Hendie, I apologize for starting this thread again, but I felt the need to clarify a few points from a SA perspective.

My Internet connection is at best pathetic, I connect at 31200 most times and am flabbergasted if I get 33600. I have never had any problems downloading with any page on this site. It does take a few seconds (up to a minute) to download a graphic intensive page, but I have found that most other web sites take a lot longer to load.

With this, and the fact that I have to pay for every second online, in mind I have to say that SACanada ranks highly in the download times scale for me. I am also not concerned about the costs involved as I feel that the few Rands it costs me to surf SACanada is way less than the many $CA I would have lost if I didn't have the privilege of other SACanada member's insights.

I have been, and am still am, involved in many forums on the net (some of which I run) and can honestly say that SACanada is by far the most moderate when it comes to flaming, etc. Thanks to your moderation skills and the (mostly) level headedness of the group, especially that of Harry. It is also the forum with the most amount of people on it that are willing to help others, regardless of what they need help with. Help is always only a question away.

Even though there are always going to be threads that poke at people's sensitivities, whether intentional or not, I believe that, in true South African fashion, SACanada has achieved an almost perfect balance. Sometimes it is just a case of reading a thread that bothers you, switching off your computer, forgetting about the thread for the rest of the day, then rereading it again in the evening and replying with a refreshed, relaxed perspective.

Keep up the good work , I for one am honoured to be part of this community.

Gautenger,

thanks for the kind words here and for your very strong support of SACanada. I looked at a number of forums and this is the only one I have ever been prepared to be a part of. I never saw myself as someone that would take part on such a thing....but, what can I say. The SACanada operation makes me feel like I am doing something useful. I think Hendie's concept for the forum was spot-on, as is his "constitution" for it. I also think the choice of the Invision software was a very good one.

When I arrived here I made quite a number of mistakes and paid rather dearly for them. This despite having lived in New York before. If SACanada had been around at the time, I am pretty sure I would have avoided them...silly things about houses....silly things about cars....silly things about credit....etc etc etc. As it is, I had one friend here in town and he helped me quite a bit to adapt to the local way of looking at some things. They also put up my wife and myself for almost a week when we flew out here for an interview. In hindsight, that was Godsent. It allowed me to focus exclusively on job-matters...successfully, in the event.

My involvement in SACanada is my way of trying to make good on that support towards others....and it is even fun...even though I lose my balance every now and then and invariably do some damage in the process.

As regards bandwidth, I trawled Canadian sites ever since about 1994 from Pretoria, and therefore I have always been deeply under the impression of the realities of using 28 kbps and later 56kbps connections. Hence the focus on keeping images to an optimal size for both quality and speed. I think, though, that in most cases server loading is a much greater factor in this respect than actual linespeed or image size.

Gautenger, your support and input is always so refreshing and welcome - it's always good to have input from the Old Motherland (even "negative" will be welcome too, if it can help us develop, change-for-the-better and grow ?) but your words here, today I think speared it for most of us who cling to this Forum. Hendie and Harry have done ONE phenomenal job in establishing this Home-From-Home Castle-In-the-Cold ?
How do I Thank Thee ? ..............
I vote a Huge Thanks for the people of SaCanada (especially HxH) who have made it so much better and easier for many of us ?
Come on you guys out there, let's hear from you ?
e.