Hi, I am a south african and would like to know some stuff about your country, if anyone is interested in sharing. 1. In SA, the acedemic year runs from January to December, same as calender year, makes sense doesn't it? How does it work in the UK? 2. What is your exact time zone, does it change through the year, because sometimes our exam results come out at 23:00 south african time and sometimes at 00:00. I know it's 22:00 UK time. 3. Does the pound use decimals like 1 pound 20 or what. Are there any other coins like shillings or pennies or else. (This is quite important if you write CT1 or others.) In south africa we have Rands (R) and cents (c) .100 cents is 1 rand. Easy, hey? Thanks for comments. Erik
In answer to your questions: 1) The academic year in the UK runs from September to June/July, split into 3 terms. 2) Our time zone is GMT usually, but during summer our clocks go forward one hour. Our clocks have already gone forward, and currently it would appear that we're 1 hour behind south african time. So in October, when our clocks go back again, we'll be 2 hours behind you guys. Which explains the timing of results coming out. 3) It's pounds and pence/pennies. 100pence = £1. And yes we use decimal points, e.g. £1.20 is one pound twenty pence - sounds kinda similar to south africa.
Great, Thanks. So you actually wake up one day, and set your clock one hour into the future and then you only have a 23 hour day. And then later you set it back to original GMT and you have a 25 hour day. Sounds like fun. Do you have to work that extra hour? Erik
The clock change always happens at 2am on a Sunday so it's an hour in bed that you lose or gain rather than at work. But yeah, we basically get up in the morning and change the clocks. Or forget to change them and arrive an hour late / early for work on the Monday morning........................ I think the theory behind it is we like having the longer evenings in the summer but if we didn't change in the winter it wouldn't get light in some places till after the kids went into school at 9am. Suppose it seems weird to you but I guess we're kinda used to it!
In South Africa, the sun comes up (in Cape Town) at about 7:00 in winter and about 05:00 in summer and it sets at 18:30 in winter and about 20:30 in summer. How about UK. By the way, Johannesburg and Durban is before us, so there the sun comes up at 04:00 in the morning in summer! Cheers.
Because we are so far from the equator the hours of daylight vary widely in the UK throughout the year. Around Christmas the sun can rise as late as 8am and it will be dark by 4.15. In summer the sun rises around 5am and sets as late as 9.30pm Exact times depend on wherre you live, up in Scotland the days are shorter in the winter and longer in the summer than in London.
