The End

Apologies to those of you who kept up with this blog… I’m so sorry.. I was a failure as a first time blogger! I guess I got so caught up in doing other things, it was hard to make time to sit down and type up entries… However I’m sitting at the airport in Amsterdam and I decided to write one final entry.

It has almost been a year and today is my first time to wake up not in Africa ☹ I have to say this feeling is a weird one… Please don’t get me wrong, I am beyond excited to see my family and friends after all of this time, but leaving my beloved Cape Town was so hard… I think I cried just as much as I did when I left for South Africa last July. It’s crazy how fast time goes.. & how quickly Cape Town became my new home. I’m going to miss it so much, as well as the family and friends I also had to leave behind! This experience would not have been the same with out them! Especially the De Ricquebourgs… what an awesome family they are and it was such a blast getting to be apart of their family this year. They definitely know how to have a good time ☺

As much as I want to sit here an list all of the amazing experiences and memories I have from my fabulous year in Africa, it would take another year just to list.. plus I think I’m planning (to attempt) to write a book about it! & Hopefully it will help others to see Africa in a different light than the usual dark/scary/dangerous place so many claim it to be. In my year here, I discovered the exact opposite! I fell in love with this place and am definitely planning to be back as soon as I absolutely can.. whether it is to live/study or maybe travel again ☺

So this is the last post ( not that there were many to begin with; SORRY) … To all of the people from South Africa, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Mozambique, Rwanda, Swaziland & others that I was fortunate enough to meet.. THANK YOU! You have touched my life in more ways than you could ever imagine and treated me with such courtesy and made me feel welcome in that magnicificant place you call home. You all have opened my eyes and allowed me to really live over the past year! I will forever be thankful to you Africa and always hold you in a special place in my heart! I hate to say goodbye, but with the life skills I learned while in Africa for a year, I know this time ill be ready for my next adventure ☺ Bon Voyage Africa, it’s been one heck of a Jol <3

Before I lived in Cape Town, going to school on a beautiful day was never an issue. In Sherman it was a bonus getting nice weather on the way to class. But now, living 20minutes from the most beautiful beaches in the world, it is torture going to class when the days are as beautiful as they have been! I know, I know I live a hard life ;) But anyway, second week of school was great. I didn’t get lost or miss class ☺ being a good student already! I dropped my iphone off at the iFix store to get unlocked so I can use it here. Glad it only took 8months to realize I could do that. No worries, my little 1930s nokia did me well last semester haha, sweet flashlight on top & all. Monday night was also the first UCT- Ikey Tiger home rugby game! Sadly we got there too late to get decent seats, but it was still fun to watch from afar! & best part is, the IKEY Tigers (our mascot) were wearing pink and baby blue jerseys! SO adorable ☺
Last weekend was such a great time! My roommates and I went to the Spier wine harvesting festival down in Stellenbosch! Only R60 to get in and we received a complimentary fancy wine glass that was soon filled with lots of different South African wines! Oh so tasty! We also got to mash grapes in a barrel with our feet! I have always seen people do it in the movies and have forever wanted to do that! Ah was such fun, live music tons of people and sunshine! The food was so delicious at the festival as well as the fabulous oysters! MMM they were so fresh and tasty!! The festival ended around 4 so after we went to the cheetah and bird sanctuary and walked around before we had to catch our train back to Cape Town. I have already done the cheetah petting when my mom came to visit and I will be going back with Brittany when she comes so I decided to just do the birds this time! We got to hold owls!!! They were so precious haha kind of creepy with huge eyes but it was really cool to see how they responded to their trainer. They were such well-disciplined birds! We eventually walked back to the train station and waited for an hour (mistakenly) for the next train. One it finally arrived we went to get on the first class side, because third class is super sketch and not safe but we didn’t realize it was at the front of the train! So we walked quickly to the first carts and as soon as we got to the door, they shut right in our faces!!! The train started to move and all of the sudden a red flying objects nails my room mate Sarah right in the forehead. Those 10 seconds may have been the most ridic, funniest ten seconds of my life haha needless to say that was an Epic FAIL lol. So we eventually had to call a cab and pay R500 to get home.


I’m just going to skip the apologies for not updating this thing in forever again :/ promise guys one of these days I will find time to keep it updated.. I know, I sound like a broken record haha but the past few weeks have been wonderful! Just busy with classes, rugby games, the beach, a few jols here and there oh and just a fantastically beautiful weekend in MOZAMBIQUE :D:D Yesterday (Monday) was a public holiday so gracious UCT gave us the day off and The amazing De Ricquebourgs invited me to go back to Mozam with them for the long weekend! I was so excited when I found decent priced flights!! I flew out of Cape Town Thursday evening after having an exam, and four assignments due the previous day! Ah was in need of a vacation (jokes) I know I don’t deserve one… it really does seem ironic taking a vacation from Cape Town.. actually it makes zero sense at all.. but hey ‘when in Rome’ ;) We left Durban early Friday morning around 5 am. There were five people in our car, four in the car in front and three in the car in the middle lol two more people met us there. What a fun bunch too! South Africans have got to be some of the nicest most fun people. I had an absolutely blast with all of them this weekend! It took us about 4 hours to get to the Mozam border where I got my 9th passport page filled: D YAY and the Visa was cheaper this time which was a pleasant surprise! Boy the sun was shining too!! Wow it was hot and beautiful!! It was so fun to be on those sandy ‘roads’ again! In Ponta… there are no such things as paved roads lol its all sand the whole way! That’s why you need a 4X4 to drive around there! It took us about 45mins from the border to get to the absolutely stunning beach house we stayed in the last time. Was just as gorgeous as we left it! The views from the balconies are indescribable!! Just miles and miles of the bluest sea I’ve ever seen meeting with large hills and white sand… ah definitely post card like. We arrived around half past ten and went straight to the beach layed under the bright sun and started the mission to be brown! Was such a lovely day out! Napping on the beach has got to be one of my favorite things to do! We went back to the house for lunch and then shortly after Roxi and I went straight back to the beach to top off the first nap haha. In need of a shower and to let my skin take a break from the sun (YES mom I was wearing SPF) lol we went back to the house for the third time. Freshening up was nice and as soon as I walked down the stairs, Leslie and Kaz were on their way back to the beach for a nice late afternoon walk. Obviously I joined, I mean really you can NEVER get too much of a Mozam beach EVER! Anyone who argues, must be a polar bear ;) Our walk was so nice and relaxing! Took a few photos and after a little while we headed back but were stopped along the way by Greg and a few of his mates who were staying at the house a few steps down from where we were staying. They were having a nice little party with music, dops (drinks) & a fantastic deckside view of the sea! We stopped off for a little while and had a few glasses of wine and chatted away! Was too fun, at one point an extremely intoxicated man ran up to the house. Naked. Covering his goods with a sandy tshirt hahah was absolutely ridiculous! He came from the house across the way.. it was a 50th birthday party.. no one asked questions.. just laughed because hey it’s MOZAM.. you can do what ever you want hahah We eventually made it back to our place feeling on top of the world lol The adults prepared a delicious supper and us youngsters went out to Ponta de Oura for a bit of a jol after supper! We tried to go to Fernandos first but sadly it was closed so we just headed to Pintos (the place I lost my camers last time ☹ ). It was quite empty but we grabbed a few drinks and some pool sticks and attempted a game of pool haha I will brag .. I hit the winning shot in ☺ haha we stayed for a little while and danced but decided to go home early so we could get up bright and early to take advantage of the beach!
8am breakfast came, & I had my breath taken away by the stunning view and sound of the sea right outside my window! To die for honesty! We packed up loaded the jetskis and headed to Ponta! What a fabulous day… sun shining bright, fresh fruit, biltong, warm water to swim in .. seriously paradise! There was tanning, beach wandering, more tanning, jet skiing , attempt at surfing, and sand between my toes. I couldn’t ask for more! About the attempt at surfing haha I really need to learn to be coordinated! All in all a perfect beach day! We didn’t stay all day as we headed back around 3 for lunch! My beach buddy Roxi and I went back to the beach by our house after we ate and napped a bit longer in the sun! We went to the Malangane market and walked around a bit after we got back and then met up with the adults for drinks at one of the local shabeens (hut bar) and watched the rugby! So fun! Supper was next on the agenda and MM was it tasty.. Perfectly cooked steak fillets, salad, veggies! Gosh I love home cooked meals.. especially from the braai! Seeing as it was Saturday night and most of the people on holiday for the weekend were jolling that evening of course we joined. We played a few games of President and Popo after supper, then moved to kings and after a few glasses of wine & savannah lights it was go time haha so just kidding mom.. well sort of ;) Off to Fernandos we went and WOW was it packed! I immediately blamed Fernando for making me lose my camera last trip in mozam & he just laughed and preceded to pour more rum into our R&Rs… You see peeps.. Fernandos is FAMOUS for their R&Rs.. its like 98779 parts rum and 1 part raspberry just for color ;) haha I was smart this time and only consumed a little more than half of one.. the perfect recipe for a good night! After our R&Rs we headed to Pintos and danced the night away! On the way home we all decided that a trip to the beach in the moon light was mandatory as well as little swim in the sea! AH was SO AMAZING!! Have never swam in the ocean at night… as stupid as it sounds because there were probably a billion sharks just chilling waiting to munch one of us .. it was such a cool experience! I have never done it before and was so relaxing to sit in the sand and just listen to the silence surrounds the mesmerizing sounds of the waves coming to shore. Very therapeutic haha my chi appreciated it so much!
Sunday morning came with breakfast & beach packing and off we went back to Ponta! Another fantastic sunny relaxing day! I took the jet ski for a spin and had a blast! Saddly it was our last day to ride it because we were leaving the following day! Swimming in the sea here is so much different than Cape Town’s ice cold water… ah its so relaxing just to float on your back and lets the little foamies roll over your hair. I seriously could live a happy life in Mozambique! We unloaded the cars and of course we headed back to our beach. This time we took golf balls and clubs! Was too fun! Not to long in the sun again because we were going to Club 360 which has a ‘360 degree view’ of Ponta Malangane & not to mention fab cocktails! Mm and aww haha love that place! Supper was seriously the most delicious meal I have eaten in a long time! After 360 we came back the boys braaied us ribs and we had salad and veggies … OH MY WORD I could bath in those ribs they were so delicious! Ending the night as usual with a little President & Popo then off to bed early for all of us! The last few nights were quite draining.. absolutely a great time but was definitely in need of a nice long sleep.
OOO Monday came so sad time to leave! We all headed to the Malangane beach for one last goodbye kiss to the sea & sand haha played around for about an hour then luck us we were served a fantastic brunch accompanied by the stunning view and the packing of the cars began. Its always hard to leave this place haha I speak from only having done it twice.. but it really is one of the most beautiful places I have ever been. Im definitely going to miss waking up to great blue sea staring me in my face! There is nothing like eating a bowl of pro-nutro with that view ;) 5hours later and we were back in Durban! I spent the evening watching Greys Anatomy with Leslie and finishing an assignment that was due today that a nice friend of mine was turning in for me!
Sorry mom, I had to skip school today lol the plane tickets were much cheaper this way! I went to gym at half past 7 with Ruthie and Leslie.. sweat my brains and all the glasses of wine out from the weekend for 2hours. It was such a beautiful day in Durban that I layed in the pool on a floatie, napped and read my magazine for a few hours. Im so sorry to throw my tortures on you guys… just kiddng.. I know I am spoiled and don’t deserve this but I hope by sharing this with yall.. you can live vicariously though this blog. I promise I am so appreciative of all of these fantastic adventures I have had the opportunity to go on!!
Instead of napping on the plane I just wrote this ridiculously long blog so hopefully my family and friends know whats going on in my world today lol. Ill be back in Cape Town shortly & guess who is coming to visit in 5 days?! BRITTANY! AH still can not believe she is going to be here so soon! I can not wait! Booked the safari this afternoon! After she goes home ill update you guys on our adventures! Until then…. You can find me on the beach ;) Love & miss everyone!! xxxxx

Cliff Jumping & Abseiling off a mountain :)

:) So two saturdays ago we payed $100 for a full day of hiking, cliff jumping, and abseiling!! It was awesome!!! We left around 7am to eat breakfast with our tour guides... we were given the low down and our pack lunches and began our hike around 8am through a place near Gordan's bay! It took us about an hour to get to the cliffs in the middle of the beautiful gorge! The weather was SO HOTT that day too, but beautiful as always, needless to say we were stoked when we made it and were able to jump in the crystal clear gorge pools! The cliff we jumped off of was abotu 7meters which is roughly 20ft :) ya i know we are pretty BA ;) just kidding but it was pretty scary looking over the edge lol. After about an hour we continued our hike which took another hour and a half and then we were harnessed up and propelled ourselves down the side of a 70meter mountain side with rope one by one! IT WAS SO COOL!!! Half way down we were in a waterfall and the view was GORGEOUS :D it took about 3-4hours before everyone finished.. my friend Kyle and i were the first ones to go so when we finished we took naps on the rocks next to the other gorge pool catching a fantastic tan! When everyone finished we hiked back to the place and had dinner then they brought us all back home! It was a long but awesome day! So now i can cross cliff jumping & abseiling down a mountain off my bucket list!! Sky diving is next (sorry mom) ;)

First week back at Varsity :)

Wow what a week! Monday was my last first day of undergrad EVER… ah when did I get so old?! First day was a bit of a mess though, I read the board wrong and though my class was at 11 instead of ten so I missed my first marketing 2 class and went to some graduate marketing course and felt like a lost freshman when I over heard the people next me say that this was marketing research haha No worries though it only took 4 days to get everything sorted with switching courses and hopefully next week wont be so hectic. I really like all of my professors so far as well! I have such a weird schedule this semester because each day is different, but at 9am Monday,Tuesday, & Thursday I have an English class with a really funny British professor! He reads stories in all different voices and is always so energetic. I think im going to like his class.. its insane though there are about 700 people in the class!! I have gotten there late everyday so have had to sit on the steps haha. Then I have Marketing 2 which seems like it is going to be really interesting. Both professors seem nice and very smart! I think this will be a good course especially because I am thinking of going to grad school for international marketing ☺ I have that class Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday & Friday at ten. For my science with out a lab credit im taking Astronomy Monday through Friday at noon, which seems really cool. I have never taken a class like it and the first week of lectures went well, I already learned so much! My professor seems really nice as well. My fourth class is People Management, which meets Monday, Tuesday and Thursday at 2. There are four different professors for the different parts of the course and so far they seem cool as well.





It’s great being back on campus and seeing friends from last semester, and not to mention the weather has been GORGEOUS! It makes campus look even prettier than before which is very hard to believe ☺ After class Friday a group of us piled in a cab and spent the afternoon on the beach, stayed for sunset while eating dinner at this delicious restaurant Cal Cachios. My digs mate Elise and I shared a banana and avo pizza.. mmm my favourite!! Friday night was the night that the moon was the biggest it would be all year. It was so beautiful, bright and humongous haha. Saturday I went with Nix and her boyfriend Gareth to the biscuit mill and had lunch and walked around ☺ love that place! Ah they always have the BEST food!! It was so packed though because it was so nice outside. After we got back I went to the beach again with a few of my digs mates and we layed out of a few hours. There was a live concert at 6pm on the beach and we intended to stay and watch, but we def didn’t come prepared because we didn’t bring any food or drinks haha so as everyone munched on their delish picknicks they packed we all got hungry and left right after the first song lol The band was cool though, I almost wish we would have stayed a little longer but hopefully there will be another one we can go to. I designated today as my first lazy Sunday! Haha I slept in then walked to the lovely pick n pay and did a massive grocery shopping with my other digs mate matt ☺ I also cleaned my room and listened to my new Taylor swift cd about ten times lol Matt is making us baked ziti for dinner YUM! And then it’s Monday again and a new week ahead!! The first home Ikey Tiger Rugby game is tomorrow nigh!! Im so excited because Rugby is like South Africa’s football, so im sure this is going to be crazy! Can’t wait! Hope everyone has a fab week!! Chat soon ;) xx

Cape Town, Round 2

Hi all :)

First of all I would like to apologize for the terrible job of keeping this blog updated … So im going to try and start over ☺ and actually keep up with it this time… sorry agan :/
Here goes…

So it’s been 5 crazy/amazing/epic/wonderful months since my last post.. Instead of making this thing 6billion pages ill spare you and just give you a quick summary of some of the things that I was very lucky to be able to do:

Hiking table mountain, biking through a national park, going to Zambia/Zimbabwe/Botswana for ten days- white water rafting, petting lions, going on two safaris, having a herd of elephants walk across the road, touring vic falls, sun set cruise from our beautiful resort with my best friends, living in Durban for 2 months learning how to be a proper South African ;) .. Having mom & Gary & Lynne Jason & the girls visit for 6weeks taking a week vaca to Cape Town doing wine tours & petting cheetas..then back to Durban for Christmas in the sun, spending New Years in Cape Town – driving to Joburg then Durban then Mozam in 2days… going to Mozambique for a week jetskiing, scuba diving and living on the beach… then getting back to Cape Town Jan 27th to meet my new roommates … (Hopefully you all know by now that I extended my semester to a year abroad)

In a nutshell there you go ☺ would have loved to elaborate more but it would honestly take a year. The photos do more talking that words ever can ☺

So here I am about to start my second semester in paradise. At the moment it is snowing like a heaven in Texas while I have spent the last 3days on the beach … very ironic!! Last semester was absolutely amazing and I am so thankful and lucky that I was able to do so many amazing things while I was in beautiful Africa! As of now I have visited 6 African countries, bungee jumped the highest bridge in the world, rode an elephant, pet a lion & a cheetah, cage dive with Great white sharks, kayaked with whales in hermanus, white water rafted on the Zambezi river, hiked two mountains, had a safari truck be stampeded by an angry elephant, watched a heard of elephants walk across the street in Botswana, watch giraffes walk along the side of the road in Zambia, scuba dive in Mozambique with sea turtles and the biggest parrot fish I have ever seen, been to a proper South African 21st, made some of the best friends I have ever had & be apart of a real South African family learning how to say Pardon instead of What ;) (Thank you so so much DeRicquebourg family, yall are amazing)… im sure that there is more I am just forgetting it because I was a bad blogger and never kept track haha. But honestly last semester changed my life and allowed me to experience things I never in my wildest dreams thought I would do. I really had the absolutely time of my life and am so excited I am able to spend 6 more months here! Last semester flew by and im sure this one will as well, so I am going to try and make the most of my time here! I miss my friends and family dearly but thankfully skype has made staying in touch relatively easy. Recently found out that my sister Brittany is coming to visit in March!! SO very excited for that, cannot wait to see her and show her around beautiful Cape Town.
So far, I love all my new room mates and new kids in the program… everyone seems really nice & our new digs (house) is awesome!! I am really happy I decided to stay another semester ☺ Registered for my last semester of classes yesterday & start school Feburary 14th!! Hopefully the next update wont be in 5months ;) xx

Kayaking in Hermanus with WHALES :)

Saturday September 25, 2010
Genius me hit the snooze on my phone and fell back asleep when i was supposed to be up at 7am because the bus was picking us up outside at 7:30am... at 7:36 my phone started buzzing again and when I put two and two together I had to fly out of bed, throw everything in a bag and run downstairs where the bus driver and everyone else was waiting on my roommate and I.. Woops!! She overslept as well so it wasn't just me haha. After we got situated we started driving for about an hour and then we got to the Genandendal museum. It was really a cool place still set up from the early `1700s and it was a beautiful day outside! We learned about Genandendal in our Core Class so it was cool to see. After the museum tour they took us outside and we got in these little huts.. pretty cool! After the tour over they took us into the adorable little town of Greyton where we had a speedy lunch because we had to get back on the bus asap to get to Hermanus to go Kayaking!! WOW Hermanus was beautiful! I couldn’t bring my camera with me down to the water because I didn’t want it to get ruined from the water while we were Kayaking! Luckily Arcadia paid a professional photographer to take our photos while we were kayaking so the problem of no pics avoided!! Since I woke up in a frenzy this morning I completely forgot to put a change of clothes in my bag so I thought I was going to have to be soaked the whole way home after kayaking, but thankfully the nice people there had an extra pair of board shorts that they let me borrow... and boy were they stylish haha!! KIDDING! But the Kayaking was so cooL! I have never done it before so it was neat to have my first time in the middle of the ocean with Whales!! We saw about 3 different whales for the hour that we were on the water! WOW were they beautiful & HUGE!!! We couldn’t get very close, but still close enough to see them come out of the water a bit! I was in the front of the kayak doing all the work… just kidding, my partner Reza was in the back doing equally as much work. I’d say we were a good team, did not flip once thank goodness because the water was pretty chilly! When some of the waves would come over the top of the kayak it was a nice little wake up splash haha. All in all the kayaking was really fun & Hermanus was awesome! We walked around the little market after we got out of the water while the second group went out. All of us were pretty tired so we went back to the bus and napped until the other group finished & then we headed back home! What a cool way to spend a Saturday in Cape Town!!

Spring Break: YOU MARRY ME!!!

Okay guys SO sorry for the lack of updates on this thing!! Mid-terms came up & then we were on break for 10days and then this week I had my first exam & a paper due! But im all finished now YAY! I think my first test went really well too!! Brace yourselves because our VAC (spring break in America ;) ) was definitely unexpected but still had a blast!!! Here goes…..

Friday 9/3/10
OH my word, the 4:30am cab came so quick, considering I had been up all night finishing a paper that was due in a few hours! Luckily a friend of mine turned it in for me! But I finished writing around 3am and skyped mom, gary, britt & lisa & daniel on a conference call and it was so fun! After talking with them for a bit, I jumped in the shower, grabbed my backs and hopped in the cab with the six boys downstairs! The plane took off at 6:30am and luckily I slept most of the two hours to Joburg, but I was still so exhausted from no sleep the night before! After the cab driver took his Jolly time picking us up from the airport in Joburg, we finally made it to Joburg Backpackers around 11am. We met Leya and Kaitlyn who got in the night before. The rest of the group went on a tour of Soweto and the 3 of us girls took a cab to Nelson Mandela square in the city. Joburg was beautiful and modern!! It seems like a really rich part of South Africa too because we saw a sick black lamb and silver rolls Royce parked outside of this gorgeous hotel by the shopping center!! Sadly I was feeling awful so we went back to the backpackers hostel and I took a nap until like 7:30. I woke up still feeling lousy but I emt my friends upstairs for pizza and hung out for a bit! Everyone went to go out to the bars but my throat felt like it was going to explode so I stayed in hoping it would be better in the morning with a full nights sleep.

Saturday 9/4/10
No luck :/ I woke up at 6:45am feeling like I swallowed rocks all night sweating to death. Not the perfect start to vac! The Baz bus was there to pick us up at 7:45 to take us to Swaziland, so I sucked it up, took some advil and hopped in the bus! I slept a lot and drank lots of water and poweraide on the way there. I started to feel a little better thankfully after a while. At 4:30pm we made it to the Swaziland/South African border & got our new stamps yay & then headed to Lidwala Backpackers where we were staying for the night. The place was so cute and I saw my first MONKEY!! Haha After we put our stuff up in our rooms we started walking down the road to the restaurant that the lady at the front desk told us about. A police car pulled over and picked us up because he said it was too dangerous for us to be walking at night :/ should have been a warning sign!! The restaurant we ate at was delicious though and they had the sharks rugby game on so we had a good time! After dinner our waiter called us taxis and we went back to the hostel and chilled for a bit then went to bed. First night in Swaziland was pretty good…

Sunday 9/5/10
I was feeling a little better when I woke up, but it was absolutely gorgeous outside so I took some more advil and tried not to think about it haha. We packed up our stuff and left it at the front while we went on a tour of Lobamba Village. It was pretty cool, our tour guide actually lived in the village so he first took us by the stadium, and then to the King’s museum where we actually learned some cool history about Swaziland! They are one of the few monarchies left in the world! The village was neat to see thought because we just observed people living their normal lives and at the end we went to watch a guy who started this non profit organization in the village teaching kids how to play the guitar and art skills. Him and his female partner played us a few of their songs and it was really great! I took some cool videos! After the tour finished we went back to the stadium and caught the second half of the Ghana vs. Swaziland soccer game! So cool to see Ghana play because I remember watching them in the world cup when they knocked the US out!!! After the game was over and we went to leave, the guards blocked off the exit because the king and his wives were driving their ballin cars out of the stadium!! HE totally waved us too! So cool!! We took a mini bus to from the game back to Lidwala and grabbed our stuff then took the little bus to Sondzela Backpackers in the Milwani Wildlife Sancuary. It was night time when we got there so we couldn’t really see the scenery but the hostel was so cool! We all put our stuff up, claimed bunks and then hung out for a little bit downstairs by the pool and ping pong table, then went up stairs and went to bed.

Monday 9/6/10
WOW.. I cant even put in words how beautiful the view was that we woke up too over looking the whole wildlife sanctuary and mountains!! Breath taking! We hopped on the 7:30am shuttle to go to the grocery store and get a few things! We came back and paid for the horse back riding and right when we were about to leave, Kaitlyn realized that the little bag she had her passport and all her money in was missing :/ At first we thought that there was no way it could be gone, just must be in a different pocket of her backpack. We had to leave because we were going to be late for the horses, so Leya and Kaitlyn stayed behind to keep looking for the passport! In the mean time we walked through the trail from our hostel through the sanctuary… it was amazing! There were wild animals running all around us, (deer looking) not sure their specific names and more monkeys!! So adorable! The horse back riding was absolutely indescribeable!! When we first got there we had to get helmets and then they took us to the place where they had the horses and picked them out for us. The guide gave me Sabuka which means the tiny one in the Swazi language lol he told me this was the perfect horse for me! She was a sweet heart! I haven’t rode a horse since I was so young and even then I think I just rode our pony haha .. But they took us all the way to the mountains and through the fields on the horses and it was so cool!! Saw lots of cool animals, herds of wildabeasts and zebras and enyallas, and much more I just have no clue the names.. but more importantly I have tons of pictures!! The zebras were my favorite to see though! Ah such beautiful creatures!! We rode the horses for about two hours and then went ate lunch at the restaurant they had there which was overlooking the lake where there were HIPPOS with in 5feet of us! So cool!!!! We got to see them eat and then go in the water and hang out haha. Sadly after lunch we heard from the girls and they had no luck with the passport and were still waiting at the police station. Even more bad luck… Today was Swaziland independence day so the Swazi embacy was closed and to make it worse it was also Labor day in the States so the US embacy was also closed so there was absolutely nothing we could do :/ not good!! Once they got back we tried to make the best of the situation and went on a walk through the sanctuary & it was perfect timing because the sun was setting over the mountain and it seriously was one of the top 5 most beautiful things I have ever seen! I got some really cool pictures too!! On the walk we saw more zebras too!! When we got back from our walk we made pbjs for dinner and re-planned what we were going to do until Thursday when the next bus was coming because since kaitlyn didn’t have her passport we couldn’t leave in the morning like we were supposed to, to get back into South Africa. I decided that I was going to stay with her because I know that if that was me, she would have stayed and I would have not wanted to be there alone. Sadly, only Leya felt the same and the others decided that they were going to leave. That night there was a traditional Swazi dance performance going on at the main camp so we took the shuttle to go see it. It was pretty cool to see, very different style of dancing but the drums were way cool! After that we just went home and went to sleep early because there really isn’t anything to do in Swaziland at night.. its exactly the safest place. In the day it’s fine if you are with people, but night time is another story.

Tuesday 9/7/10
Unfortunately the rest of the group thought that it would be okay to leave three girls in Swaziland by them selves so they left in the morning while we stayed behind. :/ As our bad luck continued, we were in a miss understanding with our program director back in the states because when Kaitlyn spoke with here the day before, she was under the impression that the situation was being taken care of and that they would call us when they made her a new passport. So instead of going to the embacy first thing in the morning like we should have, we took the shuttle to the market and then a minibus to the city of Manzini with one of employees from Sondzela. She was really helpful in finding us the right bus to transfer to because there were SO many people and minibuses everywhere, it was actually overwhelming and a bit scary because us three girls were the only white people there, at all. Please, know I am not racist at ALL… it was just a bit uncomfortable having everyone staring at us like what in the world are you doing here… Once we got on the right bus we headed to the Hlane National Park where we booked a Safari!! The bus took about 20 minutes to get there, not a bad ride, I sat next to this adorable little boy who found a digital camera fascinating! He loved looking at my pictures.. it was so sweet! Continuing with our bad luck, we didn’t check the weather before we left so we had on shorts and tanktops and it was probably low 60s .. thankfully the people at the front destk were nice and let us borrow sweatshirts for the drive. The safari was SO COOL!! Right away we saw an ostrich that walked right up to our truck & then a few minutes later we saw a mom and baby rhino!! They were too cool! In total we saw probably 6 different rhinos and tons of enyallas and more of the deer looking animals! We also saw some wildabeasts and wart hogs!! After the first hour, they took us back to the lion section and we drove up on 3 different elephant families!! AHH it was too neat to see the difference in the way the wild elephants act compared to the traied ones that I saw at the park where we rode them on our garden route trip! The last family of elephants we came upon had a tiny little 2week old baby elephant standing next to its mom. OH it was so precious.. hard to get pictures of because it was so small and in the bush a little ways. But our driver told the family in the back to hold onto their kids because he said the mom looked mad. & Boy was he right, about a minute after she got behind our truck and started getting closer and our driver just yelled for us to hold on and he floored it with the mom elephant stampeding behind the truck! AHH it was the coolest thing ever!! At first we were laughing because we were omg this is not happening, but then we were like holy cow we better hold on because if he hits a pot hole we are done for haha!! We got away safely with the elephant on our tail for a good 30 seconds!! What an experience!! After the elephants we saw three female lions chasing something.. we only saw them for a few seconds because they ran off when they heard the truck!! It was way cool to see them though!! Only thing we didn’t see that I was a little bummed about were giraffes.. but it was still an awesome Safari for only $40.!! So im def not complaining!! After the Safari, we ate lunch in the middle of the game park right next to three sleeping rhinos! After lunch we walked back out to the main road to get the next passing bus. We started walking in the direction where the busses were heading and planned to grab it on the way. We came up upon a police road block where the passing cars have to pull over and the police check all the passengers belongings to make sure there isn’t any illegal smuggling going on. As we were walking up to the stopped bus, one of the Swazi police officers asked to see our ids and asked where we were going. We told him and as he looked at our ids his exact words were.. “Oh you girls are American, I’ve always wanted to go to America… Will you marry me?”… No joke with a serious face… REALLY? Ah culture shock begun!! We took our ids said no and walked on the bus and rode thirty minutes back to Manzini where we had to get on a mini bus back to the market where the shuttle from Sondzela was to pick us up! Well ill say this next part was my first real taste of the Africa that people are scared of… Because so far in South Africa we have been spoiled to their modern way of life. COMPLETELY different in Swaziland… As we got of the bus in the middle of the crazy market in Manzini we weren’t exactly sure which of the 200 different minibuses to get on so we stayed close together and started walking in the middle of the chaos of people… once again we were the only white people so the stares were already intact, and then the grabbing of the arms started and the shouting at us when we would ignore them and keep walking.. It was so hard to keep our emotions on ease, one because we were scared to death and two because we just wanted to get home and not deal with this and make the situation worse! I kept it cool until the 10th Swazi man pointed from about a foot in front of me yelling “YOU, MARRY ME?!!” at that point I had no other option but to yell NO GET AWAY FROM ME! And then started crying… so did Kaitlyn (im not the only baby lol) Leya took charge and stayed calm and grabed us closer as we kept walking into the mass of swazi proposers! FINally a nice older man came up to us and asked if we needed help and then showed us to the right bus… Thank God for him. It was so intense and like something from a movie that just didn’t seem real. I don’t know if this sounds a lot worse than it actually was, but to say the least nothing bad happened and as much as I wanted to be angry with the situations its one of those things where you have to remember that you are not in Kansas anymore & you are in a different country where in their culture women are not viewed the same as they are where we are from and having someone yell marry me is common, I guess. Culture shock in full force! We cried for a good 2 minutes on the bus, sucked it up and made it to the market safely! We bought some pasta for dinner and went back to Sondzela and cooked it then sat in the living room and talked with these nice Dutch girls who were med students in the Netherlands just on vacation. We went to sleep really early because after we spoke with our program director we found out that we needed to get to the Embassy first thing in the morning when it opened so we could try to get Kaitlyn a new passport.

Wednesday 9/8/10
All three of us woke up at 5:30am and ate a little breakfast while we waited for the cab driver to pick us up and take us to Mbane the city that was 45minutes away where the American Embassy was located. We first had to go to this photo shop where Kaitlyn had to get a passport sized photo and then get to the embassy. As our wonderful luck continued the passport pictures were the wrong size so we had to go back to the photo place and get different sizes. Being so frustrated and upset because we had no clue when we were going to be able to leave the country we asked a Swazi police car to take us to the photo shop because after waiting five minutes we didn’t see any cabs. It was really nice of him to take us though. After we got the right sized pictures we went back to the embassy and waited in the waiting room until we received any news. The woman told us that these things can take either a few hours or days just depending on how it was handled. We cried again and then all fell asleep in the waiting room chairs. Then three hours later we received the best news and the lady woke us up saying, “Kaitlyn, we got it!!!!” One of the happiest moments of my life! We all cried again, then hugged and Kaitlyn got her new passport and walked outside to grab a cab back to Sondzela. After the rude driver dropped us off at the wrong entrance and demanded us to pay him more money we had to walk about a mile back to Sondzela. As pissed as we were about having to walk, at least we had the privilege to walk through the beautiful sanctuary where we saw three more zebras just eating grass peacefully right by the fence. We were so close to them too! Ah they are so beautiful! We all got back home, took showers then hopped into our bunks and napped until 4:30 because the weather was rainy and crummy so there wasn’t anything to do outside. For a late lunch we made pbj +banana sandwiches and sat by the fire and watched tv for hours. When dinner time came we refried our pasta from the night before and borrowed a little bit of pasta sauce from the fridge and ate by the fire talking to these really nice English people and the Dutch girls from the night before. Staying in hostels is such a great way to meet people from all over the world! IT’s neat to hear all of their traveling stories and about them in general. That night we all went to sleep so happy because we knew that at 7:30 am we were peacing out of Swaziland for good!!

Thursday 9/9/10
We said goodbye to our Sondzela family and then hopped on the Baz bus at 7:45 and enjoyed the hour drive to the border. By 9am we had hugged, RAN across the border, and high fived like 10 times because we were FINALLY back in South Africa!!!! YAY so exciting! We saw giraffes on the the drive too because we drove by a game park a few miles after crossing the border! SO COOL :D our luck at least seemed like it was turning around! By 2:30pm we made it to St. Lucia where the bus picked up the rest of our group that left us while we were in Swaziland. We made it to Durban at 5:45pm and the three of us booked a separate hostel than the rest of the group because we weren’t really excited to hang out with them. We stayed at this really cool hostel called Tekweni. We all showered and got ready and then met some friends that we met in Cape Town who were in Durban on their Vac too at the Hooters in Umlanga. Funny story, one of the guys we met actually lives next door to Gary’s family! Small world hey. While at Hooters I realized that I forgot to take my malaria medications so genius me thought it would be okay to take it with the margarita I was driniking… Bad choice! It was worse than the feeling you get when you take a vitamin on an empty stomach ahha thankfully I didn’t get sick though, just felt like it for a good 3minutes! After hooters we all went to a nearby club called Clapham Gold and had a fun night and then went back to Tekweni and passed out from being so exhausted.

Friday 9/10/10
From our previous days of waking up at the crack of dawn, it was impossible to sleep in. At 7:45am I was wide awake. Thankfully Kaitlyn and Leya were up too so we got dressed and walked to the nearby café and had breakfast. Then weather was so beautiful so we ate outside and enjoyed it. After breakfast Leslie and Ruth (Gary’s sister and mom) picked us up in Umlanga and brought us back to their house. It was so unbelievably nice of them to let us stay with them for the night instead of in another hostel. After we put our swimsuits on and we met the boys next door and they took us to the beach in Belito where we chilled and made sand creatures for two hours. After Belito beach we went to the beach that was close to their house called Westbrook which was equally a beautiful with Huge waves! It was a little bit windy but we enjoyed relaxing in the sun and not being stuck in Swaziland. After another hour we went back to the boys house and they cooked us lunch and we watched the OC for a bit and then went back to Greg and Leslie’s to shower and get ready. They took us to a cocktail party with them, which was so fun. After that Brett took us to a few different bars and we all hung out for a bit then called it an early night because the girls had to be at the airport at 5am.

Saturday 9/11/10
After a long week it was finally time to go back home to Cape Town. Kaitlyn and Leya’s plane left at 6:45am but mine and the rest of the groups’ left at 9am. Leslie made me toast for breakfast and then brought me to the airport and the plane took off right on time. We got back to Capetown around 12:30 and Lauren picked me up and brought me back to my flat! I love their family, they are all so sweet and were so helpful over the break! I honestly can’t thank them enough for all of their hospitality. Once we were back to the flat the security alarms were all going off because we had all been gone for so long that the maid did something with the alarm code and when we opened any of the doors the annoyingly loud alarm just blared. Thankfully it only took about 5minutes of constant EEEHHHHEHHHEHHHHHH before our program director called us with the right code and we fixed it. A few of us girls decided that a trip to camps bay beach was in order so we all put our swim suits on and took a minibus for about 30 minutes to the beach. The weather was so perfect!! We hung out for about two hours then got back on the minibuses and headed to the Rugby game that we got tickets for before we left! It was pretty cool to see the game in the stadium! First time I have seen a game in person! After the game a few of us girls went to dinner and then went back to our flats and got ready to go out. Only three of us ended up going out but we had a great time because the rugby team that we saw playing earlier that day was at the same club we were at. They all had on these matching long sleeved polo shirts so our friend sarah asked why in the world a group of like 20 guys would wear matching outfits out and then they told us they were all on the professional rugby team. Haha they were all fun to hang out with though for the night!

It was a nice way to end our unexpected spring break to say the least! Even though it wasn’t the vac we planned, we still had a great time and everyone came home safely so no complaints! Sorry that was a novel and hopefully ill update these things more often!! Still loving Cape Town as much as ever, especially now that the weather is starting to warm up!!