Springbok hero Bryan Habana and his wife Janine have been in Cape Town barely a year but they behave like seasoned Capetonians.
And life is good. At 27 Bryan has the wife of his dreams and they live in an exclusive Cape Town suburb. All that’s needed to complete the happy picture are a few children but he and Janine (28) want to enjoy themselves for a year or two before starting a family.
They’re spending a few days at the One & Only Hotel in Cape Town. Outside the winter sun peeks from behind Table Mountain as they talk enthusiastically about their spacious new house on an estate in Plattekloof in Cape Town’s northern suburbs.
But they’re not ready to show YOU their new home. Bryan laughs. “It’s still an empty shell,” he says. “We still have to buy a lot of furniture.”
They’re enjoying the hospitality of Sol Kerzner’s magnificent hotel in the V&A Waterfront while their house is being worked on.
“When we saw the house it was like, wow, our dream house for the future, but let’s look for something smaller,” Janine says. Bryan thought carefully about it and, bearing in mind they wanted to make Cape Town their home, he decided to do the deal.
Bryan says because of all his touring they’ve had no time to decorate the house. When he’s away Janine uses Skype to show him décor ideas.
But now they’ve approached someone to decorate for them - Aidan Bennetts, the hunky handyman from the TV programme Top Billing who also regularly provides décor ideas in YOU.
The deeply religious couple have made friends at their new church, the Joshua Generations Church in Table View. It’s called the surfer church, Bryan says with a laugh.
Janine, a sports scientist, says when Bryan is on tour she keeps herself occupied. She’s opening a local branch of the Institute of Fitness Professionals, a training institute for gym instructors in Cape Town. “I miss working with people because fitness is my passion. But I realised I should enjoy the free time because I don’t know when I’ll have it again.”
He would welcome playing rugby overseas but not for too long. “It would be only a short chapter in our lives. Cape Town and South Africa are our home. We wouldn’t exchange them for anything in the world.”