St. Lucia Estuary...

So as one of the final long weekends of the semester (yay for public holidays) me and my friend Kelly decided to go see a little more of the province that we have been living in all semester, Kwa-Zulu Natal. In our handy dandy backpackers guide we found out about this cool little town called St. Lucia next to this World Heritage Site of a wetlands reserve. We also found out that coincidentally there were three other kids from New York going there that weekend.

We rented a car and listened to our amazing mix cds left over from spring break. 4 hours up the coast we came to this cute little beachy town with one main street and some shops and restaurants. It looked very similar to Northern Michigan and very wet. I went straight to the beach and hung out there for the afternoon. We made dinner and roasted marshmallows over the barbecue and relaxed. The next day the five of us drove into the nature reserve and went on all these little dirt paths to see all types of animals. Many of them looked a lot like deer, but were called Bush bock, and a bunch of other deer like things with horns. They were everywhere. We saw a ton of Zebras, monkeys and we watched hippos with their little eyes peaking out for hours. We drove to this cool beach called Cape Vidal and took naps in the sun. Then drove back and saw some rhinos and even more animals. It was like our own little self guided safari with a lot of picture taking and screaming "look here" "look there". It was really fun and exciting because every animal we saw we felt that we were the only people who had ever seen them. The lion king soundtrack played continuously in my head the whole day. Everyone was starting to get a little annoyed "from the day we arrived on this planet..."

We came back and me and Kelly went on a date to an Italian restaurant in town and wondered around. It was one of the safest places i have been in since we got here. Lot of people out and cool things to look at. We searched for a pay phone for about an hour to call Josh on his birthday, but no luck. I guess it is the thought that counts.

The last day, Sunday, was the craziest. We woke up early and went kayaking with crocodiles and hippos. It was the scariest thing EVER! We were about 10 feet from some crocidiles and they would slide creapily into the water and then you couldn't see them anymore. They were huge and their little beady eyes would sit on the top of the water and stare at me and i almost pooped my pants. I kept telling the guide there was a crocidile right there and he was like "calm down" but serisouly... they were RIGHT there. I couldn't believe it. Then there was two "pods" of hippos. which i guess are extremely territorial. There was a mom and a baby that we had to wait for a really long time for them to move a couple feet so we could get around them. It is hard to tell how many there are because they are mostly underwater, but we were right next to a pod of about 15 hippos. In the water with them! It was wayy to scary. Then we went to the other area of the lake which mostly just had birds, but he did mention there were sharks in that area. I don't know what is wrong with me and why i thought it was a good idea to go on this tour. I guess i was thinking kayaking with crocidiles sounds cool... my heart rate was certainly up around 20,000. When we finally finished i started to break normally. It was living life on the edge, thats for sure, something i have been doing a lot lately...

The final activity of the weekend was snorkeling out at the cape. We drove about 2 hours through the nature reserve again and saw some more really cool animals. I am really bummed i can't upload my pictures because they are absolutely spectacular. When i get home i will have to do some major uploading. Sweet pictures, really really sweet. We snorkely and saw tons of really pretty yellow and irridesant fish on these rocks. It was pretty rough water but i felt like i was in my own little world floating on top of the water. It was really relaxing. The sun went down around 5.30 or 6 there so we headed back. On the way back we saw a white and a black rhino. It was seriously the most insane drive. We also almost ran into a big herd of zebras. Only in Africa right?

Last Rowing Trip...

So this weekend i went on my last rowing trip to Pretoria for my last races of the year. Good and bad things, i am excited not to have to wake up at 4am anymore, i am bummed i am not going to get to hang out with my friends as much and the trips are a lot of fun.

We drove on Friday to the Damn, right outside of Pretoria, which is the capital of South Africa, right next to Johannesburg. It took like 6 hours. But i am getting a lot better at car trips, it seemed really quick. When we got there we set up a bunch of tents on our campsite and started making dinner. It gets dark so early here because there is no daylight savings time. We BBQed and then went to sleep because we had races early in the morning.

The next day we raced our Girls 8, and since none of the older girls came we were the A team. We didn't do too well, our timing was a little off, but it was still a fun race. The competition was really high because this race was called SA (South Africa) champs and was for all rowing clubs, including masters teams and prep schools, along with universities.

The part that is fun about races is that after you are done with your race all you really do is hang out on the grass all day and sit in the sun. I love that part. That night we cooked some pasta and taught all the South Africans about s'mores. WHICH THEY HAD NEVER HAD! it was delicious although we had to substitute tennis crackers for graham crackers. It was a lot of fun because what would camping be without s'mores.

The next day i had my last race, a boat of four, and we did really well, coming in second. We hung around all day, tore down the camp and then drove to a backpackers in Johannesburg where we were going to spend the last night because Monday was a public holiday and we didn't have school. There was an after party with all of the teams at a sports club that was really fun. What else? i am really glad i did rowing a met a lot of people i never would have met and did a lot of fun things i never would have done. It was a good sport but i am excited to go back to triathlons.

Ubuntu...

Quick post. I had an amazing day volunteering today. Only a few of us went and most of them just played soccer. Me and like 8 little girls (the youngest, all around 5-7) played all afternoon. They taught me some dances, and i taught them the macarena. They have no English skills at all so i was really rattling my zulu Brian. We played a lot of games in circles and dances and then i taught them the airplane ride with your legs. I had the entire place lined up waiting for airplane rides. I think i did like 300 leg presses.

Leaving there sucks because i think they are all so adorable. And i know i don't do much more than play when i am there, but i know that none of these girls get any individual attention usually so i guess that is all i can do. They talk to me in Zulu like i know what they are saying, and i just mumble along to their songs, but it is the highlight of my week. I think i decided i am definitely working with kids.

Election day and other volunteering adventures...

So the past two days has been somewhat of a marathon of volunteering. I have to complete 60 hours for my political science class and i wasn't doing to well, until now. Yesterday it started by attending a political violence briefing Wait, i guess i should back up a little bit...

My class were recruited to be international election poll observers to ensure a free and peaceful election. I went to a training the other day (mostly in zulu) and from there they offered to brief us on the recent political violence and events with the other international observers from uganda, canada and zimbabwe. So, deciding i needed hours and it sounded semi interesting i went to this meeting, in the middle of no where. Only two other people came because of logistical issues and a couple of us from the university. It was really interesting and they talked about all of the different specific incidents of political violence in the area and why, also which areas were more expected to have issues on election day and why. I learned that this country is uber messed up politically since the majority of the population will only vote the ANC because that was the party that liberating them from the apartheid and there is a belief that any other party would force people back into apartheid. So overall, the party is very corrupt, it's leader (who is bound to win) only has graduated to grade 3 and has many charges against him, including rape. we will see how it goes. But anyway, i learned a lot about past violence. I am lucky to live in the United States.

So that was the first part of the election volunteering saga. Part two included waking up at 5 this morning to go downtown to be transferred to a township to oversee a polling station. It all sounds good and fun, but i was all by myself in this very very poor governmental housing township. I sat in the corner of the room alone and watched over 1000 people vote over 7 hours. When the lady came to bring me my (KFC) lunch i begged to leave and told her i didn't feel well. We weren't aloud to talk to anyone and just had to observe things, i counted everything in the room. Anywho, i realized that i would not be a good person to do a job that involved being alone.

Seeing the voting was actually kind of cool. the ballots were really really simple. Party name, their symbol, pictures of the person running and check box. And then they put it into this big box. A funny part about voting was before you voted they painted your thumb nail with paint so that you can't vote in more than one location. The people however in my location were very unfriendly and everyone was really tired and grumpy from standing in rediculously long lines and such. I normally really like helping out, but i didn't belong in the township, they were all giving me really weird looks, and i hadn't heard a word of english all day. It would have been ok if i wasn't completely alone, or alowed to talk. oh well, so is the nature of volunteering.

The other volunteering was a lot of fun. Last night there was a fundraiser for the Ubuntu Crisis center where we work with the kids at the orphanage. There wasn't as big of turn out as there should of been, but it was a cool dinner at city hall and all the girls came. There were speakers (mostly in zulu) and some singers, all very churchy. Even some dancing. The dinner was very south african, meaty, with a lot of potatoe salads and things like that. Actually, really good. The event started really late and lasted for a long time, one of the little girls, fell asleep on my lap at the table, but we had a good time making funny faces at each other when we were supposed to be quiet. I was the hit of the kids table for sure.

Durban Weekend...

So this weekend after a fun night out with dorm friends i went to Durban with two study abroad students from California. We left Saturday afternoon on our Kombi adventure (i still have to take a picture of them for you) crammed in and took the hour drive to Durban for a Rugby game.

When we got there we walked around to find the stadium, which coincidentally is next to the new World Cup Stadium which you can see from all over the city. We got there just as the game was starting, bought tickets and went in to see South Africa play New Zealand. Unfortunately we lost 10-13, but let me tell you it is way more exciting that football, and a lot quicker. They rarely stop the play so the whole game was over in under 2 hours and they do crazy plays where they left people up cheerleader style. The whole atmosphere of the game was really fun, friendly people. Afterwards in the parking lot it seemed like a fair. Loud music and huts that sold food. People barbequeing outside of their cars and tailgating. It was a party. We hung around for a while and then went off to a famous road called Florida road.

Florida road is a road that has tons of restaurants and clubs on it and we heard really good things about this restaurant called Taco Zulu. Funny thing is that there is no Mexican food in south Africa, so being Americans, we were all about the Mexican food. After going into a burrito coma we walked around, but realized we were under dressed to go into any of the clubs. Damn no sandals rule! oh well.

We took a cab back to our hostel (sweet hostel by the way) called the Happy Hippo and were asleep before midnight.

The next day was so much fun. We went to this place called UShaka Marine World which is a combination of a wet n' wild water park, sea world, aquarium, shopping mall, beach and surf zone. We walked through the mall and then went to the water park. The water park was actually really sweet but all normal water rules were broken. You could go down any of the slides head first and ten at a time. Things were a little crazy. Coming from a lifeguard i was a little overwhelmed by all the rules being broken but it was so much fun. There was the tallest waterslide in Africa (i guess not very hard to do) which went straight down and gave you the BIGGEST wedgie of your life. There were tube racing slides and then big raft rides. There was even a sweet lazy river that passed you by the aquarium where you could see the sharks and passed Shamu's tank. It was pretty cool. After lunch on the beach listening to a rastafarian band (think Bob Marley zulu style) we jumped some waves and rented sea kayaks. We sea kayaked for a while and saw some pretty fish. The water was so warm it was awesome. I am going to go back for sure for surfing, but all of the boards were booked for the day.

After a few more waterslides we came to reality as the park was closing and we realized we had a 2 hour kombi adventure back to Pietermaritzburg. Everyday seems like a vacation. Coming back to reality is gong to be rough.

Disclaimer...

So i realized that after i wrote that blog last night how much it all kind of sucked. Although it is not very detailed and all seems kind of jumbled up things have been crazy since i got back and i just wanted to get it done. if it doesn't make sense or you want more details shoot me an email and i will explain. Overall, i guess all you need to know is that i had a great time and we packed a thousand thing into 10 days. Cape Town is beautiful and you would all love it.

In other life it was immediately back to reality in pietermaritzburg. I have two tests and two papers due this week. No time for naps.

I guess that is it, blogs to come in the future i will try to make a little better, less scatterbrained and written with more than 2 hours of sleep the night before.

Spring Break Part 4...Wine Tour and Beaches and Cape Point

So the last days of my trip were definitely the best. Thursday we went on a wine tour in the vineyards of Stellonbosh. An area that rivals Northern California and France the world's best wines. We started off the day at a vineyard where we learned HOW to taste wine, how to smell wine and how to tell how old wine is. I acted very grown up but pretty much giggled the whole time. It is great to be able to drink legally. At the first vineyard we tasted wine and some really good soft cheeses made right there. Everything was delicious, i was tipsy by 10am. We went from vineyard to vineyard (4 in all) all very modern and learned how to make red wine and white wine. We even went down below and saw where they store everything. We tasted chocolate and laughed a lot. The day was fantastic, including the well deserved nap on the way home. P.S. Wine descriptions are very silly.













That night since we were definitely too tired to go out we met some people in our backpackers who were in Cape Town to run the Two Oceans Marathon on Saturday. Of course we hit it off right away and hung out with them all night talking about running. The next day we all went to this beautiful beach together and played Frisbee and took sprints into the FREEZING Atlantic ocean.









The next day we hiked to the most Southern tip of Africa called Cape Point. The cool part about this place is that it is where the Atlantic Ocean meets the Indian Ocean and since they are such drastic temperature differences. The craziest part is that when we got there a baboon jumped into a car and read some of our Cosmo magazine before running away with a cookie wrapper.

Ok so the next day was my favorite. Did you know that South Africa has a huge colony of African penguins? I didn't! But they are friggen adorable. We drove to see the penguins in a little beach town called Simon's Town were colonies of African penguins were nesting. The cute thing about all the penguins is that they are monogamous so they were all in pairs. We even saw some awesome penguin sex. One of the cool parts is that they weren't like roped off really or anything and you could get really close to them, but you couldn't touch. The best part was the beach that most of them lived on called Boulder Beach. I swear, it should be one of the wonders of the world, it was beautiful. The beach was covered with huge boulders, but in between was really soft sand. If you hiked past some of them you got into the most beautiful area with penguins in the water right next to where you were walking. You can see below my awesome Ariel from the little mermaid interpretation. What do you think?
The next day was our last in Cape Town and we went to visit Robben Island, where Nelson Mandela spent most of his life with the rest of the political prisoners during Apartheid. I had read his autobiography prior to coming and it was really cool to see the place in real life. We took a ferry over to the island and they explained a lot of it's history. Before it was a maximum security prison it was a place where they sent people with leprosy. We saw the graves and then we went into the prison where we got a tour from an ex-political prisoner. He was there for seven years in the communal cell area. And then we got to see Nelson Mandela's cell. It was all very overwhelming as i realized how most of the events that they were talking about did not happen very long ago. It was surreal, but i am glad i went. Visiting the island really showed how far South Africa has come in such a short amount of time.


After that it was about time for our trip to end. We went out to celebrate by eating Thai food on the water, my favorite. We drove to the airport and flew out at 6.30 this morning. Haven't slept in two days i think i should stop rambling and go to bed. Overall, super successfull Spring Break 09.