Tuesday, March 31, 2015

Email home from Africa...

I had so much to write about, but limited time and access to internet. I did, however, write things down and keep a "blog bank" that will provide some fun content over the coming weeks.

The following blog is an email I sent to my family from South Africa. I was encouraged to share it after a classmate read it and laughed. I figured it may make for something fun to read. Here goes...

March 24, 2015

Dear Mom, Dad, and Sis, 

I'm not too bad, but I have no concept of time or date, or day of the week. The rural hotel here is nice, but hot as hell. The AC unit couldn't cool a bathroom. No AC in lobby, and that's the only place we can get WiFi. There are several classmates trying to Skype home and it hogs and bogs horribly. So, it's 7 a.m. and I figured I could try email instead. I'm the only one down here for now. That won't last long.

The staff here has figured out that American's tip really well. So we are waited on hand and foot by a guy they call Shadow. There are also cats roaming the place. Yes, like house cats. It stinks like cat pee in the lobby. It has a kitten, too. It is just like home, a cat jumping on tables and roaming freely. There is outside dining and we've had to battle ants everywhere. In the bathrooms, in the pool, tables, everywhere. Ants. Ants. Ants.

People here drink so much juice. I'm shocked they don't have the runs. I'm being a picky eater, too. I don't think they have a concept of food safety. We got "breakfast packs" before the safari yesterday and it had warm meats/cheese/yogurt. I ate the bread and butter, and banana. A few of us looked at each other like...it's warm. It may have set out all night to grow a food borne illness warm. However, we haven't gone hungry. There are huge meals. A lot of choices and a lot of red meat.

Our tour guide is an interesting fellow. He is native and does tours for a living. His name is Marius, but we call him Mossimo the Italian dictator, Mufasa, and Maraschino, to name a few. He pushes us to be on time. He and I have bonded over the concept of fining people for being late. He thinks I need to enforce fines. I think he's crazy. He is a good guy though.

The group has gotten along pretty good. There are a few negative comments, but they are by far the minority. Not everybody can be pleased, and that’s OK. We have to remember that we are all exhausted and that may heighten emotions.

I haven't thought of work at all and it's glorious.

Today we start the more business portion of the trip and are on the downward slope toward home. We're headed to Pretoria area today.

Gotta run and get bags on the bus. It's 7:30 a.m.

Sarah

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