Tsitsikamma getaway

Hey hey, sorry for the delay! Been a while since I posted but I wanted to wait until I had something good to share. Alice and I are FINALLY fully healthy again and back to our normal routine. However, since we were sick over my birthday weekend and we had to reschedule our trip to Cape Town, I was antsy to plan a different weekend trip. So last weekend, Andrew and I had a lovely getaway to Tsitsikamma, a coastal town with a gorgeous national park about 2 hours away from PE. We stayed at a cute backpackers nestled at the foot of the Tsitsikamma Mountains and even had some beautiful weather despite the rapidly approaching winter which made the weekend that much more enjoyable! Friday night we cooked homemade spaghetti and meatballs and spent time chatting with the other guests in the backpackers (fun way to meet cool people travelling) as it poured rain outside. Saturday was sunny and we did two beautiful hikes along the coast and ended the day with a braai and too much homemade bread! Sunday morning we found a trail just near town to go running on, only to be stopped by a group of 25 or so baboons playing in the middle of the trail! We gave them time to scatter and ran past them a bit before my nerves made us turn around as baboons are known to attack people! It was a nice, relaxing weekend away and I can't wait to return with the rest of my family as we drive the Garden Route to Cape Town next month! 

Things at school are SLOW at the moment. We just learned that the whole school begins writing their exams on the 30th of May for the remainder of the term which means we don't have any classes to teach. We will still be coming to school to proctor tests and keep the library open for students who want to study, but we are nervous about how slow our schedules will be over the next 3 weeks. We are brainstorming ideas for projects we can be working on, but would love any suggestions readers might have! We are currently working on a recipe book of the foods we have loved cooking since we got here, but we're going to need something else to fill time over the next 3 weeks! 

We have a mid-year conference in Joburg in a few weekends, which is a bit crazy because that means we are almost halfway done with our time here! My family arrives in PE one month from yesterday!! I can't wait for them to meet my friends/students and get a taste of my life here! 

Hopefully I'll have a good post soon of some odd project Al and I have taken on... suggestions welcomed! 

xx

On the upswing!

After about a week in bed, Alice and I are finally healthy! Last week we came down with what we thought was just the flu, and we tried to fight it on our own for couple days before finally getting medicine which took a couple more days to finally clear it out. Our apartment was a mini hospital, but at least we were sick together (we just like to do everything together!). It resulted in a birthday in bed and bananas and white bread for dinner, but I very much appreciated all the well-wishes nonetheless! Alice and I have planned to go get pedicures on Friday afternoon, go for a drink at a wine bar in this cute neighborhood called Richmond Hill, and get dinner with a group of friends to finally celebrate 23!

It is nice to be back at school and busy this week. We found out that we received a grant from the Embassy to help fund the grade 8 and 9 projects, which has allowed us to purchase all the materials we need! The projects are coming along great and keeping us on our toes! The grade 8s are finishing up lessons and discussions on the food pyramid, recipe writing and the cost and availability of food in their community. Next week they will begin breaking into their small groups to create the cookbook and organize the community health fair. The grade 9s are well on their way to creating their own business, and have really enjoyed the freedom of working in small committees to create their own project. It has been exciting to watch them work so autonomously because their classes so often demand they simply copy, memorize, and recite. We also just trained, tested, and took on 6 new grade 10 library prefects! We are excited to get to know more learners well, as we spend so much time with them each week. It will also be a change of pace for us because their English is not nearly as good as the grade 11 and 12 prefects we have now, so it will be a good reminder for us to slow down our English and one more group to practice our Xhosa with.

Our Xhosa continues to improve and we just finished our first 10 week session with our tutor. We decided to keep taking the classes because the structure of meeting, receiving material, and having homework to do keeps us learning! Otherwise, all is well in PE. We are happy to be healthy again and have a few weekend trips planned ahead. It's going to be a busy 6 weeks to wrap up the term, but then the whole family comes to visit :) No fun pictures to post this time, but I'm headed to Tsitsikamma (a large national park along the coast) with my boyfriend for some hiking/relaxation next weekend so will be sure to get some good shots then!

Sending lots of good, healthy energy back to the US!
xx

Musical morning at Walmer!

Stay tuned for Principal Dyani's excitement with the video camera at the end.. too good! Happy Thursday everyone!

Where did April go!?!

Holy cow, the month has disappeared! We returned from holiday to a busy start to term 2 at Walmer. Each of our classes is getting into their projects and it's been fun for us to watch them get excited about it. The grade 9s are really taking off with their "create their own restaurant projects," and are even bringing in outside materials/magazines/etc to make their part of the project better. The grade 8s are still working through some of the introductory lessons of how to create a good cookbook, but are on pace to dive into their groupwork here shortly! This month has been filled with national holidays, which continue this weekend as we have a half day Thursday and no school Friday, Monday, or Tuesday! Our weeks have been very full with class preparations, Xhosa classes, training new library prefects, university club, and other mini projects- but we're enjoying having such full days.

This past weekend was IronMan South Africa in PE (we watched much of it from our living room window)! It was incredible to see what these athletes put their body through over the course of a day. We woke up at 7am to walk down and watch the athletes getting out of the ocean and on to their bikes, and when I went to bed at 10pm, I could still see many athletes running the marathon leg of the triathalon from my bedroom window. It was wild to watch how long these athletes could compete for- the swim started at 7 and they had until midnight to complete the course (3.8k swim, 180k bike, 42 k run). I had a few friends from my running club competing, so it was fun to watch for them as well.

This upcoming long weekend will be full of fun little activities. The NFL draft is on Thursday night, and for those of you who have spent any time with me in the fall, you know how much football means to me. It's on at 1am here, but I have 4 guy friends who are keen to stay up and watch so we're going to make a night of it! On Saturday, the City Lads (the women's soccer team from PE that our Grassroots soccer friends are close with) are playing in their first playoff game in East London, a town about 3 hours up the coast from us. A big group of us are going to drive up for the day to watch them play and then stay the night in a little beach town about 30 minutes away. There is a lot on the line for them this game so we are excited to be able to go and support! Then we will be able to return to PE and relax on Monday and Tuesday before school picks up again. On Friday of that next week, Alice and I are flying to Capetown/Stellenbosch for my birthday- so we have a few busy weekends ahead! (we live a tough life, I know).

The seasons and different school year here keep up constantly confused- because it is moving into winter here, Alice and I are constantly feeling like its September/October. Yet we are reminded by our American friends and family that summer is on the way at home, school is wrapping up, and it is indeed almost May! I'm looking forward to the upcoming weekends and turning a year older in the winelands! Lots of love to everyone, xx

Fall Holiday

Heyo! Home again after 10 awesome days of travel. As you can imagine, I have a lot to share, so I’ll try and break it down into pictures and highlights of each city.

Johannesburg

I started the trip with a weekend in Joburg. I had yet to see the city, so I stayed with another Fulbright ETA, Scott, for the weekend- he was an awesome host/tour guide!

• Friday night at the South Africa vs. India cricket match. More fun than I thought it would be (I’ve always assumed cricket was painfully boring), the fanfare was great for both teams, and President Zuma was in attendance. 

• Saturday morning short run through the Kopies (a big park in Joburg), walked around the Univeristy of Wits (where Scott teaches), and headed to Soweto- a huge township located just outside of Joburg. Over 2 million residents, well known for the large protests/demonstrations as well as police brutality during apartheid. Drove around and had a lunch of “Kotas” (or “bunny chow”)- quarter loaf of bread, hollowed out, and stuffed with fries, cheese, sauce, and sausage. 

• I was surprised to find Soweto was much more developed than I had imagined. I pictured 2 million shanty shacks, and instead found that most of the residences were small, simple houses. After Soweto, we went to the apartheid museum. The museum was beautiful with many powerful exhibits and lots of video/audio exhibits. Seeing the breadth as well of quality of the photographs and videos was a vivid reminder of how recently apartheid was finally ended (1994). There was also a large exhibit on Mandela which I find somewhat fascinating because it’s not often such tribute to a leader is seen until they are dead. It’s wild to think that he could go see the exhibit of himself if he wanted to.
• Sunday: Scott, myself, and 3 other Fulbright ETAs (Rob, Ben, and Mariann) drove from Jozi to Durban. It was a 6 hour drive in which we got to pass through the provinces of Gauteng, Mpumalanga, and KwaZulu-Natal which all had totally different landscapes! 

Driving thru Soweto with Jozi in the background

Your ticket to the museum identifies you as black or white which determines how you enter the museum, a pretty neat way to bring visitors in.

Durban

Durban is a city on the coast of KwaZulu-Natal (East of PE if you’re looking at a map). It has the highest concentrated Indian population outside of India, so we were looking forward to some good curries! I didn’t know exactly what to expect of Durban, but I loved it! The perfect combo of city and beach life.

• First morning explored downtown: Indian markets, centre city, and Juma Musjid mosque (largest mosque in the Southern Hemisphere and can accommodate 7000 worshipers). Afternoon was spent picnicking/lounging on the beach.

Outdoor lounge area at our hostel

Downtown Durban

Juma Musjid Mosque

• Next morning took a skycar to the top of the world cup stadium- incredible views and photo opps from the top. Afternoon boat tour of the port (Durban is the largest port in Africa!) and more great views of the city. Dinner with a Fulbright research grantee at a fun restaurant called Market that had a great outdoor eating area and even better food!

The world cup stadium- the architecture (specifically the triangular part) is meant to emulate the South African flag. 

The skycar carried us up the arch to an open-aired platform we could get out and walk around on. 

Our group at the top! 

Tour of Durban's Port

• Wednesday- drove to Warner Beach (a town about 40 minutes south of Durban) to lounge around the water for one more day in the quiet beach town. 

Ladybrand/Lesotho

• Another car day- 6 hours from the KZN coast to a town called Ladybrand in the Freestate about 20 mins outside of Lesotho (the tiny country inside of South Africa), which was our next destination.

Our B&B in Ladybrand

• On the drive, we passed through Golden Gate National Park- my pictures don’t do it justice, but the road curved for miles through incredible rock formations, plateaus, and landscape. That night we drove into Maseru, the capital of Lesotho, for dinner. We forgot that it was Easter weekend and Friday was a national holiday, so we waited in a line of cars for 2 hours to cross the border. There was nothing remarkable about Maseru (a typical big, dirty city), but it was nice to see.

Driving thru the park

Bridge to Lesotho

Gorgeous sunset driving in

• Friday was probably the highlight of the whole trip- Pony trek! The name, however, is deceiving. These were not ponies, they were horses, which we were more than thankful for once we began the “trek” part of it. We spent six hours on these horses that took us through the mountains of Lesotho. They carried us up steep, rocky trails, through rivers, to a gorgeous waterfall, and to the site of some Bushmen paintings (some of the oldest indigenous people to Africa). We were exhausted, sunburned, and sore from the waist down after 6 hours of riding- but it was some of the most beautiful, untouched landscape I had ever seen.

Driving to the pony trek

The trek begins..

Little did we know we'd be going through this valley

Bushmen paintings

• Saturday we returned to Jobrug, and Sunday I returned to PE. Before I flew home, Scott and I went to Easter Mass (or at least the last hour and a half of it because we messed up the mass times) at Regina Mundi. This is the largest Catholic church in South Africa, and is where Desmond Tutu preached. It was also where Tutu and Mandela held many of their meetings to organize resistance during the apartheid era, and as a result, was also victim to many police raids/acts of violence. After church, we drove past the homes that Tutu and Mandela each lived in during apartheid in Soweto. It was neat to see the areas I had read so much about in real life. 

Regina Mundi Church

It was nice to get out of PE and see other parts of this beautiful country with Fulbright friends I hadn’t seen since orientation! But after 10 packed days in 5 provinces, it is certainly nice to be back home! Tomorrow begins term 2 of the school year, so time to get back into school mode. Hope everyone had a wonderful Easter! xx 

Seaview with Scott!

Hey all,

We are so happy to officially be on holiday! Alice's boyfriend Scott arrived Sunday night, we taught a workshop on To Kill a Mockingbird to grade 12 learners on Monday and Tuesday and now we can finally relax for the next 2 weeks on holiday! Today Alice, Scott, and I drove to Seaview Lion Park to see some of the game in the park and pet the baby lions.. although they weren't really babies- they were 5 months old! See photos below (click to view them as a slideshow)

Awesome half day trip! Tomorrow I am off to Joburg for the weekend. Sunday morning I will be driving with 4 other Fulbrighters from Jozi to Durban and Lesotho (the tiny country inside of RSA) for a few days. I'm looking forward to getting out of PE and seeing more of the country! Many more photos to come following that trip I'm certain! xx