Week one!!

So this is my first time blogging since I left, so I am going to put in a nutshell everything that I have done so far…

I left on Sunday afternoon from the Seatac Airport, along with three other girls from my class. The plane ride was about 10 hours, which is the longest I’ve been on a plane in my life. We all had a 12+ hour layover in Frankfurt, Germany, so we decided to go there to explore for the day. We got there around 8:30 in the morning, so we had a very open day ahead of us. We decided to take the train into town, but that turned into quite an ordeal. We were trying to buy tickets, but obviously everything was in German so we had no idea what to get…until a nice German guy who spoke English, who also happened to be from South Africa, helped us turn the screen to English and then told us where we should go. So we got on the train and were off to find our destination. Then I had a pretty terrifying experience…we were hesitant to get off at a certain stop, so we took a little while to walk to the door of the train, and the doors open for a very short time and then close. I was the last of us four to get off, and the doors started closing while only my arm was out. So I was forced to stay on the train and was separated from the other girls, but thankfully, I just got off at the next stop, and they all got back on a different train and got off at the same stop as me, so it all turned out fine!

Once we got into town we just walked around and looked at everything. It was only about 9:30 in the morning, so there weren’t many people out and about for awhile. But we looked at beautiful churches and amazing old architecture and it was a really nice walk! When we got hungry we found this little bakery and I got some amazing bread and we just sat and talked for awhile to take a break from our walking. After walking around some more, we decided to get back on the train to find another part of town. We walked around a bit more, but some of us were determined to get bratwursts and we were getting pretty hungry! So we found a place that sold bratwursts and after eating them, walked around more but then decided to go back to the airport, because we were getting pretty tired. The ride to the airport was definitely interesting. We pretty much went back and forth on the trains until we found it because we kept either getting off at the wrong stop or taking the wrong train, but at this point, it was the middle of the night back at home, and none of us really slept on the plane much, so we just thought it was hilarious because we were so tired. After getting to the airport, we immediately went through security and got to our gate with still a couple hours to spare, so we pretty much slept until boarding.

When we arrived in Johannesburg, we met up with some other students who had arrived, our professor, and the driver who was to take us to our hostel where we were going to stay for a few nights. The hostel was called Brown Sugar Backpackers, and it was really large and nice. The first day we got there, we slept a lot and then our whole class met up for the first time to have dinner. The food there was delicious, and they fed us really well. The next day, we pretty much saw museums about African history and apartheid all day around Johannesburg and Soweto. We went to Constitutional Hill, where they have constitutional meetings, and it is also an old prison where lots of political activists were held, including Ghandi. It was really amazing but sad. We then went to the Museum of Apartheid, the Hector Peterson memorial museum, and the Mandela House, which is Nelson Mandela’s old house that they turned into a museum.

The next day we got up even earlier and went to Pretoria to a beautiful museum there on the top of the hill where we learned all about the Boers and the Great Trek, and then to the national capital building, which was also beautiful. Then we got on a plane all together and flew to Port Elizabeth, and then drove a couple of hours to Rocky Road Backpackers just outside of Plettenburg Bay and next to Kurland (where we saw a baboon on the side of the highway!!). Rocky Road is where we will be staying for pretty much the rest of the trip until we go to Cape Town. It is absolutely beautiful here. Everything is so nature-y and the scenery is spectacular, with mountains and trees surrounding us. Most of us are staying in tents (very luxurious tents), and right outside of my tent, I have a beautiful forest view. It’s amazing! The food here is also amazing, all homemade and delicious. Our first night here (Thursday), they welcomed us with free mimosas and a great dinner!

On Friday, we went into Kurland for the first time, where we will be interning/volunteering with the NGOs. It is a cute little town that is in very much poverty. It reminds me a lot of Tijuana, with the way that many of the houses look and by the friendliness of the people. Mac, from Rocky Road, gave us a tour of the village and told us a lot about it. We got to see some of the NGOs, including the preschool and the regular school, which are very big possibilities of places that I may volunteer. I am so excited to start! Then that night, we had a bry, which is the word here for barbeque, which we will be having every Friday night. We also went in the hot tub, which we’ll be doing every Friday night as well, and it was just a really fun night.

Saturday was a very adventurous day. We went on our first hike, where we hiked to the bay/ocean. But I think that hike may be an understatement. We started off doing normal things, like walking on a trail through the forest. We then came to a few amazing viewpoints, where I saw the most beautiful view of the ocean that I had ever seen. We ended up walking to a calm part of the bay, where we stopped to have lunch and then had time to put our feet in the water and walk around. But here comes the fun part. Our destination was a different part of the beach, and Mac had his own way to get there. We started off climbing up big rocks on the side of the bay, then it turned to more forest, and then we came out on another part of the bay, where it was again very beautiful. Then we saw a penguin, which was so exciting for everyone!! Then it got a little bit scary, and for those of you who know me really well, you would be really proud of me. We pretty much scaled a jagged rock wall with a drop off and climbed on more jagged rocks along the drop off, and it was one of the most terrifying things ever, but it was also a really awesome thing to be able to do! My heart was beating so fast and a lot of adrenaline was going through me the whole time. But it was pretty much a fantastic day!

Today, Sunday, we went to Monkey Land and the Bird Sanctuary! It was absolutely amazing, especially the monkeys because monkeys are my favorite animal! Monkey Land gets monkeys that have been held in captivity in some way, and they get to live there, in a free, protected environment. I’m not sure about the Bird Sanctuary, but I’m sure it’s about the same thing. But both of them are pretty much protected forest areas where the animals can roam free. At Monkey Land, we got to walk around with the monkeys swinging and running all around us, and we all got so many pictures of them! There were mostly small monkeys, but some bigger ones as well. At the Bird Sanctuary, we saw some really colorful birds, and some were pretty exotic. We even saw some flamingos, which was awesome!

This week, we will be working on houses in Kurland Village, as a way for us to bond and get to know Kurland and the people who live there, as well as get a feel for who we may want to work with. Then after that, we will be doing our internships during the week, and hiking/relaxing/doing other fun things on Saturdays and Sundays. I am hoping to blog again soon, but I hope this gives you an idea of what has been going on! So far, South Africa has been treating me very well. J