Always Yours

This Is Africa: Arrival

I’ve decided that since it is far too late for me to give a full chronological account of all the places I’ve been and seen since leaving for South Africa, I’m just going to pick one topic per post. Therefore, topic numero uno (I don’t know how to say one in Zulu yet, or I would have written that instead) is our arrival in South Africa.

We landed in Johannesburg around 5:30 pm on the 19th, where we met one of our CLCs (Community Life Coordinators) Janet, and Reg, the director of our program. They took us to a small hotel and assigned us our temporary roommates. For dinner we ate at The Apple Bite, a walk-up-to-the-window fast food restaurant right across the street from our hotel. The food was pretty good, and they had a fair amount of American-like options, which was nice for those who didn’t feel like being too adventurous in their cuisine just yet. A few of us took advantage of the cheaply priced milkshakes (because who can turn down a $2 shake?) which were delicious! After we finished our first official meal on African soil, we went back to the hotel and fell asleep, exhausted after such a long day of traveling.

The next day was full, with a visit to the Apartheid museum and a tour of Sowetto, the first black township (more about these later). 

When we got back to our hotel many of us took naps, still trying to adjust to South African time. For the rest of the night, we hung out with each other and ate dinner at the Apple Bite again.

The next morning, we had an early wake up call for breakfast at the hotel and then a short flight to Durban, where we would take a bus to the African Enterprise (AE) campus, our new home!