Return of the Magical Potatoes

So, I believe I left you all in Mthwalume, working on my ISP. There's a lot to update you on, but imma keep it short and sweet, don't you worry. I've spend the past few days writing a 67 page ISP, so I don't feel like typing out a super in-depth blog post.

Well, first of all I successfully completed my ISP period at the Bangibizo School. It was sad to leave all of the teachers and learners behind, but it was even harder to say goodbye to my host family and my mama!

On Monday, the teachers at the school threw me a goodbye party! I got a cake, some snacks, and a lot of juice!!! Also, reason for the title of this blog post: Remember those magical potatoes I told you about that made an appearance at my first dinner in Mthwalume? Well, they returned. It was monday night. I sat down to dinner. Mama gave me the warning that she hadn't measured out the curry powder again and apologized for the spiciness. I looked down at my plate, dreading the experience, when I was pleasantly surprised by the MAGICAL POTATOES! SO GOOD. They were even better this time. I'm gonna have to experiment in making them. hmm. Anyways, Tuesday, the educators had a teachers union meeting, so school ended early. I was coming down with a cold so I celebrated by taking a three hour nap!

Me and some of the staff of the Bangibizo School at my goodbye party!

I really enjoyed getting to spend some quality time with my host family in my last few days there. Especially this little munchkin, Tutu. We developed the fun game of "lets go through all of Andrea's stuff and point to each thing and ask what it is and act out what we think it is for!" We also continued our tradition of singing songs and chasing each other around the house and yard.

Tutu and one of the 2 year old twins!

I managed to successfully make it through the time period without falling into the river! Below you can see the river, relatively calm, with the stepping stones used to cross!

random cow acting all authoritative on the way home

cool picture of the sunset I though I'd share

 Wednesday was a sad day for all, as it was my last morning in the school. I went to school until 11, got a ride home, packed, and was shipped back to the dirty durbs (Durban).

My 6th grade class singing a song to say goodbye!

Funny family pictures. From L to R in the back, Abongwe, Tami, Andisiwe, Asanda, Anele, and me!
front row is Mama and Gogo!

Upon my return to Durban, I promptly saw the Hunger Games movie, which I could write an entire blog post about, so we'll just leave it at that.

Thursday and Friday were spent writing writing writing, eating eating eating, going to Victoria Street Market, going to the beach, getting ice cream from Milkylane.... you know, being productive.

Oh yes, I'm staying in the Windemere again,  right across from the beach. I'm in a new room with new roommates, well Crazy Cara was in my room before, but this time I'm living with Jenny, Sara, Maalika, and Liora as well. Good times. Made rice krispy treats. A lot of pages were written between the 6 of us over the past few days.

sums up the general attitude about writing our ISPs.

This morning (Saturday), I woke up at 5:30 to finish up my ISP and then was picked up at 7:30 to head to school! yay! I handed in my 67 page paper, printed it out for binding, and gave a 20 minute presentation about my findings. Now I am officially done with all of my work for the semester! Bring on Summer!

Tomorrow we leave for St. Lucia to go on a few safaris and go to the beach and all that fun stuff! We get back on Wednesday, and then Thursday I fly out of South Africa!!! No no, don't get too excited. I'm not coming home yet. First I gotta go to Victoria falls, check out Zambia, Zimbabwe, and Botswana, say a brief hello to Jo'burg, endure a longgggg flight across the Atlantic Ocean, and THEN, never fear, I will make my triumphant return to the United States.

As a result of the end of my formal study abroad program, I am not sure when/where my next blog post will take place. It may infact end up being posted from the US! Who knows!? Stay tuned to find out.

Missing you all.
I'm ready to be back in the US, but also not ready to leave Africa or all of my amazing friends here, which is leading to a strange mix of feelings.

Anyways,
Salani Kahle!

"White People Only"

I figure I'll start this post off giving you a view of how I start my day every morning! With this beautiful sunrise! Pro: its gorgeous. Con: it means I wake up before dawn every day.

So this week has just been more teaching, playing, and learning as always. Nothing too spectacular or adventuresome.  Instead of me telling you every detail about what I did this week, I think I'll have this blog be a series of short anecdotes, fun facts, and life lessons learned (not organized an any particular fashion) in the past week in Mtwalume!

the mirror in my room says "white people only." I'm not sure why its there,
bu it has inspired the title of this post!

• I have eaten more tomatoes in the past week than I have my entire life.
• I think I dislike red vegetables more than green ones.
• Things I didn't eat before going to South Africa: Vegetables in general, tomatoes, beets, meat from a bone, meat from unknown sources, 5 cups of tea a day, freshly killed cows, guavas, mangoes, avocados, 7 pieces of white bread in one day, 2 hot dogs with breakfast
• Things I have eaten on a regular basis in South Africa: (see above list)
• Some have been welcomed additions to my diet/lifestyle, others not so much. 
• Thus I have gained to eat the ability to palate a variety of foods.
• Flush toilets are a wonderful invention. I have never longed for a toilet more in my life.
• I have learned to fully embrace the concept of a pee bucket. The one here is very tall -- almost the perfect height for comfortable peeing!
• I have determined the perfect amount of tea and juice to consume in a day to only have to pee in the morning and at night (times when the pee bucket is put out in the back "bathing room.")
• My hair has gotten long. It sticks up in weird places in the morning.
• I have to cross a river while walking to school. Crossing involves hopping from one rock to another. After it rains there are even less options of ways to cross. I will be very surprised if i don't end up with wet feet by the end of my stay here.

view from part of my walk home!

• My walk is also mostly downhill on the way to school, making for a long, slightly miserable walk uphill on my way home. Mama walks very slowly and rests often, which is a good excuse for me!
•  Chickens are most likely to be the first to greet you when you go anywhere. 
• Dogs are usually not friendly. 
• I hear the word "shaya" meaning to hit, and the phrase "unamanga!"literally translated as "you have lies" about 20 times a day. (probably even more at school).
• I'm kind of getting sick of being told "I look like a china" although its usually followed by the statement "you're so beautiful!" so I guess I can take it. 
• Seeing pieces of weaves, chunks of hair, and cut off braids along the side of the street is a common occurrence.
•  Sunday is the most popular day to get drunk (thus, Mama typically doesn't like you to go for walks Sunday evenings). 
• There are two small children who have started waving to me and yelling "BYE!" on my way to and from school. Mama just laughs. 
• I got to go to the Ugu Municipality event where they donate new uniforms to needy children! It was nice to see all the kids get dressed up, although most of it was in Zulu, so I didn't understand much. 

lots of shoes at "dress a child"day

• Beer bottles are not to be recycled, they are to be broken by smashing them on the ground.
• Today my grade 6 students finally got up the courage to ask to touch my hair. 
• There is still 2 hours until the nightly soaps start and I'm not quite sure what to do with myself until then. I have already had my tea and that is way too long of a time period to do anything productive like write my ISP.
• Mama tries to hide carrots in my phutu and cucumbers in my bean curry. It doesnt work. I know they're there. 
• Last night mama bought the wrong spaghetti. It was whole wheat with extra fiber. Both her and the girls were really nervous about eating it. My advice was put lots of butter and salt! It worked!

My house!

View from my window. Hey cows! (there are a lot more too...)

and last, my favorite part of the week:

• I have bonded with my 5 year old sister, Nati! They call her Tutu (after Desmond), and she is the cutest little fireball ever. She has so much energy and is such a trouble maker, but she is adorable, so its ok. She is constantly talking (to herself or whoever will listen), and if she's not talking she is singing! Recently we have started singing "this is the way we brush our teeth" "the intsy wintsy spider" and "if you're happy if you know it" on a regular basis, chasing each other around the house, and tickling each other. She also really likes pulling on my leg and arm hair and then laughing her adorable but slightly evil laugh. She also likes tracing over the scar on my foot, which tickles a lot! 

Kids working in the garden at school!

Well, I think I'll leave it at that for now. I only have three days of my ISP left! Which is crazy to think about, and in less than a month I will be home in the US! 

True Life: I'm Addicted to South African Soap Operas

So, Thursday after my last post, and during Scandal, the power went out. Normally this wouldn't be a big deal. I mean, it was dark out so we couldn't see anything and had to get out candles, but I found myself freaking out that I wasn't going to catch the end of the episode. Thats when it dawned on me. I'm addicted to SA soapies. Let me give you the run down. There are three shows that I have to watch every night, even though they all involve very dramatic plots centering around a magazine company. At 6:30 there is Rhythm City, where Gail's boyfriend is a serial rapist and their therapist just put two and two together. There is a break at 7:00 for the news, and this is usually when the family has prayer time. At 7:30 is Scandal, where Shakira is a murderer and in love with another member of her family, Tino, and also pregnant with his child, and Donna, Tino's girlfriend, wants Shakira committed (duh), but Shakira has convinced Tino not to because she is pregnant. Phew. Then, at 8:00 is Generations, my favorite. Right now Queen's son, Prince (fitting?) is mad at her because he found out that she has a new boyfriend, Lungile, and Phenyo just broke off his wedding to a girl he's been dating for 7 years because he thinks he's in love with Deneo, but his ex-fiance barged into one of Deneo's meetings with an important client and called her a slut, so now Deneo wants nothing to do with him. I know these all probably sound like pretty stupid story lines, but there is something about them. I even like reading the subtitles! I also tend to get them confused... I realized I'm probably going to go through withdrawal when I leave South Africa. Maybe they're on DVD and I can order them online. I sure hope so. OK sorry for that rant. Anyways, never fear, although I missed the end of Scandal, the power came on right as the theme song to Generations started playing.

The school garden starting to grow in nicely! Next week I get to help plant some more seeds!

 
 Friday I got to spend some time with the aunties that cook the food for the kids at school who either don't get fed at home or whose parents can't afford to pack them a lunch, as well as those that don't have parents...For my ISP I'm looking at the role of the school in caring/providing for orphans and vulnerable children (OVCs), so I greatly enjoyed spending my morning in the kitchen!

The Aunties hard at work! Fish stew!

There were HUGE pots of rice and stew.

All of the buckets for the different grades after they were filled with rice and stew!

Some "salad" that they gave me to try/eat with my fish stew! Not bad!

Saturday  I went to a Zulu ceremony. When a girl turns 13 or 14 (begins menstruating), they throw her a big party on her birthday! It was a lot of fun, but I wish I had known more people there. Obviously the first friend I made was a 2 year old. We had fun chasing each other around the tent as I helped set the tables. After the prep work it was time for some dancing. All the girls were dressed in traditional Zulu dress (meaning most of them were shirtless), and they sang and dance while people went around and pinned money to the birthday girl's headband. They also draped some part of a cow over her shoulders.. questionable. Either way, it was very entertaining and fun to watch!

The money headband and Mama adding to the collection!

Saturday night I was in my room when I heard a knock on the door. A few minutes later I heard a baby cry. We don't have a baby living here.... So, naturally I decided to investigate. As I was walking down the hallway, one of my sister's turned the corner with a 3 month old baby! Surprise! She immediately thrust her into my arms, as two more small children (~2 year old twins) rounded the corner. "And here are the twins!" she exclaimed. Where did these children come from? I have no idea. The baby liked me enough, but the twins were a little skeptical. The little boy eventually warmed up to me a bit, but the other girls were too busy doting over the little girl for me to get to interact with her much. Either way it was a very pleasant surprise! At one point I went to brush my teeth, and when I came back, I found that they disappeared just as quickly and mysteriously as they had come.

This morning I woke up, had another huge breakfast, and finally convinced Gogo to let me help with the dishes. Gogo washed, I rinsed, and Andiswe dried. After we were finished Gogo said "Thats enough, you must go rest now." Well, at least I was useful for 15 minutes this morning. I wish they would let me do more. I feel like I need to earn my keep, especially since the girls do so much around the house. I feel so lazy just sitting there watching! I did a little bit of work on my ISP (meaning I started a word document and set up a table of contents, with out the page numbers of course). I also go to watch some ESPN. I was in heaven. They were even doing the NBA recap, perfect! Anele then came inside and asked if I wanted to come play outside with them! Yes! I did! I played a bunch of running games with Anele and Andiswe, my twin 11 year old sisters, Asanda, my 13 year old sister, Nati, my 5 year old sister, Zima, a 5th grader at Bangibizo who walks home with me sometimes, and another 3rd and 4th grader from the neighborhood. We played a lot of running games, had some relay races, and I taught them how to play fishy fishy cross my ocean. It was really hot in the sun, so we picked some guavas, and sat in the shade of an avacado tree. We played some hand games and they tried to teach me how to zulu dance (I'm no where near flexible enough). We sung our respective national anthems, mine being a lovely solo, and then they quizzed me on some Zulu words. We then realized it was already 2:30! So we went inside, had some lunch and tea, and listened to some music on my laptop.

Other than that I've been trying to teach the kids, trying to bond with my host family, eating immense amounts of food, trying to find the minimum amount of liquid needed to stay hydrated without having to pee more than a few times a day (both my bladder and my stomach have increased in size during this homestay), and enjoying the beautiful scenery here in Mtwalume!

ISP Initiation

10 April 2012:

Today I was transported to my ISP site, although I arrived too late to start at the Bangibizo School. I met Gogo and got to relax for a little while while Mama and the kids were at school. Everyone eventually came home and I got to meet all of them. There are so many that live here, I’m still not sure of the exact number. There are even more that are working elsewhere or going to school. Everyone is very nice and they speak very good English, which is helpful. I also found out that it was Mama’s first day at a new school… The Bangibizo school! That means that I will be walking to and from school with her every day!

It is very nice here. I'm sharing a bedroom with Mama and one of my sisters. Dinner was delicious as always (I swear they do something to their squash that makes it addictive). There were also these peeled baked potato type things. I have never had a potato prepared in such a way, but they were incredible! Thank god Mama told me I didn't have to eat all of the food if I was full, though. Such a relief!

I do miss all my SIT friends and being in Durban. Its nice to have your own space and be able to come and go as you please... not to mention being able to go to the beach every day. I'm beginning to understand why they put us in pairs for rural home stays. Not that this one is bad or anything, it just gets a bit lonely despite all of the kids around! 

11 April 2012:

Today was my first day of school. In the morning the kids assemble in front of the school, line up by grade, and have prayer time. They then go to their first classes of the day. I started out with Mrs. Zama in her grade 4 class. She had to go to a meeting with some parents, so I taught them some math and we went over a few pages in their workbook. They have break at 10:00 until 10:45 where food is served and they get to play outside. After break I was with Mama in her 6^th grade class! We had some tea and sandwiches during the break, and after I sat in on her economics and management class. They were learning about management and leadership! I am still confused by the schedule. There doesn’t seem to be a completely set time for things to happen. At some point the A class will leave and the B class will come in and the lecture will repeat, but I have no concept of the time table yet.

I got to talk to Mrs. Zama about my project, so it looks like she will help me out a lot. She said she will organize for me to talk to the OVC committee too! She also liked the sound of the photovoice project, so that’s another plus!

It was quite a long day, not to mention slightly overwhelming. While I did enjoy being at the school, not being able to speak fluent Zulu with the kids is a slight challenge and there are SO many kids in each class. My day was also unorganized, so it was a lot of sitting around, which made me very tired. I'm hoping things will start to pick up as I get to know the kids more and settle into more of a routine. 

12 April 2012:

Today was a lot more exciting than yesterday, but at times a lot more frustrating. The morning started out with prayer again and then I was back in Mama’s 6^th grade class teaching math in the morning. Actually I was just observing again, but I did correct their homework. Random side note: one of the boys in her class had stuck a bunch of pens in his hair. I found it amusing anyways.

During the middle of the period Mrs. Zama called me to the office where she showed me the OVC seeds that were sent for the garden by the department of education. The send seeds and some tools since the school has been chosen for a DOE funded OVC program. Later in the period she pulled me out to show me the kitchen where the Aunties make food for the children. There are huge pots cooked over gas stoves and the food is then dished out in buckets for each class. Today was samp and beans! I got to sample some, and it was quite delicious.

After break Mama had to go to a workshop so I went to Mrs. Zama’s class. She didn’t have anything for the kids to do so I taught them math! Her class is pretty well behaved. They get loud very easily and don’t like to stay seated, but I guess they are in 4^th grade. After we finished the correcting their assignment we still had a lot of time left, so I gave them some extra practice problems to do. The classes switched and the other 4^th grade class came in. They are less well behaved and gave me a very hard time. It was frustrating and I was just getting to the point where I was annoyed when Mrs. Zama came in and told me that the OVC committee was meeting, so I was to go sit with them. It was quite a relief. I went to the classroom they were in and they told me all about the program, their meetings, what they get from the government, what they do themselves, how they budget the money, and some of the things they do for the orphans/vulnerable children.

After I went back to Mrs. Zama’s class where she had me occupy the students until the end of the day. I asked them what they wanted to do and they came to the conclusion that they wanted to teach me Zulu! So they would write words in Zulu on the board, ask if I knew them, and then teach me the English word. We then somehow got back to doing extra math problems, which surprisingly most of them are really enthusiastic about. Mrs. Zama then let us go outside, where we played a few games together. Many of them involved dancing, which the kids got a kick out of my attempts, which only made them want to choose me to go into the center of the circle.

 Since Mama had left early for the workshop, I walked home with Zima. I met gogo in the kitchen. She helped me make some tea (meaning she showed me where everything was) and we talked for a little while. Now I'm here!

Unfortunately, I'm not sure that my Photovoice project is going to work. I might have to make some modifications.. we'll see. But I should be able to get a lot of other primary data, which is good news. I was much more happy with my day today, despite the frustrations of trying to get the 4th graders to sit down and be quiet. I guess I'm just getting a first hand account of what its like to be a teacher here. I'm beginning to learn why its so hard to be productive in class and why so many of the learners are struggling to pass. There are so many kids in a classroom that its easy for some kids to fall through the cracks so to speak, and its so hard to give kids individualized attention when they need it. You also spend most of your time disciplining them and trying to get them to be quiet (or at least I did). I liked that I was doing something all day though, whether talking to the OVC committee or teaching the kids. It helped me to stay more awake, thats for sure. At the end of the day some of the fourth graders came up to me and shook my hand or hugged me and asked if I would be teaching them tomorrow. Hopefully that means they like having me there! 

Other than that, I have watched way too much Phineas and Ferb, but on the plus side I get to watch all of my South African soaps again! Wahoo! I think I'm all caught up now, and from 6:30 to 8:30 we watch one after another. Then its bed time. Perfection. 

Oh, and a note on the toilet situation. I've made sure to bring toilet paper to school with me, since there is none there. They have very nice long drop toilets though so I don't mind that at all! At home I have yet to use the long drop. I heard from Seth and the outhouse is the worst he has used in SA. They have a bucket in the "bathroom" in the house, but thats only for numero uno. So (sorry if this is TMI) I save my numero dos for school so I can avoid the outhouse here. So far so good!

Ok, this will be the end of my rambling. I still miss everyone (both here in South Africa and back in the US of A). Everyone constantly talks in Zulu, which I can understand bits and pieces of, but I generally feel outnumbered and have been a lot quieter than I usually am.

Don't drink the water...

Well its been an interesting past week or so, that's for sure.

When I last left off, I was at the Windemere hanging out by the beach. The following Sunday we moved into 'ISP accommodations,' meaning it was supposed to be the start of our projects, but since mine is in a school, and schools are on vacation until today, the 10th, I couldn't really go to my ISP site yet. Erin was in a similar situation, so we both have been staying at the SIT house together (with Seth on most nights too). As a brief re-cap of the week, I spent most of it in the house, bumming off of the free internet, procrastinating on doing anything truly productive, and hanging out with Erin (and Seth most of the time). On Tuesday we went into Durban for the day and ran some errands at the Workshop and went to Victoria Street Market and the Mosque. Both of those last places always amaze me. There are so many different people and so many different vendors and colors and smells! Its hard to put into words.

On wednesday Erin and I went to see the Lorax with Smu. It was good to get to see her and mama again, and the movie was pretty good! Very funny and entertaining. Lots of singing. Splendid. Thursday was another do nothing and procrastinate day. I was supposed to start/finish an essay that was due today so I wouldn't have to worry about it, but that didn't really happen.

Friday was the start of a grand adventure. We like to refer to it as 'the most hastily planed camping trip in the history of South Africa.' Erin and I left the SIT house around 1:30 to catch a 2:30 bus out of Durban Station. Lugging huge backpacks, a large tent, and a few bags of food, we eventually made it to the station where we met... wait for it... SETH! Obviously. After a short wait, the bus arrived, we got on, and made it to Port Shepstone! That was the easy/planned part. We had banked on their being a local cab company that we could magically get the number of and call to give us the ride. After about an hour and a half or so we finally got the hold of Owen, who said he would send someone to drive us. Andile showed up in an old, beaten up car, we put our things in the trunk, climbed in, and were off. We got to the Oribi Gorge Hotel, about 16 kilometers from our final destination when our driver pulled over to ask someone if there were any gas stations around..... We all took a look at the dashboard and saw there was about an eighth of a tank of gas left. Great. We finally got a ride, and now its getting dark and we have no gas. Joyous. Needless to say, we finally made it (not sure if Andile made it back to town, however), and we were able to set up camp in the dark, start a fire, and eat our delicious canned dinner. Oh, and our "fire pit" was a big bowl type thing out a stick so it was at a comfortable cooking height. Convenient, right? Actually not, because it had NO BOTTOM. Wondaful. We made a bottom out of firewood and put the charcoal on top, and managed to cook dinner before the fire burned completely through the bottom.

That night was probably one of the longest ones I have ever experienced. It was freezing, the ground was hard, the tent was small, and we accidentally oriented ourselves so that our heads were slightly downhill...

Ok this is getting long winded, so I will try to tell the rest of the story with mostly pictures. The next morning the tent very quickly transformed from a freezer to a sauna in about 15 minutes after the sun rose. We escaped ASAP and made breakfast (porridge!) over the fire. The plan for the day was to hang out at the game reserve, and the following sequence of pictures will depict our day. It would have included large amounts of walking, but these two Zulus, Thuli and her companion whose name we never learned, gave us a ride to the suspension bridge and down the road! We only had to walk a little further to some viewpoints, and then the 12 or so kilometers back to our camp site.

Along the way we got to see some animals! These two were my favorite, for obvious reasons.

After a short drive we were at the suspension bridge with an amazing view of the gorge!

facing any fear of heights that we had at the other end of the suspension bridge!
The platform was a little wobbly to say the least.

After the suspension bridge we set of on our own to walk to some viewpoints. Found these flowers on the way!

Another amazing view of the gorge. So spectacular!

So happy that I skipped the whole walk back! Jokes, but I was really happy!

On the way back we stopped at the chapel with this abandoned house right next door.
So much to explore!

All in all it was a very successful day. The zebras started it off right and made us so happy, and everything was so green and lovely that we had huge smiles on our face all day. We enjoyed another canned dinner (no, I'm not being sarcastic), and got ready for bed (we tried to bundle up better and make better pillows, as well as re-orient ourselves to facilitate sleep. Nonetheless, I woke up at 3am extremely claustrophobic and needing to use the bathroom, so I attempted to leave the tent for some fresh air. After being outside for 30 seconds, I looked to my right, saw a hyena/dog/wolf/creature, which started barking/howling/growling/hissing at me, so I immediately unzipped the tent and actually dove back inside. That was enough excitement/fresh air for me!

The next morning, after our porridge, we thought it would be an excellent idea to walk 16 kilometers down the road to explore oribi gorge, only to have to walk 16 kilometers back afterwards........ Yeah in hind sight it was a pretty dumb idea. We made it 8 kilometers before we were starting to come to this realization. We finally made it, and it was so worth it.

The view from the top of the gorge. I think this was called Baboon's Castle!

Enjoying the view :)

Baboon's castle from the bottom of the gorge! It was a rough climb down.
The sign said only 170 meters, but neglected to mention that it was all rock climbing.

We made it down and found a nice rock by the waterfall to have our lunch!

Seth and I decided to climb some rocks to the top of the waterfall while Erin rested!!!

Unfortunate mishap at the top lead to a little bit of a bloody leg....

But on the plus side it got us a free ride back to the game reserve,
so we didn't have to walk another 16 kilometers in the dark!

Ok, so a quick blub about the post title. We got to Oribi Gorge and we paid for admission for hiking, and the lady noticed we were carrying our own water bottles. The lady was very quick and adamant about us not filling our bottle up from the tap. Oops. Thats what we had been doing at Lake Eland this whole time.... We hadn't gotten sick yet... yet being the key word. I tried to ask her if that was for the entire area, and she didn't give me a straight answer but told me to go into the restaurant to the bar if we wanted a refill, otherwise we would be in the bathroom all day. Seth and I just kind of looked at each other skeptically.... It turns out we didn't have to refill and that the Lake Eland water didn't make any of us sick, but everyone telling us not to drink the water only reminds me of the Dave Matthews song, "Dont Drink The Water," and after I cut my knee open, I laughed to myself as I sang, "Don't drink the water, there's blood in the water." Oops!

We finally made it back, and exhausted we bundled up again to prepare for another long night.

Unfortunately it started to rain, and our tent wasn't the most waterproof thing out there. Although we did find out that it was pretty dang airtight. Each night we had woken up at about 3am breathing extremely heavily. I would be breathing almost as fast as if I had just run a race. After cutting open my leg, I suddenly woke up out of breath, with a headache, and thought that it was infected and the infection had moved to my lungs and was about to reach my heart. Never fear, this wasn't the case. The cut was fine, but in the morning we did finally realize that the tent was suffocating us. As soon as we opened the door, our breathing slowed and our heart rates returned to normal.

Clouds over one of the lake on our last rainy morning.

The rain was a nice ending to our trip. In a way it was nice that we weren't baking, but it made it freezing even during the day time, not to mention that our feet were perpetually wet for the entire day. Packing up camp was relatively easy despite the rain.  Andile came back and picked us up to bring us back to town -- that part went much smoother than before. We ordered some fries and mielie (corn on the cob) from Nando's so we could sit in there and eat other snacks and stay warm and out of the rain (we were completely out of money otherwise we would have probably gotten more food). At 1:45 we headed over to the bus stop, a random gas station. The bus was supposed to come at 2:15, and this was supposed to be even easier than the cab ride. 2:15 came and went.... no bus... then 2:30... no bus. I tried calling their phone number and their after hours number.... no answer.... then it was 2:45... still no bus and no answer. Ok, so we're going to be stranded in Port Shepstone on a public holiday, we're going to each lose R110 that we already payed for the bus ticket, AND to top it off we are freezing and its now pouring rain. FINALLY we got through to the bus company, just as we were starting to call our friends back in Durban to come up with an alternative route home. The bus had just run into a delay because of the rain and was on its way. Phew. Big relief. I'm sure you're all happy to know that we made it safely back to Durban.

It sure was an interesting weekend. Looking back it was a lot of ups and downs. Extreme situations. Pure joy and utter happiness as well as lying miserably in the tent and bleeding profusely from my knee. It was kind of like a real life hunger games/quarter quell, with a different terror at every hour of the day, or at least the night. One hour is suffocation, one hour hyenas, one hour freezing temperatures, one hour deadly rocks.....SWEET! Would I do it again? Probably not without a car. I definitely want to go back with a car some day so that I can do more and see the rest of the park and reserve that I didn't get the chance to since it took so dang long to walk everywhere. All in all it was an amazing weekend with two amazing friends, and although it sounds cheesy, its an experience I will most likely never forget.

I've started my ISP period, finally. I'll update you all on that more in my next post.
Salani kahle (stay well, everyone)
<3

"if you feel good, you do good"

 So, I believe I left off on Monday, when we were working on our ISP proposals. Tuesday was a rough day, considering we all had a late night the night before, but we had no lecture scheduled for the afternoon, so we got to go home at 2! I finished my assignment and then obviously headed straight to the beach before dinner, Generations, and bed before 9:30!

Erin made me "21" pancakes for my birthday breakfast!!!

Wednesday was definitely one of the most interesting birthdays of my life along with one of the best: not the way I had imagined my 21^st birthday playing out. We woke up and went to school as usual, except instead of normal class we got dropped off at University of KwaZulu-Natal for a body mapping activity!!! It was so much fun! I haven’t really had a chance to draw here, so getting to paint, draw, color, and get messy was a nice stress reliever and break from normal classes. We started with a large piece of paper and had a partner trace the outlines of our body onto it. We were then taken through different steps to reflect on our selves, our lives, our goals, and what means the most to us.

beginning of the body mapping process

hard at work

my final product!!! (I'm supposed to be running,
but its hard to pose on a narrow piece of paper.
i think you can get the general idea though...)

Afterwards we walked back to the SIT house. I stopped at Debonaires to get some pizza for lunch, and then we had a lecture on sanitation. I went from body mapping to talking about poop. We learned all about the different kind of toilets and improved pit toilets and how long it takes poop to dry… it was very interesting, but the lecturer was pretty entertaining and kept us laughing, so that was good! I also learned that the cheapest way to purify your water is to put it in an old coke bottle (or something similar) and leave it on the roof in the sun. The sun will kill all the yucky things in it, so all you have to do is shake it up and drink it! Or I guess you could refrigerate it first to make it cold. But that’s besides the point.

Then, after my day of body mapping and learning about poop, I went home and immediately went to the beach. My only complaint was that it was kind of cloudy, but who am I kidding, I really can’t complain at all because I was at the beach in South Africa body surfing and flipping in the waves on my 21^st birthday. I had to take a moment to remember that I was turning 21 and not 8. Also, yes I do actually mean flipping. Seth and I have a new favorite hobby, which is that when a big wave comes we plug our noses (very essential – I would also plug my ears if possible but I don’t have enough hands), and stick our feet into the air out of the water. The wave, if powerful enough then flips us upside down and all around until we pop right side up out of the water with huge smiles on our faces! Its so exhilarating!

Anyways, after that we showered and got ready to go out to dinner. I realized my jeans are very tight (I wasn’t sure I was going to be able to wear them). And then we walked down the street to a hotel with a Japanese restaurant downstairs! It was SOOO good. I got edamame and a deepfried tofu dish with teppanyaki-don for dinner. My goodness. Considering I haven’t had Japanese food in  the longest time, it was pretty spectacular. Also. This next sentence is more addressed to my grandparents, but for a split second I thought it would be a really good idea to make teppanyaki in my apartment, then realized that was, in actuality, a very bad idea and virtually impossible for two reasons: a) the size of my kitchen and quality of my stove (see picture below), and b)the availability of Japanese food/ingredients in this country.

part of my delicious dinner! YUM

My stove. No I am not kidding. I couldn't make this stuff up if I tried.

After dinner we went back to the apartment. Erin made me delicious cupcakes and everyone sung happy birthday, and then my brother and his friend came and picked us up in a minibus taxi to take us to his house in Chesterville.

Singing happy birthday :)

Now, this is where things got interesting. All of the sudden we see police lights behind us. That in itself wasn’t concerning, we actually didn’t think anything of it at first. It wasn’t until they started yelling at us to pull over via the intercom that we realized they were after us! First of all we had a few too many people in the car than it was registered for (but that’s a common occurrence in this country. We didn’t know why we were pulled over though. So we were all kind of freaked out. The driver and my brother got back in the car and we started to drive to chesterville, but the cops followed us. Suspicious. They followed us the whole way to chesterville. Escort? It turns out the car wasn’t supposed the be on the road and the driver could have gotten arrested and we would have had to find our way home from the police station, but luckily that wasn’t how the night turned out. We made it safely to Lungelo’s house, where we kicked off my 21^st birthday party South African style!

Becky, Bhuwa, and Crazy Cara getting down

Thursday morning we slept in! by that I mean I stayed in bed until 9. We didn’t have any class, so we got to do whatever we wanted! I went to the beach for a little while in the morning, but it was cloudy and windy so I didn’t stay for too long. I came back up for lunch, and then at 2 we walked to the movie theater at the Suncoast Casino. We saw The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel. (sorry guys, you can’t see it until May, although I guess you guys got to see The Hunger Games before us, soooo you actually get the better deal.) Anyways, it was SO good. So cute. So many old people. All star cast. All that jazz. I shed a few tears and we all really wanted to go to India by the end of it. Actually it was only about 2 minutes into the movie when we realized that.

After the movie I went back to the beach with Seth again. We met this interested Indian man in the water. He really liked my haircut. Weirdly enough he was the 4^th person to comment on it on my way from my room to the beach. Sorry. Off topic. SOOOO he asked us where we were from, we said America, so he brought up Martin Luther King! He asked if we knew of him, we answered yes, he asked us if we knew what his dream was. I said it was something to do with people of all different races coming together as equals and he flat out told me I was wrong, proceeding to tell us that his dream was for the children to rule. Interesting interpretation. He also gave us all sort of life advice and even offered to buy us dinner, because when he went abroad people helped him out! (when he found out I was part Japanese he was all excited about telling me how he went to japan when he was younger). We politely declined. He also went on a rant about how kids these days only play with guns and electronics, saying how no one plays badminton anymore. Shame. As he left with his two sons he said “How do you say it in America? Good-bye? Adios? Or I guess that’s Mexico.” Seth and I both just laughed and said “Yeah, its good-bye.”

It certainly was a fun birthday. I was so glad to spend it with all of my friends and my brothers. They all helped to make it such a great day. I’m also so glad I’ve had the opportunity to go on the trip and meet all of these people. I couldn’t have asked for much more! Never in my wildest dreams did I think I would go from body mapping, to a poop lecture, to the beach, to Japanese food, to a run in with the cops, to a braai in Chesterville all in one day, not to mention my 21^st birthday… and not to mention in SOUTH AFRICA! Man, do I love this country.

Don't Touch a Zulu Man's Head

Well, sorry I’ve been so lazy with my blogging.

We got back from the rural homestays on the 14^th and have been living on the beach in the Windermere ever since! So, that means that every day has pretty much consisted of me going to school, coming home, going to the beach, getting ice cream, making dinner, and maybe doing some homework if I feel so inclined! We have been to the beach at least once a day (sometimes two or three or four) since we got here, so in other words, I’ve been in absolute heaven.

View from the 12th floor.

So to explain the title of this weeks post:

Two weekends ago Seth and I went to visit our families in Cato. On the way back, we got a little bit lost trying to find the right bus stop that would take us back to our apartment. In the process, not only did we make some new ‘friends,’ but it also got dark…. So, we finally found the bus stop, but it was in a sort of sketchy area and there were a bunch of men hanging out right in front of it drinking beer in the back of a truck. We decided it might be a better decision to try to walk to the next stop on the line, when they started talking to us. They told us they’d look out for the bus for us and make sure we got on. They all seemed nice enough, so we figured sure why not. They also told us that if we kept walking down the street in one direction we would get robbed by the heroin addicts, and if we went down the other way we would probably get raped. We figured that was a good enough reason to stay where we were at the time. Musa (which means kindness) seemed to be looking out for us – he even gave us a CD with a track that his friend had just cut! He told us to keep it as a souvenir, so I figured his plan wasn’t to kill us anyways. Jokes, jokes.

Anyways, to the point of the story. One of the guys was really fascinated with my hair, and so he kept asking me where I got it. I tried to explain that it was my hair, but I’m not sure he fully understood. Or maybe I didn’t understand him. Either way, he kept rubbing my hair, fascinated by the texture or something. He then turned to seth and wanted to examine his hair, but instead of rubbing it like he did mine, he said “Bend over. You’re a man. I can’t touch your head.” The next day, talking to Sdu and Thula (our drivers/helpers on the program), they confirmed, “you can’t touch a Zulu man’s head.” So there you go. Lesson of the week!

Between waking up at 6 every morning and having a prime view of the sunrise over the ocean,
I've started a new hobby of cloud watching/photogrophy.

Last week we had our Zulu final on Monday and our Oral on Tuesday, which means no more uBeverly!!!!! They both went well all things considered. Tuesday night a bunch of us took our families to the amaZulu vs. Wits soccer game! It was a lot of fun! My two brothers and Smu all came with me and Seth’s little brother came with hime, and a whole bunch of Mama’s and other siblings. Smu and Lungelo (Seth’s little brother who has the same name as my older brother) were dancing up with the huge crowd at center field. Seth and I joined in towards the end of the game and ended up getting on the jumbotron! Probably because we were the only two abelungu (white people) in the crowd. My brother also informed me that we made the news on national tv later that night too when they did a re-cap of the game! That means I have now been on South African TV three different times! I’m practically famous!

Best South African sister ever!

From L to R: Lungelo, Me, Bhuwa, Bhuwa's friend Mtoko, and Smu in the front!

Lungelo and Smu cheering on amaZulu!

Wednesday was a national holiday – human rights day! So I exercised my human rights by going to the beach as many times as I wanted, while trying to write a 5,000 word paper in between. Maybe not the best life decision, but I greatly enjoyed it and say it was worth it.

Thursday we handed in our essays and had more class. We started our last module of classes called CCMS – something about communications and media studies, so those have actually been pretty interesting. Its just unfortunate to have to be stuck in a classroom from 7:15 until 4:15 every day when the weather is beautiful and the beach is right outside my front door! We made up for a full day of classes by making breakfast for dinner though. We made french toast, scrambled eggs, pancakes, chocolate muffins, and BACON! It was delicious! Such a good reward after a 5,000 word paper. Which is the other thing that annoys me besides being in class for so long. Why do we need to write SO many long papers?

hazy rays of sun!

Friday, our academic director could tell we were all ready for the weekend so we got out at 2 instead of 4, and I went straight to the beach!  After dinner, we naturally had to watch generations at 8, and we supplemented the experience with a bowl of brownie batter. We hung out with the apartment downstairs with a bunch of people on the program before getting tired at 11 and going back upstairs. But instead of going to bed right away, Erin (a.k.a Mom) made us each a mini one minute chocolate cake in a mug. It was heavenly!

Some more clouds

Saturday I went to the beach a few more times. We also walked down the beach about 15 minutes to go to uShaka to print out pictures for our families. We took a minibus taxi back to Cato around 5:30, and I got to visit with my mom and Smu for a little while! Then Bhuwa came and picked all of us abelungu up and we all walked to Chesterville to my brother Lungelo’s house for a braai! They threw me an early birthday party! Complete with salty meat and a chocolate cake! We all hung out and Bhuwa danced to his favorite songs – he is an extremely good dancer – and it was so much fun! Katie and Erin came from my apartment, along with Seth, obviously, and then the whole 7^th floor apartment also came, so it was lots of fun! My brothers invited a few of their friends and cousins and it was fun getting to talk to them! It was good practice speaking Zulu too!

Some of the crew at my birthday party!

Yesterday/Sunday I woke up at 7. I have yet to sleep in past 8:30 here. But it worked out well because I ate breakfast and then was at the beach by 8:15! Hunger drove me back to the apartment at 10:00, but good ole Seth never lets me down, and we were back at the beach by 11 or so. The water was so nice and we were catching some good waves body surfing, so we ended up staying in the water for almost an hour! At 12:30 after we had dried off in the sun we headed back into the apartment to try to do some work (we have our huge independent study project proposal due tomorrow/Tuesday), but naturally we were unsuccessful. We ended up eating lunch, procrastinating, and then heading back to the beach for another two hours or so. It was a pretty ideal day if you ask me! We all made cheeseburgers for dinner (except Cara cause she’s a vegetarian – she made a grilled tomato and chesses). The highlight of the night was having REAL KETCHUP! All they have in South Africa is tomato sauce, which you think would be the same thing, but its not. Its disgusting. And we finally found real ketchup for burger and fries night!!!!! After some more procrastinating it was suddenly 10:30 and time to go to bed.

Today (Monday) we unfortunately have another full day of classes, but today also begins our last week of classes!!!!!!! Its gone by so quickly, I can’t believe it. I’ve had so much fun the past couple weeks living by the beach. My roommates are all wonderful. I’m living with Cara (we call her crazy Cara), Erin (I already informed you we call her mom), Liz, Katherine, and Katie. Seth is also an honorary member of the apartment since he spends almost every waking moment with us. Its gonna be another fun night of all 7 of us sitting around on our laptops trying to finish our proposals!

Our apartment getting ready for bed... minus Liz who's head Seth cut off....

Anyways, that’s what’s new here!

Hope all is well with all of you!