Spring Break!

I could easily write a ten page adventure log relating to everything that happened on this trip. For your sake, I will do my best to cover the most important things through photos and brief anecdotes. For starters, this trip covered the same amount of time that most public schools have for spring break. We left on a Thursday, and returned to PE Sunday, a week later. Our trip was a group excursion paid for with our tuition money from Thursday until Tuesday where we were set free into the wilds of Cape Town. We spent our first night in Outsdhoorn (oo-ts-hoorn), the next eight nights in Cape Town, and the final night in Knysna. Here goes nothing!  

We stopped on the first day to see the Knysna heads, a famous entrance to Knysna Bay where countless ships have wrecked over the years. My friend Bobby and I simply enjoyed climbing around. 

Mags and I had this adorable photo taken at the top of Otenequa pass between PE and Outsdhoorn. The whole group stopped and took photos, Mags was just lucky enough to be in this one with me! The scenery is gorgeous everywhere in SA, there are literally mountains everywhere I have been. In fact, these mountains created huge canyons on their way to the sea, called the crags, which have become home to quite a few miraculous bridges. One of those bridges, Bloukrans Bridge, happens to house the worlds highest bungy jump in the world! I jumped off that bridge, and I am alive to tell the tale. What a rush! Sorry, photos were too expensive to purchase, my parents have done well to teach me not to throw money at tourist destinations! Boom.

In Outsdhoorn the group went on a few exciting adventures. Pictured above are the Cango Caves, where we were invited to take the adventure route and squeeze through uncomfortably small crevasses and such... not as beautiful as other caves I have seen, but much more adventurous! In addition to caving in Outsdhoorn, we also visited an ostrich farm, where I was lucky enough to RIDE an ostrich! I obviously could not take any photos because I was on the bird, but please go on facebook and enjoy my friends photos on my wall. 

 Once we made it to Cape Town we visited the East India Trading Company's Slave Lodge which has since been turned into a great museum documenting the extensive slave trade in South Africa. In the company gardens next door (Kinda like Central Park) I found this huge tree, and felt obligated to take a photo. I love big trees!

The next day we woke up to sunshine, excited to finally climb Table Mountain. Everyone has seen photos of table mountain, but like always, photos don't do it justice. The three mountains (Lions Head, Table, and Devil's Peak) are simply spectacular and constantly loom over the city. While the photo above is a joke, the climb to the top was almost that hard. Think there is a back way up Table Mountain that isn't nearly vertical? Wrong. We climbed up the front face.

30 of us climbing up proved somewhat ridiculous. It took the fastest group an hour, and the slowest group an hour and a half. But the view kept getting better and everyone was able to make it!

The photo speaks for itself. The view of Cape Town from the top of Table Mountain is breathtaking.

Pat and I on Table Mountain (Looking South, opposite of Cape Town). If you look closely you can see the Cape of Good Hope 50 kilometers in the distance.

One of the best parts of the trip was a two night homestay in Tambo Village township. This program is relatively new, but basically we all paired off and were put into the hands of some of the Mama's around town. My Mama, Mama Mpumie and her granddaughter Owethu took me into their home as family. We cooked great food, told stories, played games, toured the township, and everything else that people do on a daily basis. This was my favorite part of the trip, I fell in love with 10 year old Owethu and I promised her letters, postcards, and birthday presents. Awesome.

We toured Robben Island on Sunday and saw where ANC leaders were imprisoned for much of the 60's 70's and 80's before apartheid ended in 1990. The Photo above was Nelson Mandela's cell for 18 years. Moving.

I just wanted to share this awesome photo. When clouds cover the top of Table Mountain like this, the locals call it the table cloth. It's beautiful, and I thought it was hilarious.

As soon as our group aspect of the trip ended, we took a lovely wine tasting tour of the world famous Cape Town winelands. Everyone had a wonderful time, the area is beautiful (more photos on fb) and yes Mom and Dad, you will get a bottle of my favorite wine when I get home :)

More winelands. This is where my camera ran out of battery and I stopped taking photos. In addition to what i have mentioned already, we went to the international jazz festival and saw a local minneapolis favorite Atmosphere perform. We also toured a neighborhood called the Bo-Kaap where a huge number of Malay immigrants and other Muslims from around the world make their homes. We toured the waterfront, went to camps beach, drove and hiked the Cape of Good Hope, went to the Cape Town Aquarium, shopped at an amazing market called green street market, went to a service at a Mosque with my friend Shaz, enjoyed the Cape Town night life, and went on a half day canoeing adventure in Knysna before returning to PE yesterday. I have way more stories I would love to share. But I'm afraid this is so long no one will read it anyways. Leave a comment, Facebook, or Email me if you want to know more! What a week! Miss you all.

Love,

 Andrew

Frontier Weekend

Farm hands houses

Sheering merino wool by hand

The incredible view from the top of the mountain

This past weekend we took our first full group excursion since our safari at Addo National Park a month ago. Turns out traveling with adults and guides makes vacation much less stressful. All thirty of us packed our bags and drove three and a half hours inland, to the highlands outside of Grahamstown. We were hosted by two extremely well off Afrikaaner farmers, known commonly as Boers (more a derogative term for farmers by non-whites). Manus and Winnie hosted our first evening at their lovely farm home, offering us each a few beers, a pleasant social environment, and an excellent late dinner, with traditional Boer food. We took a late night drive about 15 minutes to the Francois farm, and crashed for the evening. We wok ein the morning to coffee and tea, and an african version of the egg mcmuffin (The best things seem to cross cultures). We spent the day swimming in an epic FRESHWATER (I miss this even though the ocean is wonderful) waterfall, and driving to / climbing up the third highest peak in South Africa. The view was spectacular, and getting into a natural setting like the mountains helped quench my craving for the outdoors. This was definitely one of my favorite things we have done in Africa. We came down the mountain and spent some time learning about the actual workings of the farm (not terribly different from Minnesotan farms if you ask me) and eventually had some free time. We swam in their pool, played tennis on their court, got a tour of Francois' game trophy room (He has a mounted giraffe among 25 other species of big game) and again spent the evening socializing while waiting for the braai. Dinner was excellent and most of us passed out early after the long day. Sunday we packed up, and headed down to Manus' second farm, where we got to enjoy the coolest waterfall swimming hole I have ever been to. We had to swim inbetween cliffs just to get to the waterfall, and when we got there we were pleasantly surprised to find a deep and warm swimming hole. No pictures of the waterfall because of the whole swimming to get there thing, but trust me it was beautiful. We had a quick lunch and headed home after the waterfall. The weekend was incredibly fun and relaxing, I wish I could have shared it with so many people back home! The only challenge of the trip was trying to grasp the farmer, farm worker relationship. With the farmers so well off it was rather frustrating to see the poverty the farm hands suffer through. Many of the black farm hands live on the farm, and live in the same kind of informal housing as people in the townships of PE. Manus told me he has had the same farm hands for 25 years and has a very good working relationship with them, but almost no personal relationship with them. He even claims to pay them well compared to all of his neighbors. I don't understand how you can have the same workers for 25 years and have no personal relationship develop. This is another example of white South African's dehumanizing black South Africans, whether they do it consciously or not. The paradigm is frustrating, with no simple solution. It's just another challenge facing South Africa, and good food for thought. We leave for Cape Town and most likely the most epic spring break of all time. We have plans for seeing one of my favorite bands at the international jazz festival, shark cage diving, bungee jumping, wine touring, visiting Robben island, climbing table mountain, and so much more! Wish me luck.

Andrew

Skydiving? Too bad.

To those loyal followers I apologize, I have been having so much fun I forgot about everyone back home... Just kidding! I have simply been busy and took one weekend away from blogging. Anywho, last weekend my friends and I were anxious to take our first opportunity to travel away from the big group. We were planning all week on going to a nice hostel in Jeffrey's bay to go surfing; until we found out on Wednesday that everyone else on the trip was going, and we were on the outside looking in.  On the bright side, we have met lots of cool people here in PE who are from East London (3 hours in the other direction). One of them (Cuan) needed a lift back anyways, so we rented a car and drove him home in return from some good Eastern Cape hospitality and a few beds to crash on. The drive to East London was spectacular.

Not only was I with these three lovely people (roommates Ryan and Pat, and good friend Michelle) but the view was spectacular. The big rolling hills were very fun to drive, even with the added challenge of driving on the wrong side of the road (I was very safe I promise). We arrived in E.L. to Cuan's parents greeting us with bright smiles and big plans for a traditional South African Braai (bbq). We had lamb chops and rolls for supper, followed by a dip in the pool. Eventually Cuan's high school buds came over for a few drinks, and we were lucky enough to make new friends. In the morning we got up and drove home. Boring, but the car ride was fun again, and we had to return the car by 2:00 pm anyways.

This weekend I took a trip with my flat, and our neighbors flat 7. We once again rented cars and drove 2 hours to Plettenberg Bay. The drive took us right past where we had bush camp a month ago, and thus all the stunning mountains and pine forests previously mentioned.  

It really does look like Minnesota in some places!

The bridge that is home to the world's highest bungee jump, that I will be doing in a few weeks!

We arrived early on Friday afternoon and settled into our beautiful hostel. We left for lunch shortly after and stumbled upon the best cafe I have ever been to in my life. The sandwich below is a wonderful improvement on the standard chicken and mayo sandwich that is so popular here. The cafe adds spinach, avacado, a slice of parmesan cheese, and their homemade ciabatta bread. I would give an arm and a leg to have this at St. John's for lunch.

Saturday the women all woke up and went snorkeling with a seal colony. I thought it sounded cool, but it was very expensive and I guess I didn't want to do it if I wasn't all in. I spent the day shopping until our sea kayaking adventure in the afternoon. We hired (they call renting hiring here) tandem sea kayaks and two guides to take us out in the bay. I loved being out on the water once again, however, it's not the same as paddling a seliga (canoe), that's for sure. 

We paddled out a ways and were lucky enough to find a pod of dolphins fishing. Two dolphins swam in a tight circle holding the fish together, while the other dolphins jumped and flipped, catching fish midair right in front of us. Apparently this only happens once in every 100 or so trips (or so they say). I didn't catch any good photos, but you can see below that we had quite a view of the peninsula ahead of us. 

This is the yard of the Hostel we stayed in, plenty of hammocks--just the way I like it!

The only bummer of the weekend was that we were planning on skydiving on Sunday morning the whole time. In fact I wasn't even planning on it until everyone persuaded me it was worthwhile. But when we woke up on Sunday morning, alas, the wind had picked up and the company called and cancelled on us. We left this morning happy and healthy, got back to Langerry in time to blog and work on some homework. We have lots of papers due in the near future! Pray for us all :)

Love from dreamland,

Andrew

Safaris: Just how you would imagine them.

While this last week sort of defined what the next few months of school will look like, our trip to Addo Elephant National Park and Schotia Private Game Reserve certainly prevented any sense of normalcy from setting in. Classes Monday through Thursday were routine, we brushed up on South African history, musical instruments, popular short stories and the like. Good classes, learned plenty. Thursday evening Ryan Fuchs and I attended the NMMU soccer tryout. Well, 75 players showed up, most of whom had no intention of making the team. In 2.5 hours I played 15 minutes. I was not pulled aside because it's hard to prove that I am a player in 15 minutes after four months away from the game. Well, the coaches fortunately noticed Fuchs, and the fact that the varsity team needs a left back really helped him. Fortunately for me, I just hung around him once he got pulled aside and essentially willed myself into the final portion of the tryout. I got to play another five minutes playing a different position than I normally would. That said, at the end Fuchs was picked for the reserve team and an extended tryout and I was not. However, when we approached the coach after, he invited me to join the team and essentially Fuchs and I are in the same position now anyways. I am confident I can convince the coach I am one of the better players he picked in a training session that actually requires more than just flashy skills. My disappointment certainly didn't last long, considering that by 8:00 am the next morning we were on a tour bus on our way to Addo National Park. Addo is only an hour away and has one of the highest concentrations of African Elephants in the world. The park is huge, we only saw a small piece of it, but in about two hours, we saw over 150 elephants!

We ate a short lunch in the park, and drove about a half an hour to the nearby Schotia Private Game Reserve. Schotia is owned privately, so all the game we saw had been purchased and introduced artificially to the fenced off environment. That said, there were hundreds of animals living in very good conditions, and all of them live a completely wild lifestyle. The lions hunt for their food, the other animals graze, and most of the animals have had many cubs or calves since their initial purchase. The park has one pride of lions that apparently are tougher to find. Well, we found them in the first twenty minutes and spent a couple of hours photographing and simply enjoying their presence.

At around 4:00 pm we drove to a quaint farmhouse where tea was waiting for us. We took turns petting horses, and of course throwing a frisbee. After tea, we went back to the trails, saw more animals, more lions, and drove to the top of the largest hill for sunset. 

Dinner was held in an indigenous Koisan style lodge, with multiple fire pits, and beautiful modern features to make the experience feel incredibly luxurious. Dinner was ostrich stew, green beans, and rice.  Easily the best meal I have had since I got here. We left dinner and had a short drive back to the main lodge. We turned on the spotlight (it was dark) and were fortunate enough to see the park's hippos out of the water, and grazing in the field. What a way to end the night. The rest of the weekend we relaxed, read for class, and tried to keep up with our journaling. Quite the week! In addition, I've been here for four weeks now! I can't even believe it, but I have less than three months left here already. I better keep "living it up!" as all the locals say. 

Love from the wilds of Africa,

Andrew

School? How about lions.

Monday marked the beginning of routine living (whatever that means) here in PE. Our schedule is simple: Monday and Tuesday mornings we go to service learning from 8:30 until 11:30. We have class each afternoon Monday through Thursday from 2:00 until 5:00. Monday I am taking a South African Jazz course, Tuesday is our Semester Abroad Seminar, Wednesday is South African Literature, and the week culminates with South African Politics. Much to our chagrin, we realized this week (after receiving our class syllabus') that our work load is going to be rather demanding. Oh ya, we are here to go to school. Easy to forget with the sunny and 75 weather, the beach, the safaris.. Did I mention we went on our first safari? While classes this week went well, the highlight of the week in my opinion was our day trip to Seaview Lion Park. Essentially the park is a zoo, with all the big cats fenced in, and the herbivores allowed to roam the property freely. We saw many of the classic African animals, and most of my friends paid to have the opportunity to pet and play with lion and tiger cubs. In addition to class and the safari, one of my professors (Gary Prevost is an SJU professor on paid research leave here in PE) took me and three other guys to the professional soccer game Wednesday night between the Kaizer Chiefs and the Jomo Cosmos. The PE World Cup stadium is BEAUTIFUL. The game was entertaining, and eye opening as well. Apparently, white South Africans in general LOVE the premier leagues of Europe, but do not support South African soccer in any way. We were the only white people in the stadium. And according to Gary, who has spent a number of years attending these games, that is the norm. However, if the stadium hosted a Rugby match, the building would be full to the rim with people of all colors. Just an interesting observation in post-apartheid South Africa. It was a great week, and I look forward to getting done with my homework, because next Saturday we are going on a REAL safari at Addo Elephant National Park! Feel free to send me any questions.

Love from PE, Andrew

My friend Margaret petting a Siberian Tiger

A lazy lion.

Look ma, first day of school pic, with my name tag and everything!

Lion King anyone?

Ryan and I at the stadium before the game.

Orientation Week

What a long week! Friday afternoon we left for Tsitsikamma National Forest with all the other international students at NMMU for bush camp orientation. We stayed in a tourist hostel/ backpacking lodge called tsitsikamma adventures. The area was stunning, with many farms surrounded by mountains. The weekend proved to be a forum for all of the students to get to know each other. We met students from Germany, Finland, the Netherlands and more. Unfortunately, St. Cloud State has an existing program at NMMU as well and 45 of the 90 students at the event go to school in St. Cloud, MN. Ironic I know. The feel was very different from typical orientation weekends here in the states. We had tons of down time because there was very little structure. That said, we ziplined and hiked for most of Saturday.

A few things about bush camp: the ziplining was awesome. The hiking was better. The company was better still, especially when the bar was open. The landscape in the countryside of South Africa is remarkably diverse. While driving we saw the richest neighborhoods, the poorest, farms, mountains, pasture, and near Tsitsikamma is a European Fir farming area, and I swear it looked just like the Northwoods of Minnesota. Great weekend, but enough about bush camp. 

Monday we visited NMMU for the first time. Ryan Fuchs and I met with the soccer coach and earned a tryout starting next Monday. Although, we also learned this team won the national championship in December... it's ok, they have a reserve team. 

Our home stadium has a bar and an ocean view, not bad!

Tuesday just so happened to be my birthday. And what a day it was! In the morning we had a short introduction to our service learning and then had the rest of the day off! We went to the beach, hung out, and planned for the evening. At about 4:30 I got a wonderful invitation from my neighbors (a flat of 6 young women) to eat a formal birthday dinner with them. I got dressed up and walked down the hall to find a candle-lit multiple course meal waiting, not to mention the girls, wearing their favorite sun dresses. It was a great way to get the night started, it reminds me how easy it has been away from home so far. After dinner the party got started. Everyone came including a group of South African friends we had met over the weekend. A great time was had by all, that I am certain of!

Wednesday we had more orientation--incredibly boring in the morning, unbearably boring (maybe had something to do with the fact that it was my 21st the night before, but still). The afternoon was much better because we took a bus into the townships for the first time and visited our service sites. This was quite an experience of mixed emotions. To be completely honest, my first impression of the poverty was "this is it? It's not nearly as bad as I thought." That, however, was just one of the townships which had received government housing and appeared relatively close to middle-class. Two of the three service sites are in this neighborhood, including Pendla Primary school and the House of Resurrection. When we visited, students were not in session at Pendla, so it's hard to know what that site would be like. However, the impact SJU has made there is noticeable to say the least. House of Resurrection is an AIDS orphanage, for youth up to 12 years old. House appeared slightly disorganized, but the kids were frickin cute and it would be a fun place to serve.

On Thursday we took an all day tour of Port Elizabeth with our tour guide Bradley Lawack. Bradley has worked with our group for 7 years and grew up in the townships. He will take our group on outings all semester long, and I can't wait to get to know him better, he is one of the most interesting people I have ever met. He took us to his childhood home, and then showed us the worst of the worst poverty. This is where I realized the poverty here really is THAT bad. This was a slum, houses were not built, they were tied and taped together. This is where Missionvale, the last of the three service sites, and the site that I will be working at is. Missionvale is well funded, and well established. They give food, medical care, clothes, and even christmas presents to hundreds of locals. As of last year, they also have a nearly free private school for children k-3. This is where I will spend my time for service learning. The principal has an amazing vision, and I look forward to learning as much from him as I can. 

We left Missionvale and visited the Red Location Apartheid Museum. Turns out Bradley also curates different exhibitions at museums. He taught us all about the massacre of 1970 and brought many if not most of us to tears. The museum is internationally renowned, and maybe my favorite place I have visited since arriving here. 

 Michelle and me drumming at Bush Camp

 The library at Pendla, a tiny building CSB/SJU built.

 Port Elizabeth's public library in the city center, guarded by Queen Elizabeth herself.

 Typical township home, maybe a bit on the lower end. 

The front homes are among the toughest we saw, the painted homes beyond are government built, and our home is along the beach off in the distance in the former white district called summerstrand.

We are spending the weekend finishing up homework for our first classes this week, and sunning at the beach. But like I said, It was a week to remember.

First Impressions

24 hours of travel is so long. And jetlag is real. Anywho, travel was safe and efficient. We arrived in Port Elizabeth last night at 9 pm. Unfortunately, it was already dark and we hardly got to see the town. That said, 9 pm here is 1pm back home, and we stayed up late getting settled and soaking everything in.  Well, when we finally did go to bed, it was 1ish here. I went to bed sleepy, and excited to get a full nights rest after all the travel... And then we all woke up at 430 am and couldn't fall back asleep! Turns out our body thought that was just a nice afternoon nap. After trying to read, and make the most of the early morning hours, we (my five flatmates) went to the beach and swam! Nothing like a polar bear plunge to get things started on day one in Africa. The waves are HUGE, and the water is warm. Not to mention it was already 75 degrees out. Although, it was raining. At 8 we walked about a mile down the beach to go shopping at the mall, we bought food, and other necessities. We bought lunch at the internet cafe at 9, and without thinking (because it felt like afternoon considering we got up at 430) Pat tried to order a beer and received a wonderful puzzled look from our waitress, "are you kidding, it's not even 10 o'clock!" She didn't serve him. In sum, the place here is beautiful. The apartment is comfortable, the company is great. We have only scratched the surface of South African culture, but to be certain, living in the flats across from the beach with my classmates will be very comfortable. 

Sitting on the Plane, pensieve

Our living room

Ryan moving into our bedroom