Warning- this is another epic post, about another trip!

In the interest of time, I’m going to have to summarize my last trip, not the long narrative of the last trip…because well it’d be nice to be current again. Also, I’m writing this in the computer lab where I just noticed we’re operating on Microsoft 2003…speaking of being current…
Anyways, a week and a half ago, I went on another trip (yay!). It was organized by a lecturer here, named Blessing (yes that’s his first name) and was scheduled to go a long time ago but because not enough people signed up to go, it was postponed. In the end there were only 7 of us, plus Blessing and the driver of our van, but it was really nice that way I think (I’d take 7 over 40 any day). We went to an area north of Durban, about 3 hours away, called St. Lucia. It’s home to a great game reserve and wetlands park so that is it’s main draw. This was to be an education trip as well, teaching us through experience about rural and community development, what Blessing’s degree and study has been in. We headed out of Durban on the smaller highways, climbing up through rural neighborhoods and through sugar can farms, then onto major highways through green stretches dotted by small communities of tiny homes and the occasional smattering of cows and people out and about. Blessing took us to his own neighborhood and his home to show us the community and where he plans to start some of his own community upliftment projects- like a community garden project. I learned a lot about rural community issues and what makes a good project and what does not. Like I have found before, in Africa the journey is definitely an integral part of the experience. You are able to see and learn so much just driving through different areas, witnessing the changes in landscape and housing.
It took us the whole afternoon to get to our backpacker destination because of the many stops and detours we took to see different communities. Blessing narrated along the way. Our backpacker was called the Veyanne Cultural Village and is run by local community members (ie an all African, all Zulu organization). I forgot to mention that the greater region we were travelling through is called Zululand. The backpacker is set up like a mock Zulu village. There is a large main hut for meals and gathering, a cattle kraal (which is used not for cattle here but for a bonfire and traditional dancing), and smaller separate sleeping huts, where we got to sleep. The first thing we did when we got there was get dressed in traditional Zulu clothes which was really cool. Except for the fact that it was still reallllly hot even though it was the evening and the clothing was really heavy. The skirt, made out of cow hide, was so heavy that rolled up, it stands up on its own. This is the kind of skirt a married woman wears. We also had thick beaded belts, necklaces, bracelets, and Zulu hats (I’m sure you’re all dying to see the pictures of me in that- it is pretty funny). Later a group of young men performed traditional Zulu dance for the guests and they were extremely good. There was the leg lifting dance (that just doesn’t sound right but I can’t think of another name for it, I should probably find out the Zulu name for it) as well as back flips and all that. Then they said we had to dance with them and we all tried our hand at the leg lifting. There is also photographic evidence of that on someone’s camera. It was really fun, albeit embarrassing.
Sleeping in the hut was fun, except for the fact that it was extremely hot in there as well. The thick roofing seemed to hold in and super heat the air, and as I was staying in it with Annereike, who is Dutch, I named our hut the Dutch Oven (cue laughter). The next morning we headed out bright and early to the game reserve, the name of which I would write if I could spell it and you could pronounce it. We drove around in our van and as soon as we came around the first corner, there were three zebras in the road with a giraffe behind them. So exciting! It’s so exhilarating to see these animals right in front of you, you don’t even know what to do with yourself. There is awe and much photo-taking, then you have to keep driving because another car comes up behind you. But it is amazing. A little further down the road we stopped for more zebra and a wildebeest and then I noticed something moving and it was a hyena! It ran behind some bush and was tearing at a carcass with some more hyenas! That was one of the coolest things to see in action, even though the bush was kind of in the way.
Even though we started in the park at 7 am, it was extremely hot that early and the whole day. My guess would be high 80s if not low 90s with high high high humidity. Ever break we took we were guzzling water, we bought the 1.5 liter size and several smaller ones each. We were sooo sweaty but it was a great time to cruise around the game reserve. Even when you weren’t spotting animals the landscape was awesome. We ended up seeing lots of impala, wildebeest, zebra, baboon, another giraffe or two, water buffalo, one rhino (!!!), monkeys, wart hogs and baby wart hogs (adorable and about 5 feet away from me), waterbuck, and probably some other things that I will see in the photos later. Unfortunately, the closest we came to an elephant was some fresh elephant poo but we couldn’t find them! As it got later and hotter it got a lot harder to see big game because they rest in cool places under trees or in mud. This is why it’s so hard to spot lions too, since they sleep also for 20 hours a day. But all in all, I was really excited with what we saw.
In the afternoon, we travelled to a drop-in center for kids who have been affected by HIV/AIDS, either with the loss of a parent/head of household, or more personally. The idea of a drop-in center is the kids come in the morning to get breakfast before school, then go to school, come for lunch to the center, back to school, then get some food on the way home and bring some to parents/elderly and other children at home. There were maybe 30 or 40 kids there from I’d say 3 to 16 years old. They had been waiting eagerly for us but were shy once we got there, at first. They sang a few songs for us and did a skit (in Zulu), then we played games with them. The first one was like duck duck goose and the second was called Teddy Bear and was generally about hugging. It was fun to interact with the kids. They served us a generous lunch and then we got a tour of the humble facility, which helps an astounding number of people. The area is considered an HIV/AIDS infection hot spot and it could use way more of these facilities.
After departing from the center, where we could have spent a lot more time playing with the kids, we were headed to the wetlands park for a boat ride through the wetland for more game spotting. First we stopped at the biggest curio (souvenir, handi-craft, carvings, baskets, bracelets, etc.) and produce market I’d seen so far. The smell of pineapple was delicious as soon as we stepped out of the van. I tried the African equivalent of prickly pear there (Laina, it was kind of like Tohono O’odham cactus fruit).
On the wetlands boat trip we saw lots and lots of hippos! It was great! There were some babies too. We also saw African fish eagle, stork, crocodile, Egyptian geese, but the hippos were definitely the highlight. The scenery here was also great. Caked with sunscreen and sweat, we returned to Veyane for dinner and then crashed pretty hard for the night. Thankfully, it was a little cooler (only a little).
The next day we headed to the beach to an estuary area. We took some of the dancers from the first night with us. Oh I forgot to mention that this whole time we also had Sisa with us, a girl about our age from the community we would be visiting later this day. It was sort of like a cultural exchange, Blessing knew her and thought it would be nice to learn from eachother. Anyways the beach was great and although I didn’t go in (no suit) I enjoyed myself and watched the dancers do backflips in the waves. After relaxing on the beach some we went to a crocodile park and saw lots more crocs, even little babies!
After this, we packed up and headed to Sisa’s community near Richard’s Bay (a little bit south back towards Durban). Richard’s Bay is one of the most polluted places in the area because of a local mineral mine. Blessing has been working in this community to start a community garden project. Because of lots of beaurocracy (like they’ve been waiting 2 years for the government to hook up their irrigation pipe) it has had some trouble getting off the ground. There is also no where for them really to sell their goods, and the soil isn’t so great. As we walked around the community, learning about it, a pack of local kids started forming behind us. They were captivated and so were we with them. We kind of became our own parade. We tried to interact with them as best we could. My conversational Zulu doesn’t go too far with people who are native speakers. Again I taught them how to high five and had a crowd of boys all running up to my outstretched hand. Then they started to play sort of tag with me (just me, I’m thinking it was the hair), where someone behind me would run up and tap me in the back and then when I would turn around they would pretend no one had done it and run away from me. The local women who tend the garden were all very warm and welcoming to us. We went to Sisa’s home, a cluster of small buildings for her extended family. After this, we unfortunately had to leave, but our parade of children followed us to the van and crowded around, making departure difficult, we waved through the windows and eventually took off on the 2 hour or so journey back to Durban. Another full and impacting weekend.
(So I’m not that great at summarizing….).

This past weekend, in the spirit of a true summary, I went to uShaka Marine World, which is a shopping area, beach, aquarium, and water park all in one. While it was still sunny and hot, we were in the aquarium, when we got out it was raining. So after lunch when the rain still hadn’t passed, we put on our bathing suits and went on the waterslides in the rain. It was so fun, I felt like a little kid again. We went on the lazy river three times and it winds around past the penguin and shark tanks (very cool and very fun). The girls I was with were all great fun and we had a good time getting wet and laughing together. We had a great dinner at a restaurant called Moyo which is right at the beach edge. They have seaweed sculptures made out of green glass bottles and glass jellyfish lamps. The food is amazing and not so expensive because of the good rand to dollar ratio (10:1). It was a great day. Sunday I went to a market down by North beach and got some great souvenirs that my friend Myrthe bargained for and got everyone down to half their price (you have to do that here because they over price things when they think you’re a tourist). Afterwards I went to the harbor to the Royal Natal Yacht Club to meet a friend of a friend and her family who are in the UKZN sailing club. I loved seeing all the sail boats and the family we met owns their own and let us on it (while docked). I would love to get sailing here!
Anyways, sorry that was so long but it was another great trip I had to share about. I have my first test Tues in Zulu so I’ve been studying a lot for that. Also the scuba course has started, so I’ll be in the pool and in classroom time with that for most of the weekend!