I recently returned from a trip to South Africa for work. It is a VERY LONG flight (18 hrs from Atlanta!). I knew very little about South Africa before I went. I found out that I still need to learn more and spend more than a few days inside a hotel and office building. ;-)
South Africa is a relatively young democracy with a very proud and diverse people. I was very impressed with the attitude of the people that I met through work and afterwards in the evening. One night, I attended the South African Developers User Group meeting. The topic was workflow which was well received. Since the MSFT rep put me in touch with the organizer, he invited me up at the end of the session for some Q&A on SQL 2005. It only lasted about 10 minutes, but I felt like the developers there really understaood the value of SQL 2005.
On another note, I will be in Houston on March 14th to speak on DB Snapshots at the User Group meeting. If you are in the area, please stop by. You can find out more at http://houston.sqlservercentral.com.