Gate community

I knew it. There was another security check for SA flights before reaching the gate. Except, as the queue built up to go through, they let half of us pass by unchecked. Best intentions, tempered realities?

I should eat something said the woman selling sandwiches in Costa Coffee. They don't give you food on the flight until after ten. And it's rubbish, by the way, she confided. All the cabin crew eats her sandwiches instead. "Lovely sandwiches!"

In a strong, possibly Iberian accent, she told me about the property boom in South Africa while heating my toastie. "I remember 8 years ago, people were selling one bedroom flats in Spain and buying three- or four bedroom detached houses in Cape Town, with tennis court and pool!"

Would I buy she wondered? I said not to start with. Good she said. You never know what will happen to the economy down there. "It could become Zimbabwe. The black people HATE the whites. They hate them! And here, England is becoming black. They come here, 15,000 come from Eastern Europe to not even work. Just live on benefits. No other country like this. France, Germany, they all say no. But we say, come! I don't understand."

"Nor do I," I said.