![]() ![]() “Our tourists are so important to us right now that one bad experience could turn a nation of visitors away.You can add a free German Word of the Day and picture to your website.Īdd a German Word and Picture of the Day to your WebsiteĮvery day you will get a different word and picture appearing on your website. Schäfer added that travel agencies, airlines and airport officials should exercise cautious communication with tourists travelling to countries with varying regulations relating to passports and immigration control. “And, of course, the Consul General of Germany, Tanya Werheit, who was in constant contact with me late into Saturday night, Sunday and ensure an emergency passport could be issued first thing on Tuesday morning.” “This was teamwork with huge gratitude to CTIA’s Mark Maclean and Frans Mohlabeng, Qatar Airlines, who were patient not to deport her and allow her to remain at the airport for two days with her baby and Immigration who helped with her final entry into SA. It was a team effort in which she said all role-players wanted to abide by the law, but still break the red tape to free them for travel. “While other countries accept this difference, South Africa does not.” “It turns out that out of Marlene’s four extensions, her fourth had a different barcode than the initial three,” she said. #German word of the day password#Schäfer explained that German passports allowed for passport extensions as children aged, instead of getting a renewed password altogether. She said: “It would be so unfair for the mother to be deported when the administrative glitch wasn’t her fault. ![]() Schäfer, the DA’s Deputy Speaker of the Western Cape Provincial Parliament, said she was not going to quit until mother and daughter gained entrance into South Africa. “But just when I thought it was over the officials had misplaced our passports, and it was another hour-and-a-half before it was found.”Įventually Beverley Schäfer was able to work wonders and arrange emergency passports so they could enter the country and start their holiday, Van Leeuwen Boomkamp said. Rebecca said after enduring days of all the moving pieces she was finally set to gain legal entrance to her destination. They are European tourists choosing South Africa as a travel destination, but they get treated like criminals and put in the holding cells, of all places!”Īfter a very long ordeal over documentation, embassies and alleged administrative cock-ups, the Paarl Post witnessed first-hand the family’s reunion on Tuesday morning at De Leeuwenhof Estate. “It is of the utmost importance that tourists are assisted on arrival in South Africa. The family had already approached the German Embassy for assistance, but were told they could not be assisted on a Saturday afternoon, coupled with a German public holiday, the Day of Unity, on Monday.”Īs a role-player in the local tourism industry who also suffered much financial losses due to travel restrictions during the Covid-19 pandemic Van Leeuwen Boomkamp said he was upset over this treatment of tourists at the airport, because tourists bring in much needed revenue into this country. “I immediately called Beverley Schäfer of the DA and informed her of the Horras family’s predicament. Van Leeuwen Boomkamp told Paarl Post Chris urgently called him late Saturday night informing him his wife had been detained at the airport. “This was deemed unacceptable by the immigration officers at CTIA, who wanted to put them on a flight back to Germany on Sunday at 12 noon.” ![]() “The child arrived with her kinderreisepass (child passport) that has documented extensions for young children,” he related. Van Leeuwen Boomkamp immediately took proactive steps to prevent the foreign visitor and her daughter from being deported on the next flight back to Homburg, Germany. And he too was the first port of call for the distraught husband and father, Chris, after his wife and child had been blocked from entering the country. The family’s first stop in South Africa happened to be at the De Leeuwenhof Estate in Klein Drakenstein, Paarl, the guest farm of the well-known commander of the Drakenstein Farm Watch Daan van Leeuwen Boomkamp. “I ate rice and chicken for all meals, but luckily I had a travel bag with baby food for Marlene.” “I was asked to stay overnight in a room with one bed and blankets that had been previously used,” Rebecca said. ![]()
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