rivalry it really is. Amazing. Amazing. And everybody from age five to age 100

16:22is in South Africa's involvement. And this, which again shows the power of that particular sport and bringing everyone together. I do see another sport, though, that's made the news that's not so great. I see one of our South African swimming treasures has not been given a prize money by those absolute turds who run an administer swimming and Olympic sport in South Africa, Sascoch. It's totally right that they have cock in their name because they are all cocks and clearly don't know what they're doing. Did you hear about this? Well, yeah, I mean, it really bugs me because I worked in the space for quite a while. And we were actually evolved to a degree with the swimmers. Yeah. You know, it's so frustrating that how these things work is that these administrators believe that they run the sport as and without them to be useless. They're there as a professional courtesy so every country has administration purposes. But they don't need to manage these swimmers.

17:24These swimmers are managed. They have everything that they do. These guys might attract some sponsorship they could help during Olympics, they can't stop. But ultimately it's down to the swimmers. So the thing that I find really retarded around this whole thing, Tatiana Skumako, Tatiana Smith now, our greatest female swimmer, our greatest swimmer. I mean, decorated, proper Olympian champion, right? Worldwide icon of the sport. Dedicated life to be incredible. She doesn't get paid the prize money at like the World Champs or the Olympics River. The swimming organization does. Now, why that in the first place as necessary is beyond me. I think that's just stupid. And then what these deck bags do is that then they hold onto the money because it's a fair amount of money that they get made, that gets burned here. And then what they do is they basically just pocket the interest and then they believe that they're managing the funds. One year, one year is what the hell onto the money for. And then after being big to pay money that's not theirs, they then don't pay the interest.

18:26They hold onto it. And then they think that, oh, no, no, this is just a management fee. We're just taking this. It's not in the contracts. It's not in anything. It just, Garitha, it'll forever bother me and make me want to use short and aggressive words. It's just like these people are such prex. They're just low-lying, nothing, among the things at that. We talked about this the other day. I mentioned the David Friedberg quote about makers and takers and it got you and I into a whole conversation, remember. And again, these guys clearly are the sports administrators in South Africa. I'm sure there are some good ones in the sports that are being administered well because there is, it's a business, like anything else. You need good business administration. You need good corporate governance for doucheyery duty. You need people who look after the money and do appropriate things with it. But these guys are obviously just parasites. And you know, it's amazing to me that our swimmers

19:27are consistently since 1994 and South Africa's new dawn and things that have happened in all those 30 something years. The swimmers have brought back the gold and the silver and the bronze and they are the only ones who we can reliably say are going to make South Africa proud at the Olympics and yet we seem to treat them like shit. I mean, Roland Schumann has had to go to America and he had to long ago, you know, in the era of rake in Roland and those guys, they were just, they were doing South Africa so much good in terms of PR. And I just feel that it all falls apart the minute it gets to the politicians and the parasites who are meant to add value instead of taking it away. If we just had a couple of diligent tunnies who get together and make sure everyone has like you, make sure your visas there, make sure that, you know, the latest track suits have the kit sponsor

20:30because you get like general kit sponsors and then you get, there's nothing about the story. You get general kit sponsors but then in technical sports you have your own sort of technical outerwear. So it's a very technical sport. Now, if you just had a couple of tunnies you basically get together, you know, there's tunnies in this country who are running engineering firms from the back end who are putting together like the payroll for tow truck businesses or whatever. We need more tunnies running stuff in this country. They just want to wake up in the morning, they just want to have their rick-offie and a couple of rusks and then they just get to work. And a cigarette. And a cigarette 11 and they're just like a, they'll talk about the cockabouts, you know, there's other check, he's doiling is a bit fucking messed up or whatever. But that's what you need. You, a administrator in this country is a tunny. You don't need any flamboyance, you don't need anything else. None of these dick bags have anything other than parasitic attributes. Tunnies. Well, as if to prove the point.

21:31So we were talking about the flyover at Cape Town Stadium and it turned out this week, I don't know if you saw in the news, but Cyril's plane, which is called Inquazi, took off and had to return to base because something was fucked up. And, you know, isn't that just typical? That because, you know, government will always find a way to do everything worse and at greater expense and end up being twice as embarrassing. And this just proves that this is our president's plane while we're busy worrying about Erling who actually maintain and run a fleet of aircraft. We cannot keep up presidents one fucking plane in the sky without some issue happening in the same week. Administrative Tunnies, if we just, I mean, like we, they can start their own union because they're never gonna go on strike, but we can get a union of them just so that they all have to get the same shirts or they all get the same, you know, Christmas party, whatever. We unionize administrative Tunnies,

22:32this country will be so much worse. I mean, we'll do the most, yeah. Most effective country in the world. And I'm sorry, Lacks, Indians, Khalids, whoever else, but I'm sorry, but, Afrikaans, Tunnies are going to be the superior administrative race if we honest with ourselves. Yeah, I mean, they can do anything. Large, small, rich poor, they can manage anything. And I do think Tunnies play an important role in this country. I do agree with you. The thing about Tunnies is they're not greedy, they're not materialistic. Very little ego. That's why you need to have them in charge. Yeah, I totally, I will follow my sword that I don't think a Tunnies gonna look at the books one day and go sheepers. I'm siphoning four million randia because I wanna go to Dubai or I wanna get a benten in Paris for the weekend. No, no, it's not a Tunny move. Well, I did something which I think

23:34you'd be quite interested in. It was on Tuesday or Wednesday. I mean, the days are a bit of a blur because everything's happened so quickly. But I went for a swim in the Mediterranean, which I mean, you know, the color of that water is just spectacular. I posted a picture last night on my Instagram because I just, I felt, it's almost magical when you see those blues in the water here. It feels like it's otherworldly. It really is. It's a dreamy atmosphere. And it's, it's a lot saltier than, you know, the Indian ocean off of like KZN or the Atlantic. It's really fucking salty. So you get in there and you just feel totally refreshed. I think that there's some magic in these waters because it seems to give me huge amount of energy. So I'm as excited as I am, you know, my favorite part of any trip is coming home. But this has been short and extremely sweet. The very interesting week we even had a spring day

24:36did you hear about that season, limited edition. So what happened at spring day? Did I miss something? No idea. No idea. I mean, it's a, it's a worth in the comment section. Do people think we just gotta stop and go back and forth? If you got something to say, write it in one comment and then it's easier and then we can carry on. Oh, there's like this dullness. I mean, come on, limited edition, limited IQ. Tracey, Tracey and Tracey has something to say, which has, which relates to what we were talking about with sports administrators. This is probably the best comment of the morning. So far, speaking from experience, I was involved with the Netball Association. I handled the marketing, but the tunnies, holy shit, they can organize, manage, and admin the crap out of anything. They're the best. You see, you're on to it. Yeah. So what the show does, go with what the show does. Yeah. Someone died from Spring Day hooliganness. Wow. OK, well, I didn't know about that. But Spring Day has always been a bit of a disappointment

25:38as far as I can remember from school, even. We used to, we used to wear like civis at school in Spring Day. I don't know if that was a thing for anyone else's school. And it used to, in fact, it used to be aber day at some point before that. Yeah. Where you would plant a tree. And South Africa never used to be as green as it is now. Whole climates, whole areas have changed their climate because of reforestation and because of the planting of trees. And north of Johannesburg is technically a tropical rain forest. And that was a arbor day that I remember from a long time ago. And then we started Spring Day. It was always meant to be the first day of Spring and everything was going to suddenly be warm like that. And it never fucking was. It was always cold, at least until the middle of September. Well, no, it's been warm this whole week. I mean, so my, my, I live across the road from this hotel.

26:42It's got a lovely tree entrance, right? Yeah. And like the full canopy's out there. We had the most mild, most mild winter. And I've had golf yesterday. It was glorious. No, the weather's been phenomenal. I know like in Cape Town, there only gets spring and month late. And I think we make this as an annual sort of joke because that's obviously there always behind. But nice, spring, September 1st, go time here, huh? I like that. I'm currently just in a shirt. I'm even wearing pants this warm. Well, the whole of the previous week, or two even in August, was surprisingly very, very cool. I never liked it around my birthday because of the weather more than anything else. It's a shit time of year. But this year it was different. It felt like summer had come early. Well, it has been, yeah, it has been indeed. And now we, we're having some sort of El Nino, or El Nino effect. I always forget which one it is. Yeah, they say we're in for an extremely hot summer. But I'm, I'm okay with that. I don't mind a very hot summer.

27:43I think that could be quite exciting. All right, by the way, I just have to say for everybody who did sign up this week for the daily briefing, we started our subscriptions. We had a couple of technical issues to do with the payments, which was very, very irritating for us as much as it was for you. I think we've sorted out everybody's problems. But if for some reason you have subscribed and you're having issues, please email us. You can email me garrathethclip.com or you can email Janine. I wouldn't really email James unless you absolutely desperate. But you know, J9, just the letter J and a nine, send J9 at garrathethclip.com and then garrathethclip.com will sort out all your problems. It's amazing to me like there's so many of the names because I see everybody who's subscribed, I see every single name. And there's so many of the names who are like regulars and have been part of the show for more than 20 years,

28:46which is fantastic. It feels like, you know, these are the most loyal people who've really helped me to build a career. And it's awesome to see it and to have that kind of closeness of relationship where I actually get their name on my screen, the way that my name has been on their screen for however many years. It's fucking cool. So thank you. If you have subscribed, if you haven't yet, you can go and check it out. The best way to probably do that is on the website on garrathethclip.com and you just got a shop and then you can buy a subscription there. And we're going to be adding a load of really, really cool extra bonus material over the next few weeks. So it's not just the daily briefings, which I'm Monday to Friday and seem to be picking up very, very nicely. People love them and they're getting bigger and they're getting better. I'm still keeping it under 15 minutes, but it's starting to become a much fuller thing. And... No, what about that? Garratheth, it's really great. I listen to all the time. Thanks, man. The thing is, I know you from a very long time.

29:47I know what you care about, all of it, I know what you do. And to solve, yeah, it's just, it's really good. It's just, there's nothing more to say. You know, it hits the notes, the tempo, the info. It's just brilliant. Really is. Yeah, and I just feel like news these days is designed to annoy you and piss you off and make you grumpy. And that is absolutely not what we're going to do. We give you all the info that we're not hunting, coating, or hiding our heads in the sand or pretending something's not happening. There are plenty of reasons to be, you know, worried and concerned. But I think that the news has become almost like a fight-off-like mechanism. In order to survive, they've turned it into clickbaits, but a negative kind of clickbaits. And I just don't want to participate in that anymore. I really don't. So, by the way, we recorded a... I think it's a two-hour-long episode with God-lores, the other day, which I have to say I was a little notes about.

30:48I know. Because it was meant to be 20 minutes? Well, the problem with having God on this show is that there's always other stuff going on and he goes down rabbit holes and off untangence. But I do enjoy talking to God and he's... It's a great guy. He's fucking smart and he has amazingly interesting takes on things. He's got a tremendous sense of humor. And he's a word-smith. He uses too many words, but he's a massive lover of language. And to have him on the show was epic. So, we recorded a two-hour special with God, which will release in the next couple of days as well. So, pay that's not going to be for subscription, that'll be for free on this channel. And you'll be able to see it. Yeah, amazing. It really is. It's the base that you've built over so long. And it's important to have his conversations because of the shit that's out there. That's always been the thing. You have been the one...

31:49The one sort of island where people can actually go to and get value. And if people want to click bait, you know, we can also do that. James can work on that. LAUGHTER All right, a couple of comments. I just want to go to this one quickly. The only weakness in Tani Admin is that if you call her Tani, she will help you with anything. But you need to slip some risks every month. That's fine. Yeah. Totally. I mean, I've taken off for the guy yesterday that likes to slip rest of Tani's in other ways. Oh, right. OK. Well, you see. Dark horse. Judith says, I used to avoid going to school in spring day because children at my school would bring balloons to fill up water and throw it each other. I heard that was happening though in South Africa yesterday and then the government had to issue a warning that we mustn't waste water. I mean, talk about... Yes, that's common sense. Yeah, but really, again, the safety has come on.

32:52No, but I mean, I... No, but... I want to balloons foreign, but when you're opening hydrants and I've seen other clips where... Yeah, I mean... OK, and there's always levels, right? You get people who do things out of fun and you get people who are just retards. Then we've got Dinnika, who says, I hate being called a Tani, but I suppose I am one. Are you guys interested in other sports? Trans-Alpine Run was run in Switzerland this week, trail running. No, I'll take this. Dinnika, look, we've been through this many times. It's fascinating. You love it. The people who run it love it. It's just... It's a very hard sell to make something interesting to the general person who might not care about sports. I know. Yeah. You need to add a gladly the cross-eyed bit. Yeah, that's good from Tracee. She says you need to add a gladly the cross-eyed bit. T-shirt to your merch. Are we going to... Yeah, we're going to start with those. Probably the first one is going to be...

33:54You know, it's the weekend baby or a Pusa Thursday because people still love that shit. But we're definitely going to make why you never give me. That's the opener. That's the shit. I think that's the one that people will... Especially, you know, South Africans who are sick to death of the ANC slogan. They say it's a bit of life for all. But the real ANC slogan we all know is why you never give me. I'll buy that. I'll... That's right away. I'll buy that. Okay, then this... Yondas says I was about to email you yesterday, Gareth, and say, did you steal my money as I couldn't get the pods and then I saw an email with the link and I was caught up in the past two days. Okay, great. Thank God. I don't want to feel like anyone's being ripped off here. We get ripped off enough in South Africa, you know? So let's not find new and creative ways to rip anybody off if we can possibly help it.

34:55Yeah, Yondas, I see you there. Gareth's been working as Tets off for 20 years. One small glitch for 20 seconds and your first thing was, why this guy steal? He's got a... He's got a threatened Thai reputation for your... For your demo. Listen, we've got to talk about all the Gary stuff that you've been doing. Gary player, the gift that keeps on giving 91 years old, national treasure. I watched the video, the two, but of Gary going up the hill with at Bryson de Shambos thing and he fell. And I mean, let me tell you, as you put it in the video, usually when someone at that age falls, it's fucking over. That's the beginning of the end. They go straight to ICU and then you can literally start the ticker and it's done. But Gary, fucking hell, gets up. I mean, a man is like a honey badger. He gets up, crawls up, fucking up the hill,

35:56carries on as if nothing's happened. Yeah, he really is just a force of nature. And it's just a shining light about being better. You should just try harder. Like the guys, he's so funny. And you know, I've said this for a few times. People don't understand how funny he is because he's always in the media and he's always under so much scrutiny and people always want to ask him serious things. But that, oh, he's just such a legend here. He's so fun. He's one of the most fun human beings ever. And I think when you get to that stage where you know how much fun you can have with life, you want to keep it going. And that's why it's so double, double hell bad. I mean, it used to be his brand. He wasn't the biggest guy, but he was definitely like pound-to-pound the strongest. But I think he got to that stage. It's like, I just, I don't want to die. This is actually fun. I want to carry on and look at him go. Yeah. And he's outlived almost everybody who you could have called his most serious competitors over the years, right? Well, they all did or precariously, probably not toiletzing by themselves anymore.

36:59Yeah. All right. Okay. So Melissa brings, sorry Ben, I don't want to move on too quickly from Gary, but I also just have to say, now before we do, you're obviously very good. Sorry, Gary. Yeah, before you do, I mean, there's a lot more Gary coming. You know, we're working on, so if you follow Africa's major on Instagram, you will see as the stuff, as it drops that we're working on. It's really great. It's not like branded content. It's just as shining a light on something interesting right now, which is so. Well, I even learnt that they're redoing the first hole at the Gary Player Golf Club at SunCity, which, you know, everybody's not. It just doesn't happen. Like the scale of upgrades and things, it just doesn't happen, but I'm going to be doing actual videos around this now. I'm going to be, yeah, it's cool. It's like an investment in the future of good here, making big things around the country even bigger, and just making people to look at South Korea and take it seriously, that's another thing.

38:01Well, I'm excited about that, and who knew I would be excited about the Nedbank Golf Challenge again, so I'm very excited to follow you on that front. I'm so excited about this too. So Melissa brings up the, probably the biggest story that's going on in terms of culture in America at the moment, which is this Lindsay Clancy trial. Have you seen any of this? Do you know what this is, Ben? Or should I explain it to you? A mother murdered her daughter. Yes. No, then I've been told. No, this fucking monstrous witch strangled to death three of her children. Three of them. Oh, okay. And the eldest one ran away, and she then chased him down and strangled him to, and now she's claiming she had postpartum psychosis, and that's why she did it, and she shouldn't be held responsible. That's the story. Yeah. And I'm guessing the political left have her back over some stupid reason. This is not one I want to blame

39:02on the political left, funny enough, because it appears it's much more of a feminist solidarity thing than anything else. It's not the left, it's not political. It's worse. It seems to me that there are a group of, and a huge group, it's not there's not some small thing. You know, there are 11, I think the 12 jurors, or 11 jurors, and there are a couple of women on the jury who, it seems, cannot reach a decision on whether this malignant evil wicked witch who should be burnt at the stake is guilty. They can't bring themselves to come to the conclusion that this woman should be held responsible for her actions, and I cannot help feeling that part of the reason that they don't want that is because they themselves, and they admit some of these women, listen, by the way, if you know a woman who is in some way supporting this Lindsey Clancy,

40:04you need to get the hell away from her, as quickly as possible. And if you have children with her, you need to get those children away from that woman, because this is the kind of thing where they want to excuse her behavior, because they think they might do something like that themselves. They're the kind of people who are so self-absorbed that they are in pink. Oh, absolutely. Look at those, they're all attacked by those. Look at those heredons, those, those atrocious looking and sounding and thinking women. Look at them. We really are living in a simulation, huh? Well, the trial, they cannot seemingly come to a decision on, you know, this jury is just incapable of, you would think by now that any sensible jury would have already sent this woman to the electric chair, and have turned the power onto a lower burn

41:04so that she could really suffer. If someone is prepared and, you know, the people are saying, oh, but she's in a wheelchair already, because she jumped off the second floor balcony when she realized what she'd done, that wasn't. That's not her punishment, that's what she did to herself. I hope she has either an enormously long prison sentence, and she needs to get a prison, she mustn't go to a psych ward. This idea that if you're insane, that that is an excuse for bad behavior, if anything, because you're insane, that should be the first reason to put those people in jail. Insane people are not good in society. I don't want them around. I think they should be put in cages, and this woman should be the first one to be done so. You know, this claim of psychosis, and I know that there are women who suffer from postpartum depression and postpartum, rare, unrecasion psychosis. It's a real thing, but that is no excuse for your actions.

42:06That does not remove agency from you. It's crazy. Just show those women again. Let's just look at them again, those supporters. I just want to see them hang on. I know you don't want to see this first thing in the morning then, but just put them back on, James. Just put them back on. You need to see that. Just look at that. But, Garret, you don't think this is the final nail in the coffin in one of the biggest truths of our living times, is that liberal white women are the biggest cancer of this earth. I almost feel like this is their crowning moment. Well, if ever they had an apotheosis in terms of showing what wicked evil darkness lies in the depths of their hearts and souls, this is it. It's supporting a murderous evil which is executed in cold blood. Her own kids after she'd sent her husband

43:08to the fucking shops. There is just nothing in the world that you can do to redeem yourself if you're a supporter of this kind of behavior. Nothing. As far as I'm concerned, you should be avoided by the rest of humanity at all costs and because we can't just put you in jail for supporting someone, that doesn't mean that any of us should ever wish to be associated with you. Yeah, I think it makes a really good point. This whole thing what you were saying about insanity is quickly how funny how quickly it'll fall away from you when you're going to defend yourself in the showers and you've got to live the most basic life. You won't be insident anymore. You'll be scared, you'll be vulnerable and your true lights will come through. It's absolute bullshit everyone claiming this whole insanity thing. This person's just evil. And you know what's gonna happen now? Is every time any woman is accused of anything whether it's petty crimes theft, they're gonna claim, well, I had postpartum psychosis

44:08or my hormones weren't balanced or my brain chemistry was wrong. And I'm not nailing women in particular on this front, but I've got to say that these feminists who are supporting Lindsey Clancy are the same, they want you to believe two things at the same time. They want you to believe that women and men are completely capable of doing exactly the same things. That there is no difference. And that women and men should be trusted with exactly the same jobs no matter how. People orientated or things orientated, those jobs are. And that because there are no differences, that no woman should be barred from any job ever. And I kind of agree with that part of the equation. But the same people want you simultaneously to believe that women have some special relationship with the moon and with their periods and with their brains and with their bodily functions that renders them in a special way,

45:12never to blame for any of the stuff that ensues during those periods of the moon or the body or the brain. And you cannot hold both those positions at the same time. Either women are exactly like men and can do exactly what men do and must be held responsible in the same way men are. If they want the goodies that they think the men have or they're different. And if they're different, then they get different goodies and they have no responsibility like children. Then the state cannot hold them liable or criminal for any of the things they do. You can either have one. So you know what pass, pass, pass, pass, pass, why is it called pass, pass and pass, pass and impression? Do you know what that normally leads to? No, it leads to ice cream, it leads to extra days and track pants, it leads to conversations that husbands don't want to have,

46:13it doesn't lead to cold, blooded murder. Now I'm no mother. I do not hurt Voveries, I'm not a specialist in this. But if you go through life, it does happen and women do feel this. And it's a very difficult thing to process, but everyone processes things differently. Psycho absolute evil witches murder, and it can't be blamed on something like that. It just can't be. My cell says, if there were grounds for federal jurisdiction, I'd support the fed seeking the death penalty. Three children murdered by their own mother. Life without parole is the bare minimum. I couldn't agree more. It's not even just a crime. It's a crime against human, like who we are fundamentally. Mothers should be nurturers. And it's like a child should feel it. It's safest with its mother. So this isn't just like a hate. This isn't just a crime. It is an absolute bombination of what we stand for. And it should be straight death. It should be stoning. It should be a stoning. Yeah, I feel like it's a crime.

47:15It's a crime. It's not a crime against just the children to your point, Ben. This is a crime against the future. Because what you're doing is you are destroying your own, your own future, your own line, your descendants. It's like it's the most heinous and destructive thing people can do. You know, we have words for specific kinds of murder. There's Fratricide and Patricide and Matricide. And Infanticide is what we call it when you kill your own babies. The youngest of these kids was eight months old. What kind of absolute depravity, what depths of evil do you have to plumb to hurt some? I could not in the wildest rage hurt

48:15even someone I fucking hate, child I fucking hate. And it's not mine to imagine the kind of thing that would drive someone. And you know, there are plenty of people who've been crazy in history and in criminal history. But there's a special kind, a special circle of hell reserved for people who do this. And I'm kind of over talking about it because it's such a depressing subject. It is, Garitha it is. And the people who support it are in that same circle because they want to make it sound interesting. No, she's evil, she must be put away from this world. She shouldn't be of this earth and she shouldn't be power's society. There's nothing interesting about it. That's just the conclusion. I mean, it's just, it's wild to me that the same people who, you know, they want a whole bunch of things, special treatment for themselves. And I can't help thinking that they just see this as a way of having more of the goodies and less of the responsibility in life. And they're hopping on board. And if you've seen interviews, listen,

49:17I'm sorry, I went down a bit of a rabbit hole the one night while I was lying in bed because there were a whole bunch of these videos that came up. You cannot believe some of the things that these crazy supporters, it's not so much even Lindsey Clancy that makes the story vile, it's the supporters because every one of these women has made it about them. So before they even, Lindsey Clancy is totally not important to them. They're using her as a proxy to force the rest of us to hear their boring fucking bullshit story about their meaningless life and how absolutely pointless they have been and how the thing that makes them interesting is that they also once had a postpartum depression moment and that that suddenly makes them newsworthy as well. Every single interview that's been done by a third person, the first thing these women do is start speaking about themselves. And many of them are doing this to camera stuff,

50:18this kind of, they all think they're smarter than every one of the psychologists, the medical experts, they blame the husband, they talk about astrology, they say, oh, no, well, because, you know, Mercury was in whatever. That's for how the whole thing, I mean, these people, they're witches, you can suddenly understand why someone wanted to burn witches back in the 1600s, hundreds, that's why, because women started doing this kind of shit and then the guys are like, look, this is fucking out of control. We talk about toxic masculinity a lot, this is toxic femininity, these women need to be treated like witches and Salem. Yeah, guys, I think earlier in the comments, so Kalameda really great point is that it's not being, it's being made about her, it could your thoughts there, it's not about the victims, imagine being an eight month old being strangled, that's the art rage here. How about her and what she's going through, or, you know, poor me bullshit? There are three dead children here. Wild, it's just absolutely wild. Let's not go past that.

51:18And I do want to, let's just balance this with a great story out of America, because this is a terrible story out of America, but the great story out of America is that there's a woman in Montana. You know, Montana is a huge big state, it's quite wild. It's not, you know, you live hard in Montana, it's cold, it's vast, and they have mousse in Montana. Mousse, enormous, have you ever seen a mousse? Yeah, massive, not in real life, but I know what she's talking about. They are the size of a taxi, a South African taxi. Enormous things. I mean, it's an antelope, but it's not, you know, it's like the biggest cow you've ever seen, but much taller and with antlers, it's terrifying. Like, shame the little size. Yeah, and they make a terrifying noise. Anyway, this mum in Montana fought off a mousse with bear spray. She, this mousse was coming at her and her kids,

52:21and this is the kind of person we should lionize while we've been inized Lindsay Clancy. She fought off the mousse with bear spray, which is just a great story. We should actually just ask her what should the punishment be? Because this woman's clearly in touch with being a mother and being a decent person, and she clearly has the ability to fight and kill and create harm, but she's harnessed in the right way. So therefore, she is now, in my opinion, the world's expert in how to defend and be a mother. So she, so suffers deliberation of your peer's bullshit. Ask this woman in Montana. Boy, Sylvia, what's going on here? Should she get death penalty? Yeah, get cool. Sorry guys, Sylvia said it's, she just, it's all good. Absolutely. It's all good. You know, it's interesting that because of this too, a lot of people are asking, is the, is the jury system really the best system in America? Because, for example, you know, voting used to be only for landowners

53:22and principally those were always men in history. And then of course, juries used to once be just men and landowners. And certainly honorable people in the community. And now of course, as somebody said this week, which I thought was a very interesting point about juries in America, a jury of your peers means that you're going to be judged by the kind of people you meet in airports. We all know what those are like. Well, a jury of your peers, I mean, did a whole bunch of pedos decide over what our Kelly's fate was? That's your parents, right? It should be people exactly like you. But like America do some very strange and outdated things because they want to try and make out like, oh no, we're not that young, we're a very old country, we do things proper. But then they do these stupid outdated shit like this whole jury thing. It's nonsense. Find someone's sound mind, you can deliberate over a fucking proceeding like this. And they have the power, they're empowered to make a decision. Or go to us. I mean, cheapest today, we like any other show, we solve the world here.

54:27We solve all the problems. All right, listen, I'm going to let you go, Ben. I know you've got other stuff to get going with today. You've got cleaning around the house and domestic chores. My apartment currently looks like Margaret's issue. They were fixing something in the roof and everything had to, so I've even I've even had my cat here at this stage and she's normally around. She's stuck under something. She could be under rubble right now. Find her. All right, well, I'm going to talk a little bit about molten. I'm going to have some of the people I've been on this trip with, discuss it with me. You actually know a lot of these people too. So I'll make sure I put on some people. I'll make sure I put on some people. They're wonderful people. I miss them very, very much. All right, we'll catch up with you in a couple of days. Thanks, Ben. Hi, guys. Thanks for everybody. All right, there's Ben. By the way, the gourd episode, I'm going to wait to hear from Jay Nyan and James and then we'll make that available later on this weekend or next week, early next week as well. So there's plenty of new and exciting content coming to.

55:28As you may or may not know, I'm in Malta, where I have come here with the guys from TTS and their franchise conference, which we'll talk about in a second. One of the people who's been very involved in putting our itinerary together and making it really cool is Stacey Lee Roberts, who's going to come and sit right here next to me right now. You've been a rock star, by the way. How are you? Great. Good. How about you, guys? Laker, thank you. So Stacey, first of all, what an awesome trip. And I think it feels like we've been here for a week and a half, but it's only been four nights. That's it? Crazy, right? You jam packed everything in here. How can you tell how much time flies when you have in fun there? Well, we've had so much fun that I've seen some of the stalwarts of Tervest. I've seen some of the stalwarts who are the people who pull all nighters. I've seen some of them feeling pretty tired. It's been that busy. I think they also found it a little spot on the island, which is either a good thing or a bad thing for them. Apparently they dragged you into this shit on what was it Wednesday night?

56:30Unfortunately. You survived. So well done. We made it. Yeah, good work. OK, so let's just talk quickly about what the purpose is. You guys bring some of your best, some of your longest standing, some of your most important franchises on the trip with us. Because people think Tervest is a number of the, and it is a number of things. I mean, you guys are so involved in everything from some of the airlines, the food that we get is from Tervest. But that's the group, right? So the corporate travel, the travel, like T side of things, which has become so important, there are so many things that Tervest does, but the franchisees make up an enormous part of the business here. So tell us a little bit about them, who they are, and why they play such an important role. Absolutely. So we've got a number of franchise partners that are part of our business, and they're quite an important part of our business. So in terms of how we select them, I would say if you look at somebody like Ricky,

57:33who you're going to hear from a little bit later. He's coming up next. So you're off Reynolds and Joe from Tag. These are long standing relationships that have been built over time. And really, we earmarked these businesses that also embody a part of what Tervest offers. And I think that's so important, because building those relationships, you have such a better understanding when you are aligned. You know, when you've got the same type of values, the same type of vision for where you want the business to go. And so Tervest has a number of different franchise partners, some of them that have been so long standing. You know, it's all about the longevity. It's all about the relationships. And really, that's the key thing over there. And I mean, some of these people have been part of this family for more than 15 years. So it's a long standing collection of relationships. And obviously, Tervest is a major, major player in the South African travel economy. I mean, you guys are an enormous company, hugely successful.

58:36And you are able to create great deals, amazing opportunities. You're able to leverage things in a way because the company is so influential and important. That, you know, the smaller guys, if they weren't part of that family, you would find a lot harder to do. Absolutely. But it's also, you know, we've built those relationships over time with our partners, with our suppliers. And we so happy to be able to almost become an extension of their business. And I think going back to the relationships again, it's understanding their business, understanding what their needs are, not just us trying to solve them something, but almost developing the business together. So, you know, seeing what are the challenges and what are the gaps within their businesses and developing those products together as we move along. So, we really become an extension of each other because we know that their success is our success. Yeah, I mean, we'll talk about the fun stuff in a second, but there is actually a business part of this.

59:38I mean, there was a conference on, I think it was Monday or Tuesday morning, Tuesday morning where, you know, their business presentations and people are given the numbers and everything is laid out in terms of a catch-up which you get to do in an exciting place every year. And, you know, I've been fortunate enough to accompany you guys on a couple of these. And we've seen some amazing places, but I see a lot of the familiar faces who are obviously the people who get it and who are doing the business. And that's terrific because in an economy like South Africa's where we can see growth and tourism is responsible for so much of why South Africa is, a player, you know, in that realm. And for Turvest, which is an international company, we mustn't forget you guys have now got properties all over the continent and in other parts of the world. This is an exciting time. You're growing South Africa's economy, one franchisee at a time apart from everything else.

1:00:39One franchisee at a time, but also what's so great is that for the strip in Malta, we've actually leveraged on our partners that are based here in Malta. So life experiences ran the program for us and I think you touched on a good point of it, we are growing the tourism economy. And we, I would say we're one of the biggest contributors in South Africa, but not only in South Africa, in Africa. Yeah. We're turning over huge numbers for your suppliers, like your airlines, like your accommodation groups, and extending that out into different countries across the world so that we can almost extend our offering as well. So the partners that are joining us, are just getting that service in South Africa, but they're able to actually tap in and leverage on those partnerships across the globe. Now the fun stuff, not so much fun for you, because people are constantly putting stupid messages on our WhatsApp group asking you what time the bus is leaving, what time they have to be up, even though you've told them a fucking million times. So you've been very patient with everyone, but that's not your actual job,

1:01:40because you've been involved in a part of the business which is fascinating because I think so many South Africans, you know, travel is the big bucket list. It's the dream for the end of the year or the next three years if we save, but corporate travel and particularly incentives, corporate group travel, the kinds of things that you organize, and this is part of your, your what certainly was part of your day job before, that is an enormous part of the business. And these are the companies that buy packages that organize the incentives and rewards programs inside their companies for people to travel, because that's probably right at the top of what people want in a company if they've done well. Absolutely, absolutely. So yeah, we do put those programs together, similarly to this, I would say. And I think for the South African corporate market is quite a huge thing. It's a performance driver. As you say, you want to join a company, what's the incentive that's involved? That's what you want.

1:02:40And people want to know that, you know, my efforts are not going to be in vain. I've got to reward at the end. And for some of these companies, they've taken it to the extent where they can actually bring along their partners as well. And now it's not just you who's actually sitting on the back and say like, I want to do well, but you've got your husband or wife kicking you in the side as well to say, you better do well. And which companies, because you have insight into this, which companies in South Africa are the best to work for, because there are these kinds of incentives. So you're going to let any names out. Oh, I would say, and I think with our prejudice, I would say that San Lama is probably one of the best. I think that they've got... Who does San Lama? Who is the San Lama? Absolutely. I think they've got such a beautiful culture in the company, really excellent way to reward their teams as well. And they make sure that they're consistent with that. And I think consistency is really where that culture, it sticks. Yeah. They develop it and it sticks there. And people know when they join the company,

1:03:42that's what they can expect. That's very cool. I've never really been in the corporate world, but when I speak to people who have for more than 10, 15 years, the things they remember are those kinds of tokens of appreciation, because that's one thing for your bus to say, well done, but it's entirely different when your bus says, you've got a week in Malta with your wife. Exactly. Exactly. And that's what actually makes our role so important. Because now we are actually showcasing on behalf of our clients. Yeah. We've got to make sure that we feel full that responsibility to develop a trip which is going to be a bucket list experience. I mean, it's quite cool. You're not... It's not a grudge purchase. No. Not at all. Not at all. But you know, we see quite a shift as well in the clients, not only San Lama, but particularly all of our corporate clients. They really want us to balance that trip out.

1:04:45So it's no longer kind of full the trip, pack it up as much as you can. And what we really try to do as a tourist to make sure that that trip, you've almost got a personal buy-in as well. We try and develop a program which showcases and almost exposes that destination in the most beautiful way, the culture, the food, the history. But then also to give them some optional excursions where they can now start to explore the destination in their own pace. And I think this is pretty important because when you're traveling with your partner, it's great to be part of a group and it's great to do those group activities. But at some point, you want time to slow down a little bit so you can really save it in that moment and experience it your way. All right, but between you and me and the audience, is it very difficult trying to herd the cats on this trip in particular? The people on this trip have been absolutely legendary. You are so, you're being so nice.

1:05:47I know these people, I love these people, but yes, as they give you headaches. I think, you know, as it's our, we're getting to know each other, I think they're just trying to see how far they can push that envelope. That's all it is. But in the nicest way possible. Listen, the food. I'm going to roll onto that plane today and I don't think I'll fit through the door. And the food has been phenomenal. I didn't expect Walter to be, you know, maybe that Mediterranean diet, I've always liked that, but yes, it's last night we had this dinner. I think they were, it felt like there were 25 courses because they kept bringing food at this beautiful little villa in the middle of a multi-multi. Walter's only, it's not a huge island, but there seems to be so much here that we drove and drove and then we got there, we ate and ate. And you think you've discovered everything and you find something new like that on the last night.

1:06:48It's phenomenal. Absolutely. And it's such a beautiful island because I think it really brings in that blend of history, culture. You've got, I mean, we went to Pacherville and you've got the modernity of club streets. Beautiful. You'll all know that you walk around, it's steeped in history. Even the place where we were, it's incredibly beautiful. Absolutely. All right, listen, one other thing I've got to say and one of the reasons I wanted to have you on the show is because your social media, as the kids say, is lit and your Instagram in particular, I'm sure you don't want to hold a stranger's phone on you, but I think if anyone wants to see your stuff because you posted the most beautiful things, I'm not just on this trip, but I saw some of your other stuff that you've been doing. So give us the handles so that people can go and follow you if you want them to. You're welcome to follow me. And I love actually love putting things on social media. You're good at it. Just so that people can see and experience it like a real, so it's Stacey, S-T-A, C-E-Y, C-P-T.

1:07:49Stacey, C-P-T. But you're not from C-P-T anymore. I'm not from C-P-T anymore, but I'm going to hold on to it. Hey, you never ever get there. You never get the cape out of some people. You never do. But your stuff really is bloody fantastic. And I encourage anybody who wants to see what kinds of trips not only that Stacey is on and organizes. Well, it's the kind of things that are available. People don't know unless they see. And I thought I always thought I was quite imaginative. But unless you see some of these things, you don't know what you're missing and what is out there and what is possible. And if you work in a company and you're in charge of those incentives or those rewards or those trips and you may be you organize the travel inside those companies, you should really get in touch with Tervis Travel Services and see what they can do for you. And by the way, for all the rest of us who are either working for ourselves or are paying for those trips ourselves, go to travel.co.sa.

1:08:49And you can find out all the best stuff there from Ache and his team as well, because they put together some amazing stuff. There's always new stuff happening on travel.co.sa. And you can find out all about it. Thank you, Stacey. It's just a pleasure. Nice to see you. Awesome. Yeah, we're going to be talking to a whole lot of the people who are here on this trip with me. And I thought it would be fun to. Debbie says, by the way, Stacey says, you sound like a phenomenal link to the organization. There we go. That's very corporate speaks. I reckon Debbie's in charge of travel at her company. All right. The amazing thing. So the whole multi story was for me, obviously, I was immediately interested in something that Tracy brought up now about the history of the place. It's steeped in that. And we went up to Verletta to, I just saw it in the distance. I didn't get to go in, but St. Elmo's fought, which the Knights of St. John in 1565 managed

1:09:51to hold off the Ottoman Turks. They managed to resist the siege for a month while thousands of Ottoman soldiers on hundreds of ships were attacking them mercilessly. And in those days, war was brutal. You've got fire. You've got steel. You've got rock. You've got ash. And in this kind of heat, can you imagine? It's been what, 35 degrees, at least, maybe 32 to 35 degrees every day. There's no shade here. There are no big trees and things. There are a couple of trees in Waldorf Gardens, but the place is fucking hot. And if you think about what that siege must have been like, it's terrifying. Absolutely terrifying to me. OK. So let's see what we've got here. We've got a couple of other comments and I want to introduce you to Ricky.

1:10:54To a list tagline is wherever we are, we're always local. Is that actually the, I don't know, but if that is, that's cool. And then visit Malta, says Goon, instead of doing what Lindsay Clancy did. I like that too. I mean, that's the bare minimum we could hope for. Good day, all GCS people and garrots and turnie Michael Vansville. That's a hell of a name. Good for you, dude. OK, I want to bring in Ricky. Ricky is from Reynolds Travel. They've been in the business for years. And I actually met Ricky's mum and I met you on the, did we on the Bulgaria trip or something together? Might even have been before that. No, it wasn't actually the Bulgaria trip. We met on the cruise ship. Oh, that's right. That's for the rugby ball cup. That's right. Yes. That was fun. All right, so Ricky, and he's going to tell us the story of Reynolds because it's actually a lovely story. And again, these are kinds of stories that South Africans like to hear because they

1:11:57are the stories of small family businesses that grow and become tremendously successful. And you guys have done exactly that. I mean, your mum, who is a legend in the business, started Reynolds Travel how many years ago? 48 years ago. Wow. And she's a powerhouse, huh? That lady's got more energy than I've actually ever seen. She carries on and she parties with the base of the base of the service. And we, as we know, she's not really far. That is a difficult thing to do. So she was running this for years. And then you were actually involved in other businesses. And then she eventually said to you, hey, why don't you come in here and see what you can do here as well? And that was 15, 20 years ago. Yeah, 13 years ago. Yeah, correct. OK. So the story of Reynolds is actually quite a fascinating story. So my father was a little bit of a maverick. So what he did was he bought and sold properties. But in those properties, there were businesses. So he would start to run those. And he would combine them.

1:12:58And so I never owned anything. Of course, those colored buildings, the green one, the blue one, the red one. They owned everything. Yeah. But he's the banks. The banks. OK. And so on. So from there, he bought a building with a travel agency. And he started running. I didn't really know what he was doing, but he would do what the company was currently doing. And then from there, a lady came into the store and wanted to buy a ticket to go to Greece to find a husband. Oh, wow. With her father. If I was going to send her to Greece, my father refused to sell her the ticket. Why? Because he liked it. He won it to marry. So he didn't sell her the ticket. And so he went on a date with her and so on. And then fast forwarded, but they actually got together. They went on a date. And so forth. And my mother was a teacher at Brackpan High, this is from the east. You guys are very strong advocates, by the way, of springs.

1:14:00And you're probably springs greatest ambassadors. I would like to think so. Yeah, I think you are. Look, it's in a very tight field. You guys are cheap advocates for springs. 100%. So from there, what happened was my mother was a teacher at Brackpan High. And he said to my mom, you know, it stopped teaching come and take over this. Travel agency, I don't really know what I'm doing. My mom was an accounting teacher, so she sort of, it helps quite a bit. Sure. So from there, they didn't have a license to ticket. So what she would do is she would sell a ticket to a customer that came in. And in those days, everything was paper. Just handwritten. What were those machines called that you used to put a credit card on? And then you'd go clunk, clunk, clunk, with the thing. You'd move that piece across. And then it would, like a duplicate or a triplicate thing it would put the numbers onto the card. It's the fact that you're asking me and you're thinking of my age that I would know that. I don't. I do a follow-up. They used to have, but they had those things, right?

1:15:02That was what your mom used. What were they called? A valedator. So there we go. There we go. A valedator, Jesus. That is a blast from the past, all right? So she would run out the back door to the travel agency across the road, validate the tickets, run back into her own office, and then sell the tickets to the customer. So that's how Reynolds' travel actually started. And from there, it just got a grew. But again, as Garrett always said to me, it's not about business. It's about relationships, about people. And she built such relationships with the clients in spring. So at that stage, we had Colgate, from Ono, we had PG, we still do. Sure. Yes. And all those companies started using her because of the relationships she actually built up with it. OK? So then from there, we then moved on and grew and grew and grew. Our university, I was still a young chap then. And my mother then came to me about 15 years ago in Seattle, Ricky. We have a problem.

1:16:02The world is moving towards technology. We don't have that. We have traditional agency. We need to go to this. We still have validators and all that kind of stuff. We really need to move on with technology. Yeah. So Mary then said to me, OK, please go around the world, go and see whatever you can find and see if you can bring back any technology that we can start to actually adapt our business. Right. Because even though my mom was so old school, she wasn't blind to the fact that the world changed. And that if you don't move along with the processes, you will die as a customer. But especially with a little company from springs, where no one really knows exactly that. And everything's not internet based. Everyone's getting their content from the internet. It doesn't matter who you know anymore. And it's sort of going through that sort of error. So from there, I went to America. I went over to Dubai. I went over to America and I went to Europe. I found absolutely nothing. Really nothing. So this is another thing that I think it's worth reflecting on us is South Africa. In so many ways we give ourselves a hard time.

1:17:04We think, oh, you're in the arse end of Africa. And so far, we always catch up to things right at the back. And that's not true. I mean, it's not true for our banking. We take for granted online banking and phone banking. In America, they still use checks. Talk about validates as the American still sign checks. They don't have OTPs and their cons. Correct. In some places. They have moved that way. But you didn't find anything. Nothing that was relevant to the South African market. Right. There was also a big criteria was if it's going to work in the States, that's fine. But it needs to be able to be functioning here. And we in Africa travel very differently. Company travel, personal travel. We travel very differently. Our needs are completely different. And in the back, in our back yard was turvist. And I had Philip Kats and I had Barry Batling. And I had when we had come into office and present this to me. And from there, I said to Mary, your aunt is here. There's no point in looking at something funny. There's no point in looking at something that is extraordinary

1:18:06and from overseas and exotic. Or building it yourself. Or building it yourself. Which could go very well, but you could equally spend millions developing something that doesn't work. 100%. And also you've got to remember we at travel agents, we understand travel, not technology. So what we then, that is we partnered with turvist 13 years ago. And from there, I spent two years sitting in turvist's office with the technology just learning it. Right. But what they did is they actually boosted our company because now we're not just offering the old school, servicing the old school travel agency to corporate. We're obviously in the technology, but we've got that very, very personal touch behind it. And that's where turvist has also been very smart. And that's the thing. But you'll deal with that kind of administration for your clients. But what this travel IT, for example, does is it allows you to do that as seamlessly as possible. So that you can spend the time that you

1:19:07have to spend actually dealing with the clients and their concerns and putting the things together, they want and so on. And that's 100%. It's like you can offer the best technology, but if you've got the worst support behind, there's no point in having the technology. When you get stuck somewhere, the technology can offer you a ticket change. That's mean it's going to happen. Sure. You want someone in the background doing the nitty gritty work, making sure that those emergencies and everything else that technology just cannot do is there. And it's that relationship that Mary's installed to say, and her biggest worry was, we're going to lose touch with our clients. So that was actually a fundamental. When starting this and implementing this kind of technology into the company was a had to keep that fundamental of that personal touch with the technology and how do we bring them together. OK, but do you still have an office in Springs? Yes. OK, that's fucking important. But. And clearly it don't is. OK, travel's funny because, and you're probably more well placed than most to talk about this. If it goes well, it can be a highlight of your life.

1:20:10It's one of those things that you hope people will show in the pictures they show of you at your funeral. In other pictures, here's you on some fancy beautiful island somewhere, or here's you at the Eiffel Tower. Whether it's life stuff, but if it goes badly, and there's a fuck up, it is an absolute disaster, and people never forget that. And they are worried. I think everybody's worried, because for most of us, travel can be an expensive thing. And if it isn't managed properly, we don't know that there are safety and security and fallback things that we could do, it can be very nerve wracking for people. And that's exactly it, because in this day and age, there's so much content out there for travel, but you don't see the little nuances when it comes down to actually those moving parts. So just an example, a lot of people are like, oh, I've got the cheapest ticket on X-Wines at website. But they don't see in that ticket that they have to collect. They're bagging each stop, and it's not going right to the final destination.

1:21:10They leave their bag behind, they don't check out. There's those kind of things. End up wearing the same outfit for three days. Not good. Not good. Well, listen, thanks for coming to talk to us. I am blown away by the story. We only just touched on it here of Reynolds travel, because really, it's also the story of a family. And you have just added to that family with your two twin daughters. So congratulations on that. It's a shout out to my two little ones. Absolutely. Before they even know what's going on, they're going to be on a show. So you can show them this one day when they can understand, but it's so nice to see Ricky. And thank you so much. Thanks, Gary. Thanks, Steve, on that lovely bit. All right, so we're in Malta, and we've still got a little bit left of the show. We will also be going to the comments section, and make sure that if you have anything to say and you want to tell us about the daily briefing, you can do that to email me at Clifcentral. I'm at Clifcentral, at garethclif.com. And I will be happy to hear your feedback. Also, if you have any ideas for guests, people that you'd like us to have on the show,

1:22:11let us know about that too, because the producers have been hard at work finding us all kinds of interesting people to talk to. And today is no different. Jolene, come on over. So Jolene Roberts has been a guest in the show before. She was with us when we were in Bulgaria two years ago, and she came on the show and told us all about it. Oh, yeah, this is perfect. So Jolene is with the Travel Assignment Group, which is a company. Then I'm so bored. Because he's putting shit in your bag. Jolene is with the Travel Assignment Group, which is a company that... When did Johnny start? 15 years ago. 15 years ago. And before that, he was actually activist. He was a boss. He was a boss. And Jonathan has done a tremendous job. He's also been on the show once or twice. He'll remember the Tag Foundation, which he started, which does such a lot of tremendously important work. I was at a launch just the other day for...

1:23:13And you've got a dinner coming up, too. Yes. I need to put boys through the best school in South Africa. Well, Johnny will say it is. It is the best school. OK. Boys and girls. And girls now? And girls. That's true. 55 boys and 16 girls. Girls at Park Town Girls and the boys are at King Edward. And Johnny really has... I mean, how many kids is it all together now after all these years of the Tag Foundation? Gary, you know all of them by name. Yeah. Um, probably that... 105 or 6. That's phenomenal, eh? We have our first spring book. Really? We see Mueel. Really? We went through the program, eh? It was kept to spring back by Ressie and the Bobberman's game. Very phenomenal. Well, actually, after the Bobberman's game. And then we have a say to who was the captain of the under 20 spring books.

1:24:15So, and we have a countance, and we have... Yeah. A lot of very successful young men. And we'll... It's such a success story. But before we get into Tag Foundation, because the Tag Foundation is obviously what gets the lion's share of the attention, but there's a business behind that. And we've spoken to Stacy already this morning about the franchises and the relationship between Tourist and Companies Like Tag. Yes. And I mean, you guys also, your bread and butter is corporate travel. Which I will be. And that is a phenomenal business in South Africa. It's a huge contributor to the economy. You've got some massive clients that you've been dealing with for years. And you have to handle... I mean, it's big groups. Yeah. Big events. You send people all over the world. And you've been in the travel business for years. I met you first at Seekers. Yeah. Me? You were lucky on the day.

1:25:16OK, but tell me about that day-to-day stuff. And who your clients are and how to invest and travel IT plays a role in this. So we have a phenomenal set of clients. Tag is similar to you've to head Reynolds Travel on earlier. It's a similar type of business. We're a medium-sized company. We do predominantly corporate travel. Right. And our corporate customers, if we wanted to grow, we needed a tool. Obviously, us coming from a service background that was our natural port of coal. And travel IT being the best tool in the marketplace. And that is a fact, not an opinion. And just so that people know, this means you have the best infrastructure for finding flights, car rental, accommodation, all in one. And it does things like expenses and things that make corporate travel

1:26:21a lot easier to manage. Yeah. If you don't have this tool in your business as a company that travels, I think you might be in the stone age. Yeah. And also, you're spending too much money on your travel. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The best thing about travel IT is the transparency for the client. So they see everything, which is what you want. And the technology that drives it makes us more efficient. It makes us be able to give the client that needs the attention that's going to the complicated places that needs help, and the ones that are flying domestically, that don't need the help that would normally book on a website or something. They can do that. But it's on art too. But having brought that in, sort of sent us into the next phase of travel. And as a lot is to grow quickly and offer a tool

1:27:22that a company, our size, would normally not be able to do. But because we partner with service, obviously, it then allows us to have access to all these tools. We all do it slightly differently. Service have their way of doing it. And service can handle clients that are hundreds of millions of brands travel turn over in a year. I like customers that are, I wouldn't mind 100 million in customer. I was going to say, there was someone about to go and give you their business. No, no, no, no. I'll do it. But we sort of handle the next level down from that. That's our sweet spot. And I find that with the tool, it just allows us to give the clients a best offer, keep them honest, keep us honest. And it just delivers a service that we should be delivering to. Because in the days of the validators.

1:28:25I mean, that was a thing, right? It was a thing. It was a thing. It can't belong to. But also, you talk about transparency and using technology to make things better. There were a lot of real crooks in travel, in most days. Yeah, in the frough. Right, there were bad people. Bad people. Bad people. Not even people. There were just steel clients money that would take huge commissions from places they weren't meant to. I mean, things have changed. Absolutely. And I mean, we charge a service fee. We tell you upfront, we're contracted in. You know what you're in for. Know what you're in for. And you can order it. So, you know, and that is something that is quite important to us. Very important question from Karl here. Please ask Jolene if she's OK with the passing of Dali Pa. I was very sad, Karl. Yeah. I was devastated about Dali Pa, because yes, I know that I am named after a song of hers.

1:29:25Are you actually? I'm actually. Really? My love, Dali Pa. Oh, man. Absolutely. I didn't know that. My name came from that song. And every time I meet somebody that doesn't know me, they start singing that song to me. It's quite bizarre. It's not nice. So I'm hoping that maybe with the passing of Dali. Things will get easier. Things will get easier. OK, we're hanging out. So, Jolene and I, all of us, we're walking through Valetta and Malta on Tuesday night. And we turned a corner and there was a chick who's married to South Africa with a guitar. And she was playing Jolene. She didn't know you were coming. And then as you turned the corner, you were there. There was a woman singing Jolene. And it's been the week of Dali's parting. I mean, it's just a lot. In fact, she was just still getting over it. I mean, it's been very emotional for you, right? So, OK, Jolene just wants to tell us everyone how hot it's been. No.

1:30:26OK, can I just tell you something? Right. Now you're going to listen to this because really, Malta is a beautiful place with many things to see. And it has got the most beautiful churches and the most beautiful museums. We haven't seen them, however, because it is sweltering, not a person can't leave the hotel room. Because those places are not a condition. We walked to Gerrath and asked for a little years today and asked her against the wall and said, look, you've got to take me back to the hotel. Because I am melting. I'm going to melt. And I will have a big puddle there at the bottom of the pavement. But you survived. Really? Barely. It's really hot today. It's ridiculous. I believe it's 15 degrees. The cold is just telling me. It's 9 and 15. And it's cold. They're not cold, but crisp. You know, in the morning. I just want to walk out in the morning.

1:31:27And it's just a little crisp. You know, that crisp. That's what you're actually angry for. OK, well, there's a safe trip back. But before you go, just quickly, tag foundation. Yes. Because this is something, obviously, you've got partners and clients and friends who've been mass of donors to the tag foundation. Johnny Bears, obviously, the majority of that custom. He and his wife Tracy done most of the work behind the tag foundation. You're very involved with the kids, though. And you guys supply everything from sports equipment to their tuition, to their accommodation. Yeah, the person behind the hero behind the tag foundation is Johnathan's wife Tracy. She sits with those boys. She makes sure they have everything they need, everything they need. And it's not about writing a check. It's got nothing to do with it. It's about taking each human and making sure that their life by the time they finish school is enriched

1:32:31and they can then go on and have something no one can ever take away from them. It's phenomenal. And we have our function on the seventh of October. It's our donor function. So it is our big, we have one function a year that raises the money to put these kids through school. And that's coming up now. It's coming up now. So yeah, it's all exciting. And it's why we do the travel. We do travel so that we don't do this. So you can do this. Yeah, that's tremendous. So yes, it's absolutely tremendous. Carl says, Jesus, Jolene, have another fucking cigarette. Jesus, Carl, don't start with me. I tell you what, I don't even smoke. I smoked 10 years ago. It's the heat. I have Esmer. And I'm coughing like a cowboy. Jolene, try and get some cold. Right, thank you. There we go. All right, no, Carl appreciates the honesty. So do I. I love it. Thanks, Jolene. Thank you, guys. All right, also, like it is for you. Good to see you, my friend. And next up, I'm going to bring the two guys who really are

1:33:35the brains behind the show. They are the, well, yes, them Philip Kats and Barry and the rest of his team. But certainly, Wayne and Claude are the guys who are at the forefront of what's going to happen next, which is always more exciting than anything that's happened already. So grab a seat, Bertie. We'll make this. We'll make this a, there we go. There's Wayne. How's it going? It's good. OK, so thanks, Jolene. Thank you, everybody. All right, so we've got Wayne and Claude. And you guys have been rock stars on this trip. You've pited harder than anyone else. Claude, for those who don't know, he's also been on the show before. But you're right in the beginning. Remember, that was the first time you run. And Claude has an amazing history in travel. He actually knew Thomas Cook back in the day. Remember when, and we're not talking about the travelers, Jigs, we're talking about the oak who traveled around

1:34:36on that ship called the Beagle. And when Claude started that, I mean, that was really the beginning of travel and money, you know? Thomas Cook. No, but if you think about it, the organization we represent in South Africa, American Express, global business travel, I mean, they started their business in delivering goods. Right. And that's how that company started. I wasn't being so casted. There is a link there. OK, thank you for that. I didn't plan it. I didn't plan it to be a link. Look, I wasn't there just to put the record straight up. No. OK, but listen, we've spoken a lot about travel IT this morning. We spoke with Stacey and with Jolie and with Ricky about it. But this is the backbone of what makes you guys so successful. And I mentioned when we were talking the other night that you guys, the gorilla and the room when it comes to travel in South Africa. I mean, in a complimentary way, because you make it possible

1:35:36for smaller businesses to have access to the infrastructure that allows them to do amazing things for their clients to scale, to be able to find all the absolute best deals they can to give them a transparent way of reporting to allow them to keep track of their expenses. I mean, from a corporate travel point of view, this is probably a world first in terms of that level of product. I don't think it's too much to say that. So when we started this 13 years ago, it was a, let's call it something out of the ordinary to have an online travel system, to believe in online so strongly. Yeah. Corporates were, which we not take for granted. Dantative. I mean, it's funny that Ricky was talking about how his mum used to use those validators with the credit cards. It got a chunk of clunk. And now we think about travel. And there isn't, to me, there isn't anything that wouldn't be online when it comes to that world.

1:36:36But 13 years ago, that's not the case. Well, the thing is that that's the whole evolution here. Is that today, you don't talk about anything that's not online. Whereas 13 years ago, we were trying to convince people to even talk and have it in their conversation. Yeah. The partnership has really grown to have as travel IT. We've seen as one to have as travel services. Sure. And we've had many instrumental people get us there, right? People like Mourne, Claude, the Fenters partners that you were talking about. So the likes of Ricky, Joe, it's all helped us transition into this world of online. And giving corporate TMCs and smaller customers the ability to book travel, manage the expense, and also look after their mass component. Yeah. So we spoke a little bit to Stacey about the mass component, which is the incentives and the corporate travel side of things. There are obviously, you guys have got an enormous array of clients already.

1:37:37But for anyone who's thinking about, because it can be complicated inside a company, that's not your main focus. You don't want to be running a massive travel department inside a company. And this, obviously, one of the things that makes it an advantage to have travel IT is that this simplifies that process. But you guys can help them hold their hand through the process. Well, is it? There's a person there who can deal with that stuff. It's interesting, right? We got to the London Tech Show, Florida myself with it. And you walk around that room. I mean, you've got the best of the best in the world. Sure. And there's a South African company showcasing a mass product, which has really become a gateway to the corporate entities. Because it's so fresh, it's so new. And it manages absolutely everything. But the points I'm making is that those international companies don't know who we are. We've walked into that arena, and we're really getting a lot of feedback and a lot of client involvement and engagement from that shot.

1:38:38So the next step, and I don't want to jump too far ahead here, is obviously this goes international. And that you're able to take what is now a product that has a proven track record. It's not just a blueprint anymore. It's got it works every day. It's working right now. And you can sell this anywhere in the world. And that's our job. That's what Claude and myself are not tasked to do. It's take this. Well, let him have this fucking chance. I'm passionate. Gerrath. I love this. And by the way, Wayne is the chief sales officer for TTS. And he's the one who has dealt with the client. What is the client feedback then? Just all happy, all fucking phenomenal? Yeah, look, Gerrath. I mean, I'm currently looking after the operations for our global element of our business. And I would be stupid to say that everything is perfect. So travel is quite an emotive purchase. I mean, I always use the analogy. I mean, a CEO never gets too angry about a pen

1:39:41not being delivered because they need a pen, right? But if it doesn't get his one A seat, then he's a stuff. So we deal with that on a regular basis. But from a technology point of view, I mean, it's made our lives easier as a travel management company, more efficient, more productive. And it's made our customers last a lot easier in managing their travel spend, right? In managing their travel programs. And that's really where one of the big, unique elements of our product is compared to all these global technologies that are out there. We've got a solution that has been developed not just with the customer in mind, but with our travel consultants in mind as well. So we operate on exactly the same platform to be able to service our customers, to be able to manage the travel program. Whereas every other technology is kind of like another piece of technology that you've got to go into.

1:40:42Right. You've got to work with, right? And it's never integrated properly. Yes. You have to translate from this thing to that. Correct. And that's been our uniqueness. That we're on one seamless platform. And we're able to then manage anything that our customer needs us to help them with, very quickly, very efficiently. So that's been, I guess, one of the success factors of the technology. But more than that, it's just been a journey where Wayne being the chief sales officer doesn't necessarily get out to look for business anymore. The business comes to him. Right. And that's not a, you know, I'm not, I'm not disrespecting his role in our business. But it's literally phone call off a phone call of, you know, and our customers have become a promoters of others. But it wasn't always like that because now it is selling itself. But in the beginning, you had to obviously really get out there and explain to people. They didn't know what it was. They didn't see where the benefit was.

1:41:43Yes. I mean, Garrett, it's a fact. Our first presentation was done in Philip Kats' house, literally. And we didn't have a system, by the way. We had some developers that were writing some screens. And it looked OK. But we only had flight. We didn't even have call hotel. Yeah. So now that's 13 years ago, right? The world's changed dramatically since then. So content is now available. Online integrations is what we talk about. We talk about APIs. I don't want to bore. No, no, no. This is interesting that people are going to. We go into things that is called NEC, which is the new distribution capability. So GDSs, NECs, the big OTAs that we talk about, booking.com, Expedia, all those guys, we've integrated into that world. So suddenly, that global, that big monster that you think about has become quite local and quite focused in one arena.

1:42:45Because people think they're smart when they discover like booking.com or hotels.com or whatever it is. But you guys manage to integrate information from any number of sources. Interesting thing, which gives you oversight that those individual entities cannot possibly give you. Correct. And I mean, that's why COSA, we've done a lot of, we spent a lot of time talking about travel. That's it. Travel.coza, where you can now go and see cruising as an example, right? So online packages. And that's what this game's about. This game's about encapsulating you, encapsulating the corporate, looking off to your requirements and the corporate requirements. Everybody forgets us. The corporate traveler is you and me. Yeah, but you guys take care of both. But the reality is that the real business is in corporate travel. 100%. And if you don't get that right, then the individual. 100%. Which often is a lot more administratively complicated

1:43:46because everybody thinks they're a princess when they're traveling. Well, they're the best travelers. Of course. And they expect this level of treatment for themselves. The corporate stuff at scale, if it goes wrong, can go very wrong. And if it goes right, can benefit for years and years of their client relationship, obviously, in this case, TTS. But all of the franchisees as well. Carol, that's all one of the comments earlier that is there a travel IT for individual travelers? Travel. That's it. That's it. So that's the exact form. It's exactly that. And it uses the foundation. And the price thing we were able to offer are corporate customers. Correct. That as well. So there's a lot of benefit in going into that platform and to look for product. And did you see the other comments about Claude being amazing AI? Which is. I mean, it couldn't have chosen a bit in that moment.

1:44:48Your name has come from a major fashion. Imagine everyone's called Gareth. No, that just doesn't sound like it. It would never work, right? It would be a disaster. People would be horrified. They'd never want to use it. OK, but you said something amazing last night. Because, and you might just have been tired after a very busy and hectic week. But we were all talking about where we'd like to travel. And you said, I've been everywhere I want to go. Which I think some people were astonished by that. I thought it was quite cool because you have been to over 40, 50 countries. 57, yeah. Phenomenal. And because you've been in travel business for so long, you're not overly romantic about these things. You may be a bit jaded because, you know, if you've been somewhere for the fourth time, maybe it's not as exciting. But I think it's a remarkable thing that you've had your full of travel. It's been that incredible and that tremendous. You've seen all the things that you want to see. You know, I'm going to stop traveling.

1:45:49But there's nothing that's on your bucket list. Yeah. I mean, these things come up from time to time. So maybe next week, I might change something or see something on my, I'll create a bucket list. But having said that, you know, travels have been in my blood for many, many years. And in fact, for my whole family as well. And we talk about where we're going to go next. Not necessarily, we have to go here. We have to go there. Right. So I'm actually planning a trip now to the US for my grandkids. And my wife is actually planning the trip. I'm just going to help her plan the show. Right. And we want to go to Disney World. Right. And and every kid's dream. It's interesting in the first place my youngest daughter went to was Disney World. Right. So, you know, it's these type of things that you do now because what we do as a family is where we're going next. And that's the beauty of the industry that we've been in. It used to be a hell of a lot more glamorous in the old days.

1:46:52We're having been in the industry used to get benefits of flats and all that. And now it's just, it's just become... Everything, everything in good ways and bad has become more corporate. Right. Because there has to be efficiency built into it. And there's also part of what you guys have done with travel IT. And you have Philip Katz, we just got to give that some credit to what a clever man. Right ahead of his time, just saw where things were going and thought this is the way to do it. But these efficiencies and these checks and balances make companies run better. But they do take some of that sexiness and that glamour and that excitement out. They also take a lot of the credit. Which is not a bad thing. They're really meant to talk about a travel trip and then you start talking about company policies. Oh my God. People fall asleep. Beauty of care. People fall asleep. And, you know, and there are probably some of your listeners and that have traveled way more than any of us, right? Yeah. You get guys that are on a plane once a week,

1:47:53yeah. Traveling into these places that are very difficult to travel in. And you ask them if travel is glamorous. And they'll say not a chance, right? So you've got to try and what we do is we try and make travel work. And that's not easy because you're dealing with a lot of other entities that are part of the supply chain that have to actually also believe in making travel work. And that doesn't always happen. I mean, we get travelers that come to a hotel in the Telegos or Nairobi and they're standing at the front desk and the lady saying, well, you know, this has been painful, right? When he's got proof that that trip has that hotel room has been paid for, you know, we've given it. There's the proof and they went into it, right? So, so sort of things that become quite challenging. The airports that you fly to, you know, you do. And not to mention events in the world where it's volcanoes and Iceland or wars in Iran

1:48:54that are 100%. Change everything on a daily basis. And you guys have obviously got systems now in place. Take care of those things when they change. That's right. I mean, it's exactly that. I mean, we got to be there with you next to you, but we got to be there with you on your journey. You know, be fucking weird if you were next to me the whole time. And just think through the take. We are. No, I know. But that's where we are on your phone. These days, everyone is, right? The Donald Trump's NSA is probably listening to us even though they're not technically in the audience, just to make sure. But technology has made so much possible that was impossible before an at-tremendous scale. So where does this go next? You hinted at, like, international and travel IT becoming a platform that places like America, which are quite backward when it comes to travel. Well, we've just had a straight session

1:49:54in the beginning of the week. And the one question was, what is this going to look like in five years time? And we all looked at each other. And we kind of just kind of don't know, right? Although a lot of what we're doing is planning for the next five years. But what is it actually going to look like in five years time? So it is so dynamic at this point in time that you kind of getting caught out a little bit when certain things happen, especially some crises, et cetera. And that's when you start developing ideas and processes, et cetera, in order to manage these crises. But it just makes you better as an organization, better as a platform. But the new wave, I mean, we've talked about it, is there? Sure. There's two. You're already using AI. It's two ways of looking at it. You're either going to run away from it or you're in a crisis. So we've embraced. Right. With AI, the booking capability, content capability,

1:50:59that's going to come into the forefront. So AI is going to retrieve that on your behalf. But exactly what Claude was saying, it's when things go wrong and travel. What's AI going to do for you? I lost my luggage. When we arrived here, people didn't necessarily get their luggage right. So who's going to help you with that? OK, so the airlines are going to embrace AI. Why? Now they can locate where your luggage is. Right. But AI, I was not going to get my luggage. I'm not going to have a dress or a suit or pair of pants. They know you want a dress. That's exciting. 100%. The point of making is that the future of travel is not going to be about your booking enablement and content enablement. It's going to be about the support structures and the vast problem that you get with the executive. Yeah. I mean, that is exciting. But what are your sights on in terms of the business? Because you guys said you're thinking about what could happen in five years? Like what's on your immediate short term plan? Because you know, honestly, tourists in South Africa

1:52:02and TTS, thanks to things like travel IT. You are the biggest brand in South Africa when it comes to travel. But not just in South Africa. The rest of the content. You know, properties, the TDM guys, are good properties all over the place. So what's the most exciting thing for you? So the immediate next big thing, I mean, we've spoken about as international expansion. Right. That's immediate goals. The other massive expansion is the leisure space. We haven't really touched on it. And the reason being that with the likes of Google and the likes, they pump in all this content, pump in all the pricing elements that you want to, that you as a customer want to go and retrieve. The point I'm making is that if we focus, not if we are focusing on those dynamic packaging capabilities, the cruising capabilities. Why do people want to come to South Africa, Garret? If you're going to speak to European or American, why do they want to come to South Africa? Well, I mean, I would say the bush.

1:53:02Yeah, the bush. So what have we done in the bush in terms of marketing and getting packages off there you are. So we want to entice it. Is it a problem? Because I know that this is something that's a persistent issue in South Africa that we just don't have enough lights to the country and that it's far for people from the rest of the world. Can you imagine a scenario in which South Africa is in the top five tourist destinations for European travelers, American travelers, Chinese, Japanese travelers? Does that would be a domestic market would explode if we could do that? Look, I mean, it will take a lot of effort from all stakeholders to be able to entice all these different diverse groups of people coming to the country. But I mean, let's, again, two or three weeks ago, I was in Cape Town with my grandkids and I took them to the oceanarium there.

1:54:03And I hardly heard any South African being around there. There were Germans, there were Americans, there were Brits that were there. So there definitely is an interest to come. But it's all it's value for money. Yes, it is a long-haul destination for them. I mean, they can fly to Spain. I wouldn't, you know, shopper hours in Spain and beautiful beaches, etc. But I think the lure of our country is that we have a lot of diversity in terms of what we can offer. Wine forms, Kruger Park, you know, beaches. Mountain. Adventure trips, you know, climbing cable, mountain, all those kind of things. You really see that in many countries, right? You're either going to Spain for the beach and the food baps, but that's it, you know? What else can you do? That's true. And I may be simplifying this a little bit, but we have so much to offer. So much diversity to offer at really good value, you know? The flat-yes is going to be quite expensive and it's more than they're working and they're going to pay to go to Spain. But once they hear, I mean, you get so much value

1:55:04for the dollar and all that. No disrespect to Malta, which I think is an amazing place. I've never seen it before. And I've actually been really impressed with it. But Cape Town's pretty good on this. Oh, wow. By far, right. And we have access to so much more than they have here. And they have a huge tourist industry at any given time, like a quarter of the population of this island is tourist. It's a tourist, yeah. And that should be the case for our country. We are way more space. We definitely have more to show off. We perhaps need more flights in and out. And we need to let people know what's there. Because I think that the potential is enormous for the domestic tourism that business. And you did mention the bush, but in the tourist group, there are properties that... Beautiful. The Pilan'sburg, in the Kruger, there's an amazing place. And in East Africa, and in Zim.

1:56:04And some amazing things. So it's happening. We're getting there. We're eating the elephant one bite at a time. And that's exactly why the future is brought. That's right. And I mean, the focus is taking the South African company and globalizing it. But as our tagline says, wherever we are, we're going to be local. So is your tagline? So someone mentioned the tagline in the comments earlier. We're going to be local wherever we are. Right. Very good. Well, listen, I do have to say it's always lovely to travel with YouTube, but it's hard on my liver. Derek, you are also to blame. I've been a bit... Listen, I know you've been disappointed in my participation in the 3am club this week. You will prepare for your show, right? So we... Claude is only this polite and nice to me when he's on the show. Yeah, he talks to me when the fucking camera stops. All right, Jens, thank you so much. Please keep doing the amazing work that you're doing in travel.

1:57:05For most of us who just get to travel once or twice a year, if we're lucky, we get these corporate things that happen every now and then. This is... It's made so much better and so much more efficient and so much more painless by the kinds of thinking and technology that you bring to this. So thank you. And put it back to the box tomorrow. Yeah, hell, that's a big thing here. Biggest, greatest rivalry. Big stand on the spot. Big one series on our home soil. Yeah, and there are any rumors about planes going on. Stay here. Cancel. Don't know. E-Link. Yeah. We've got some E-Link people here, don't we? Yeah. We've got E-Link here. We've got... Yeah. You know, you're in a couple of... All right, thank you, Jens. Very nice to see you. Thanks, Jens. And thanks, everybody. That is a wrap on the show for this morning. We will see you on next Friday's show live. And if you haven't joined us yet on the Daily Briefing, go there and get your subscription now. It's very, very easy to do.

1:58:06And if it isn't easy, then we will help you to do it. Just email me, garretitgarrethcliff.com, or you can email JanineJ9 at garretitcliff.com to find out more. Have an awesome weekend and good luck to the box tomorrow. And I will see you back in South Africa by lunchtime tomorrow myself. And then we'll back on Monday with more. Cheers, everybody. Bye.