Christmas Adventure

Ntofo, Me, and Nothabo

Hello all!

I am back from my amazing adventure that I had today with my host sisters. I decided that for Christmas I wanted to take them to the local nature reserve. My mom and I have talked alot about how the average South African really doesn't have access to the safari part of South Africa. Having this reserve so close made it possible for me to open that up to my host sisters. It was a good time had by all. Let me give you a detailed recap:

After picking up the car in Ladysmith this morning I drove about an hour to my house, first stopping in town to check my mail, as I am anticipating some birthday cake mix from my mom. I tried, in vain, to find a parking space in town within 4 blocks of the post office. In South Africa, small towns are very quiet and empty during the middle of the month. But at month end (when people get paid) or, apparently, the entire month of December, all hell breaks loose and it feels like at least one person from every family that lives in villages around Estcourt shows up to go shopping/get money from the ATM. Usually this results in 150 person-deep ATM lines and ridiculous grocery store pile ups. However, around Christmas time it gets even worse. Many people come home from Johannesburg/Durban to visit their families and the population of town seems to increase exponentially. Most people hate month end because it’s usually too crowded and insane, but I usually enjoy it because the town comes so alive and it feels like people are stocking up for Armageddon which I usually find hilarious. However, today it was too much. I ended up parking about 6 long blocks from the post office and after all that there was nothing. I actually found myself wishing I didn't have the car and had taken a taxi in. This is so funny because at this point I had only had the car for about an hour and I am always wishing I had a car at my disposal...

Next I went to my house, which is about 25 minutes from town in the rural areas. As I was pulling up to my house my 2 younger host sisters (who are 5 and 8) started screaming so loud that I swear you could hear them from 3 houses down. They were dressed up and ready to go, along with my 18 year old host sister. We drove about 35 minutes to the Spionkop Nature Reserve with has a huge dam, lots of wildlife, and horseback riding. I had never just driven around to see animals (previously I had gone to see them on horseback) so I was a little worried that the animals were all hidden away from the roads. This reserve is great because of the number of animals but they always seem to hide away from the dirt roads you drive on, which is a bummer. However, we immediately, before even entering the park saw 7 giraffe and once we got in saw about 7 more, lots of springbok, antelope, some kudu, and tons of zebra. The girls were all totally psyched and shrieking a lot, thereby scaring away a lot of the animals, haha.

A giraffe that walked right by our car

One thing that everyone neglected to mention to me when I was planning this trip was that my 5 year old host sister Ntofo gets terribly car sick every single time she is in a car. I think it's because she is never in them (maybe 3 times a year?) I mean I would have planned ahead or something or done something else fun…but oh well. At least I would have stockedup on plastic emergency bags... So, she threw up a total of 3 times, luckily she got outside all of the times and was fine right afterward. Ehhhh.

After the park we went to my favorite restaurant that is super close to my village and is surrounded by farms. Since we are situated right by the Drakensberg Mountains there is a ton of touristy stuff only about 25 minutes from us. This place is a called the Waffle Hut and everyone always jokes with me about how I love it way too much. So the girls were really excited because this was the first time any of them had been to a restaurant. They were all shocked that you could get whatever you wanted from a menu (instead of everyone eating the same thing), so I helped out by helping them choose what they wanted. Smi (my 18 year old host sister) made the comment that they were the only Zulus eating there and asked me why black people weren’t there. Honestly, it’s because most Zulus in this area don’t have much discretionary income. Also, more importantly, when Zulus eat out they usually get take away from KFC, Chicken Licken, or Nando’s (all chicken/meat heavy options). I talked to Nozipho about this later and she agreed. Waffle Hut's menu is definitely not meat-heavy, and therefore is not a Zulu hotspot. Also this place really caters to tourists and there are always a fair share of Europeans who are on vacation eating there. We did get a lot of stares due to our group make up and me being very motherly by cutting up Ntofo’s food, taking her to the toilet, and speaking Zulu. All the workers there are Zulu and they were all very taken with the girls and asking them their names and talking to me excitedly about them. It was all very cute but at the same time a little sad. Those kinds of reactions are really just examples of how segregated South Africa can be sometimes and how far it still has to go.

Anyways I’m certain that the restaurant was the girls’ highlight of the entire trip because that’s what they told my 33 year old host sister Nozipho (Nothabo’s mom and Ntofo’s Aunt) about immediately when she got home.

After the lunch it was about 3pm but Smi really wasn’t interested in going home just yet, so we drove about 40 KM to go to town. There was really no reason to go back to Estcourt but I think that since the girls never get to go to town they were really just relishing the fact that I was open to anything and willing to seemingly take them anywhere, haha.

Smi
Nothabo
Ntofo
after the day was over!

All in all the day was a success. I have lost my voice almost completely to illness, but had a fabulous time anyways. Tomorrow I am doing part 2 of my car rental and taking 3 of my closest coworkers to Pietermaritzburg (where my first site was—about an hour and a half away from my village) to go the movies. About 8 months ago I told them randomly that I would take them to the movies because they had never been. Because their Saturdays are taken up ¾ of the time with funerals in the village we hadn’t gotten to go yet because no one's dates were ever open, so I took advantage of the luxury of having this car and will be taking them there for the day.

I must say it is pretty fun to expose people to great things for the first time. Their wonderment and excitement is always amazing to watch. It’s kind of a guilty pleasure, I imagine.

So next week begins my vacation! I am picking up my friend who is visiting from the US from the airport and then we are going to Kruger National Park (more animals!) and then go to Cape Town. It should be amazing.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all!

<3