Set in a classy boutique hotel in Rosebank, Johannesburg, Level Four is redolent of older hotel restaurants where standards are high and the menu laced with the familiar. And something from Thailand, inevitably.

I had thought that this restaurant, Level Four, was in the same hotel that I was staying in - the Southern Sun in Rosebank's Sturdee Avenue. But my shuttle driver from the airport frowned and asked, "Which one?"

I said, well, I'm staying at the Southern Sun Hotel at 54 on Bath. No no, he said, those are two different hotels. It turns out they're about a block apart - a long block - which in this part of Joburg means that your hotel receptionists are going to tell you to take an Uber if you don't want to use the hotel shuttle. (Read more about that here.)

But luckily the shuttle was readily available when I needed it so it deposited me outside 54 on Bath just in time to meet some of my favourite colleagues whom I hadn't seen in an age. That's a part of the life of us Maverii -- we seldom see one another outside of a computer screen.

We had wine (for me, whisky for them) in the gorgeous bar on the fourth floor which is currently named after a fancy gin brand. Apparently it changes sponsors every now and then and is...