This week has been an interesting one to say the least. It begins with a taxi strike and ends with an amazing trip to Jeffrey’s Bay, includes a bit of internet drama and attacking monkeys.
On Monday morning we were suppose to head to Pendla Primary School, one of the places we are planned to volunteer at, for a welcoming ceremony. Unfortunately, that was the first day of a taxi strike and the private taxi’s we use wouldn’t run for safety concerns. From what I’ve heard, the taxi’s and combi’s are striking because the city plans to replace them with a bussing system in the next few years and people are obviously not happy about that. It has caused a lot of headaches. So after waking up at 6:30 to get ready to go to Pendla we all had to chill in the flats until 9:30 and then get shuttled to NMMU so we could get our cards activated so we could go to the computer labs on campus. However, the system was down and we couldn’t get them done. So then I had to wait until 11:45 to get picked up to head back to the flats. Monday was a very confusing day to say the least.
My first day of actual classes was on Tuesday with my Senior Seminar class only because the strike was still going on we held it in the church across the street. Wednesday the strike was continuing and yet again we had to be shuttled to NMMU for classes (I had Community Service Learning and South African Literature). This was also my first run-in with the dreaded monkeys that seem to haunt the campus. Everywhere you look are signs that say “Don’t Feed the Monkey’s” and “Beware of Biting Monkey’s” or something along those lines. Someone from our group was eating an apple when all of a sudden six monkeys began stalking her. Apparently all students are afraid of the monkeys; I saw a guy throw his bag at one and it still wouldn’t leave him alone. Thursday involved more monkeys and my favorite class, Marine Biology, and my most hated class that I have transferred out of, South African Politics.
So a big drama that is happening right now involves the internet. At the flats we get pretty good internet but we have to pay for it ($6/hr), or there is an internet café about a mile away ($2.50/hr), or the crappy school internet that is free but incredibly slow and all we can do on it is check our school e-mail (Facebook is completely out of the question). It is really frustrating because our director thinks the only means of communication we need with home is the e-mail. He doesn’t seem to understand that Facebook is the main means of communication for students these days. Also, attaching photos to email is incredibly annoying and takes up way too much time, using Facebook or another photo sharing site works perfectly; but he doesn’t seem to get that at the moment. The situation has gotten so out of hand that people are thinking of contacting CSB/SJU to discuss why internet is so difficult to get down here. Other study abroad programs don’t have this problem; China, for example, only had to pay $5/month for unlimited, serviceable internet access. What most of us are worried about is how we are going to be able to use the internet when we have to write papers and do research. It really has become a huge problem.
Most of the group took our first free weekend and had the most amazing time EVER!!! We headed out to Jeffrey’s Bay Friday morning (we don’t have classes on Fridays) and we got back Saturday evening. Jeffrey’s Bay is paradise. That is all I can say about it, do a Google image search on Jeffrey’s Bay and you will get an idea of what I’m talking about. The town itself has a ton of surf shops, and a lot of factory shops. Billabong, Quicksilver, Lizzard, Roxy, all had factory shops there and everything was super cheap. We stayed at a backpackers place called Island Vibe. Imagine a surfer’s hangout, hostel, tiki bar, tropical island all rolled into one and you have Island Vibe. The Bay is world famous for its surfing and this hostel caters to every surfer’s dream, cheap rooms right on the ocean, packed with awesome people who want to do nothing but eat, sleep, and surf. I didn’t get good pictures of the place but you can bet we will be going back there a few times. The room I stayed in had a patio that overlooked the ocean, as did pretty much all the other rooms we had. It looked more like a hotel than a hostel (and it only cost $12.50 a night!). Surprisingly, though, I didn’t go surfing. Surf lessons were in the morning, we got there too late and today the weather wasn’t cooperating (it rained all day). But I did go sand boarding. Sand boarding is basically like snowboarding on sand. I got sand everywhere but I had an amazing time. The dunes opened up to the ocean so the view was to die for. Some people I went with had some nasty wipeouts that they will be feeling for a while, but decided not to try anything to advanced. Definitely going to be doing that again.
On the way back from Jeffrey’s Bay those in the car I was in, Colleen, Nakita, Laura, Jenny, Simon, and I went to Sea View, a drive-thru place where you can see wild animals in their “natural” habitat. I don’t like going to zoos because seeing animals in cages pacing in circles is extremely sad to me, this was only marginally better. We also could pet lion cubs, which was fun to see. Simon and Nakita decided to pet the 11 month old cubs. These animals should not even be allowed to be called cubs, they were huge. They clawed and bit at Simon and Nakita, and they have flesh wounds to prove it. There are also medium sized cubs and baby cubs that we can play with. When we go back I plan on cuddling with the baby’s.
Tomorrow we are going on a safari, finally. I have spent over two weeks in Africa and the only wildlife I’ve seen are some birds and a few Kudu and semi tamed lions at Sea View. I want to get up close to the wild lions, elephants, giraffes, and zebra. You can bet there are going to be massive amounts of pictures from that.
Check out my updated flickr page: www.flickr.com/photos/gearman22
Peace.
No comments:
Post a Comment