Recap

I'm pretty tired right now, and I've been doing a lot of journaling over the past week, so this will just be a recap of my ten days of freedom.

Wed - We left from Leribe where I was working and drove through to Durban via the Butha-Buthe border post. I think we were the only people who had crossed through that day because the border guards on both sides were practically dead asleep. The Lesotho side only made Peter show his passport, and they didn't even ask me if I was married (probably because they thought Peter was my husband...a common theme throughout the trip). We arrived in Durban around 8:30 p.m. just in time to watch the Euro 2008 game that night (which for the life of me I can't remember, though I could easily look it up, I suppose). Peter's flat is amazing. It overlooks the Durban ocean and has a beautiful veranda... I fell asleep quite easily that night and remained asleep until 7 a.m. the next morning.

Thurs - We hit the gym - Virgin Active (Peter is a gym freak, too, fortunately). Then went over to Woolworth's for food. Yes, the big clothing department store also has food shops, and they are basically where you can get the best things in South Africa (including organic vegetables, cagefree eggs, and smoked fish!). We cooked some brunch, then headed down to the beach. It was so warm out, I was in total shock after the cold of Lesotho! There were a few surfers, swimmers and general teenage riff-raff. Didn't see any Great Whites, though. As far as I can remember, we left the beach then to partake in the South Africa national pastime...shopping in the mall! I went a little crazy, particularly since I normally hate shopping. But I think that after being in Lesotho were there is nothing to shop for, I felt compelled to make some purchases in retail mecca. We ended the day with Peter's famous chicken stir-fry and more soccer on TV.

Friday - Gym again. Then we went into downtown Durban, where I bought some crafts from the stalls along the beach. We tried to find the Victoria St market, where the fish sellers hawk their goods, but it was useless, because no one in Durban could give us directions to the market, let alone the street. I had forgotten my Rough Guide, and our trusty Garmin (GPS) was back at the flat (partially because I put a boycott on the computerized woman's voice constantly telling us the countdown to the next left turn). We then went to see "Indiana Jones", which, unless you're really into sci-fi, I don't recommend. The night ended well, with sushi and some backgammon. (I should mention here that Peter has been working in casinos his whole adult life, so I knew better than to wager anything on our games. Good thing because I only won 1 out of about 8 games.)

Saturday- Gym, gym, gym. Brunch. More craft markets, lots of reading and relaxing in the flat. Probably we went back to Gateway (the mall). Then we had Indian food for dinner. This was one of the things I was most looking forward to in Durban. Apparently the city has one of, if not the biggest Indian populations outside of India and the food is supposed to be amazing. We did have a terrific dinner, but as I've noticed anywhere I've ever had Indian food...it all usual is of about the same quality to me. Good quality, but never the most amazing this I've ever eaten. So I guess I'd had my hopes up pretty high. I guess I'll just have to go to India.

Sunday - I did a lot of reading. A book called "Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight". It was a memoir of Alexandra Fuller's life growing up in Zimbabwe, Zambia and Malawi. The week before, I'd read "When a Crocodile Eats the Sun", another Zimbabwe memoir. I thought the Fuller book was better, but both really brought home the fact that nothing has really changed in Zimbabwe in 30 years. (More on that later, maybe). The best part of the day, was when I met up with a local Ultimate pick-up group and got to play some disc! I am totally out of sprinting shape, and I didn't have any cleats, but it felt so good to be out there!

Monday - we hit the gym, then headed up toward the Wild Coast on our drive to Swaziland. Swazi borders are interesting because they close...some even as early at 4 p.m. We had planned to go through on border post, but we would have cut it too close for comfort and didn't want to get stuck, so we drove up to the main gate to Mbabane. The South Africa border was really irritating. They made up write down the serial numbers of all of our electronics, which took forever (I just made one up for my laptop), and then never told us the purpose for the declaration. Clearly, it's to prevent theft, but when we exited Swazi two days later, they never even checked out things. So we got to the Royal Swazi Sun Hotel around 8 p.m. and unpacked what seemed like a years worth of stuff.

Tues - No gym for me. We had an amazing breakfast buffet with the freshest fruit. Then we headed to the Mantega Craft Center. It is really catering to the tourists, but there were so many great things there, and it was very tastefully constructed, so it was exactly like being at a tourist destination. Lesotho could learn a lot of Swazi when it comes to tourism. Lesotho basically does nothing to make tourist feel welcome, and I think they have a lot of potential to do so. For instance, there is a place in Swazi called House on Fire. It's this crazy cool venue, guest house and restaurant, that is super funky and brings in musicians and artists. They also do weddings, parties and have some theatrical performances. I loved the place, and I was there in the day when nothing was going on.

We went from there to Manzini, where I spend a long time in the Manzini Marketplace. Most of the time, I was in the back corner, listening to music on this sellers botchy laptop. I wanted to buy some local hip-hop and pop, so I hung out there for quite a long time while they played track after track for me. Eventually, I just decided to have them make me a few mixes, so I walked around the market while they burned some CDs for me. The hip-hop turned out to be more of the kwaito music that's played in the taxis here. They call it house a lot of the time, but it's really just kwaito. I'm bringing it home, so you can hear it if you're interested.

Finally, we drove back toward Mbabane and hit the local game park. It was pretty cool, as we saw bushbok, eland, warthogs, and hippos! We heard there were zebra around, but we never spotted them.

I ordered prawns for dinner that night, and I thought they would be normal ones like at home, but no...they were huge! Like lobster claw sized. They were absolutely delicious, too!

Wed - Early, early run in the gym, buffet breakfast, then we decided to drive out of Swazi through the top border post and go to Kruger National Park. Kruger, of course, is the major game park in SA, that has the big 5 (elephants, lions, water buffalo, rhino, leopard). It's only a 2 hour drive to the southern gate, so we got there with seemingly plenty of time to see the animals. Only, we we arrived, the park ranger turned us away. The whole park was closed because it was at human capacity, so no one else could enter. And it had been closed for a few days.

So, we drove up through the Eastern Transvaal a bit, then headed straight for Joburg.

Thurs - Amazing day! I hit the hotel gym. Then I met up with Tanja, a friend I had made in Israel 9 years ago. She lives in Denmark, but was visiting her boyfriend in South Africa, so we made a plan to meet. It was so crazy to see her down here after all these years, but it was a great visit. We went to this fantastic organic market in Byranston (attached to a Waldorf school, actually) and spent a few hours there. The food stalls were outrageous. I think we could have stayed there and eaten all day! Then we went to visit another friend of mine, who is a Masotho that lives in Joburg. He works at this crazy cool studio that does advertisting photo shoots. When we arrived, there was a group of models walking in, and I swear it felt like I was in L.A. We wrapped up the night with dinner. I ate an ostrich kebab! Yummy...

Friday - Another great day in Joburg. We went to the Apartheid Museum, which was brilliant. I could write a whole other post on this actually. For now, though, I'll just say that if you're in Joburg, you should go. Everyone should go, or at least learn about apartheid history at some point. The one thing I will say is that I still have a hard time dealing with the fact that this period of South Africa history, is hardly history at all. It seems like something that shouldn't have happened in my lifetime...

Saturday - Arrived in Maseru, and I have to say that I was really happy to be back. I mean, I loved the holiday, but knowing that I only have three weeks left here, I was eager to see my friends again.

Photos should be up on Flickr.