Sorry about the delay. Writing hasn’t been as much of a priority after service sites, because service sites were the high point of the semester. They were the times that I wanted to remember more than anything else, so that’s when I blogged every day. Nothing seems quite so exciting anymore, and I don’t know how much internet access I’ll have after Saturday, so no promises on the regularity of posts. But as for now, let me recap the past 5 days.
Saturday I got to sleep in. That was a wonderful experience, except for the fact that I can’t sleep in. I stayed up until 2, but I still woke up at 8 because I’ve trained my body to do that. Breakfast was wonderful, and after breakfast I read my Bible and packed a little. After first tea time, we were going to play soccer but pretty much everyone was asleep still, so instead of playing 2 on 2, we played Quelf. It was enjoyable game of Quelf, and we played until we left after lunch at 1.
Saturday was the Zulu experience. We went to a village structured after a traditional Zulu village and stayed there for the night. The first thing we did was stand around as a man (A white man, ironically enough) explained to us different aspects of the Zulu culture. After a couple of minutes, we went inside as the rain picked up and he talked some more. The stuff he said was interesting, but he was a sort of dull man. After that we took a break, where about 15 of us went down to a lake right down a trail. The mud at the bank was deep and great to walk in, but that tempted me to go swimming even though I didn’t have a swimsuit. While 2 people went in wearing their swimsuits, I went in with John in our boxers because we couldn’t resist. It was surprisingly warm and enjoyable for 15 or 20 minutes until we came back to the village in our underwear. After that, we hung out, then enjoyed dinner together. Dinner was a wonderful meal of Zulu bread and steak, followed by beans, chicken, grits-like material, and 3 or 4 other things I don’t recall. The Zulu beer wasn’t very good at all. One of the best meals from South Africa, and the best traditional South African meal by far. Dinner was followed by dancing, where we watched traditional Zulu dances and tried our own hand, and conversation and early bedtime, because there was no electricity.
We woke up at 8 and had breakfast. Traditional Zulu cornflakes, straight out of the cereal box. We took a tour of the village the workers are living in and saw some of those things, and killed the rest of the time making traditional Zulu pots and beaded bracelets. We left to come back to AE and rest up after that. Resting up was a 2 hour nap, with intermittent reading. After that was dinner, and after dinner was Big Fish. Incredible movie, and it was great to watch again. Love it. After that was another late night, and I stayed up until 3 because I couldn’t sleep and was busy doing nothing. Wake up at 7 killed me, and we went to the safari.
Safaris are interesting things; there’s a fine line between taking a 4 hour drive to get somewhere, and taking a 4 hour drive looking for animals that aren’t out. It was a very rainy trip, and we were on safari or having breakfast or lunch for 24 hours in a 48 hour period. We arrived at 12:30, and were safari-ing until 6. After that journey we hung out, had dinner, and slept. The next morning we were awake at 5:30 and out by 6, and we stayed out until 6. Same plan for the evening, and woke up at 5:30 the next morning. We drove out, and were exiting the game park at 10:30. Unfortunately, we had to wait for 2 hours for the buses that were taking us back to arrive. After they arrived, we got to take the 4 hour drive home.
It was a pretty fun safari. I got to sit with plenty of people and enjoyed the company. We saw so many impala and wildebeest, so that was great. We also saw over a dozen rhino and probably more giraffes, which was pretty good. We saw some water buffalo, and an elephant, so we saw 3 of the Big 5. The elephant that we saw charged another one of our group’s jeeps, but I’ve already experienced that so it wasn’t even cool when it happened to them. One of the jeeps saw a lion, and another saw a leopard, but I didn’t see either. I was more focused on enjoying the drive and spending time with people, and I got plenty of quality thinking time in, so that was enjoyable. It was a fun safari, but we didn’t see too much because of the poor weather (it rained or was cloudy all of the first 2 days). I would have enjoyed staying at AE with nothing to do. There was one point where we (the guys) were sitting on the porch of the place we’re staying and we were talking, while a hyena walked by. It was pretty close so we started taunting it, and it turned and looked at us for about 15 seconds. After that, it turned back around and kept walking. It was so awesome and manly, and one of the highlights of my trip.
After we got back, I cleaned the room and had dinner. We enjoyed a movie after dinner, except for the fact that it was Due Date, and all around not a very good movie. The company was enjoyable though, so that made the movie better. And I’m finally going to bed to get some rest after 2 straight 5:30 wakeups following 4 hours of sleep. Hopefully I get some good rest tonight and do something crazy I can blog about tomorrow. Goodnight!
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