South Africa: Day 5

The day went as follows:

 

I woke up.

 

I went to the waterfront and abused the free wifi to Facebook chat the awesome people who were online while I was.

 

I went shopping at the mall, and I by shopping I mean the kind of shopping where I walk into a store, look at the prices, then proceed to storm out of the store grumbling "what, was the dress spun with gold?!" in a yiddish accent. I bought nothing, of course. My wardrobe has certainly NOT been expanding as Semester at Sea alumni assured me that it would, and I am getting VERY tired of my underpacked clothing selection.

 

I HIKED A F***ING MOUNTAIN B*TCHES WOOP WOOP

 

I ate a South African buffet dinner in the treetops. There were no baboons, and it was a very nice restaurant. I ate springbok, which apparently is an animal. I broke my budget again. People really need to start telling me the prices of things BEFORE I show up in the shuttle. Oh well, at one point I had an entire plate of desserts, so it was worth it.

 

Summary of the Day: Fat, broke, tired, and happy.

South Africa: Days 2-4, aka SAFARI TIME!

So! The safari.

 

As some of you all know, I've wanted to go on a safari for like, ever. I think it's one of those things where I was jealous of my grandparents being cooler than me and having pictures of lions humping, so I had to catch up.

 

Here's the general summary of my 3 days:

 

Total Hours on a Plane: 4

 

Total Hours on a Bus to and from Kruger: 10

 

Total Hours on Game Drives: 16

 

Total Number of the Big 5 Seen: 5

 

Time it took to See all 5: 3 hours (so I guess I really could have done the 1-day safari. Huh. I'm assuming I was just incredibly lucky.)

 

My Favorite Animal: HIPPOS. They waddle so waddlingly.

 

Animal My Car Saw that No One Else on the Trip Did: Hyena

 

Cast of the Lion King Accounted for: Everyone but the racistly black lion with a British accent.

 

Number of Times the Animals Burst into Song: None. WTF.

 

My Favorite Moment: When a freaking LION emerged from the brush and began to roar because he couldn't find his lionesses. He walked along with our car for a full minute, roaring and grunting morosely all the while. And I got it all on tape. I'm going to put it on Youtube and call it, "A Depressed Lion". He was totally 8 feet away from me. Our guide got shivers.

 

Funniest Moment: We walked in on two baboons humping. The female baboon did not approve of the male baboon's advances and shrugged him off of her. The male was depressed. Luckily he had a baboon harem, so he went over to one of the other ladies and proceeded to get the massage of a lifetime. The look in his eyes as that lady baboon picked ticks out of his back was reminiscent of me eating Wild Ginger's pad thai woon sen after three months on Iowa dorm food. Confused? Don't worry, I have pictures.

 

Worst Moment: Throwing up my malaria med...again.

 

Rating of the People in my Safari Car: F*** them. No, like seriously. They were utter dicks to me. You know the types of people who make friends and suddenly decide they don't need to get to know anyone anymore ever because they already have friends? They were those people. Like, they legitimately ignored me when I tried to talk to them. I was left making friends with the one guy no one else wanted to talk to because we was an annoying diva. That did not help my image amongst the group. It was like being in high school all over again.

 

Accomodations: CUTE! I stayed in a little bungalow that on the outside was reminiscent of my hut in Tagorme, but on the inside was filled with modern Western accomodations. Unfortunately the outlets were South African and I left my adapter on the ship, so my camera ran out of batteries on Day 2. I had to borrow diva boy's spare camera, further cementing me in the group as the girl who was friends with the diva who therefore we shouldn't talk to even though we weren't going to already because we already know each other and hate everyone else. Sorry, did I just rant there? I guess I did.

 

Food: We got breakfast at 10am and dinner at 8pm. The in-between was an epic struggle for survival. I enjoyed the challange. Also, one time a monkey dropped from the ceiling and stole our jelly. Why do monkeys keep invading my space?

 

Drink of Choice: South African Semi-Sweet White Wine. Mmmmmm...

 

Biggest Let-Down: Didn't see the wild dogs. :(

 

Cutest Thing Ever: Giraffes wrestling. Try to imagine it. I'll tell you if you got it right later. Also, baby elephants. Olivia, the word "heffalump" popped into my head on multiple occasions.

 

Overall Rating: I wanted a safari, I got a safari. It was just that: a safari. I saw almost all the animals we could see, and even had a few out-of-this-world moments. I also had long periods of seeing nothing. That's fine. That's how a safari is supposed to go. And I paid 50% of what the SAS trip cost, so awesome for me! Still, there's a little part of me that feels unimpressed. I don't think it's because of the safari itself, because it was about as good as it could have been. I just think it was one of those things where I had built it up in my mind for so long, it was never going to be as good as it was in my imagination. I guess for something costing me a grand, the stingy part of me was aiming for a leopard to jump into my lap and give me its cub. But I'm glad I did it, and I'd like to do it again sometime. I'd also highly recommend the experience to other people! Hopefully next time I'll have better people with me, as they definitely put a damper on my whole experience. I think I want to go to Uganda or Rwanda for my next one to see gorillas!

South Africa: Day 1

South Africa is beautiful, but daaaaaaamn is it cold. Like, seriously...no one informed me about this. I did not pack for the cold. Africa, why aren't you behaving like Africa right now? Get it together.

 

The field trip today was so dumb that it doesn't even merit an explanation. It was a sorry excuse of a program that didn't even include food from the ship. I was running on one apple from 9:00am when we finally got out of that stupid bus at 7:00pm. Needless to say, I will be asking for--nay, DEMANDING--a refund. $90? Puh-lease. I know my rights.

 

We went to Mitchell's, a pub, at around 8:00. My day got considerably better as I received a hot plate of Cape Malay Curry, sweet potato fries, a glass of white wine, and a shot of an "African Toilet"--otherwise known as alcohol mixed with chocolate syrup and banana puree.

 

So, my first day in South Africa was not great. I'd rate it at around the level of my first day in Morocco, but less scary. Nonetheless, I'm on a plane to Kruger National Park tomorrow to begin my three day SAFARI!!!

 

Bring it on.

The Seas to South Africa

Take a plane. This shit is ridiculous. It's like a roller coaster ride that lasts for a week without stopping, only there are no loopdie-loops and I want to shoot myself in the face. I think my history professor has grown so accustomed to me running out of class to barf that I'm essentially a half-time student in his class.

Explanation

Alright, alright...to be fair, here's the email I sent my parents on Neptune Day:

"So.

I know I've been a really good kid for most of my life, and have never really done anything too crazy. And I know that you know that I'm extremely obsessed with my appearance, so much so that I've been known to weigh myself upwards of 10 times a day.

What you don't know is that on Semester at Sea, when we pass the equator like we did today, there's a ritual called Neptune Day where some of the girls liberate themselves by shaving their heads.

I may have done that today. I cried the whole time, like literally sobbed. But I think that since I thought the only thing beautiful about myself was my fake red hair, it was unhealthy for me to keep it. So I hate being bald, really really hate it. And I feel hideous and disgusting. But I want you to know that I did it for the right reasons. I hope I can find something beautiful about myself now that isn't from a bottle of dye.

I'll have very, very short brown hair when you see me in December."

So there you go. I look like a boy right now, I hate it, I hate myself, and I don't want to go outside. But I know it's good for me. If I can't go to a temple and meditate in India for three days, I guess I'll be doing this and seeing the repercussions for the next year. Does anyone remember what my natural hair color is? Because I don't.

Back at Sea: Neptune Day

Shaved my head. No big deal.

Ghana: Day 4

We’re docking in South Africa tomorrow and I’m feeling pretty ill, so I’ll need to wrap up this blog about Ghana ASAP. I guess I won’t be doing as detailed an account of Day 4 as I initially planned. Here it is in brief:

I woke up early the next morning, had a very fruity breakfast, then was graced with a rare group discussion with the village elders. Here’s what stuck out to me: when asked what the greatest problem in Tagorme was, the chief told us “poverty”. “But,” he insisted, the poverty was a result of the village’s lack of education. As the old man had told me on day 3, villagers only had a primary school, but aside from that had no feasible access to secondary or higher education. How, then, could they be expected to learn skills? Then men knew how to weave and fish. The women knew how to make pots. But those skills alone were not enough to bring money into a village when most of everyone else already has their own fish, cloth, and pots. If given the option, they would not spend so much time making pots by hand. They would rather use machines. “Forget tradition”, they said. All they wanted more than anything in the entire world was for their children to get an education and bring their village into the modern world.

The chief posed a question to us. “What will you do for us?” We didn’t really know what to say. They had an idea to market their crudely-made pots in the USA to further their sales range, but as my professors explained to me later, this was simply an illogical business move which would bring in no money. They wanted us to contact our schools and set up exchange programs for Ghanaian students. This one seemed for reliable, but the problem for Tagorme was in secondary education, not higher education. Who in the USA would be willing to feed and house a Ghanaian student through middle and high school? It’s a tough situation. None of us knew what to do.

To finish off the day we went to a game reserve for lunch, whereupon a baboon attempted to steal my lunch. I caught the bastard red-handed and scared him away. He then came back with six of his baboon buddies, who stole another girl’s lunch. We spent the next hour throwing apples at the hungry baboons surrounding us. I am now two for two in countries where I’m attacked by apes.

I miss Ghana dearly. I want to go back as soon as I can, hopefully in an education-related role. I don’t much approve of Americans going into countries and promising to “help and save” them, like they’re children. But when the actual inhabitants of said country come straight up to you over and over again and say “help us”, how can you say no? The Ghanaians didn’t ask for money. The people of Tagorme didn’t dig into my wallet as I was sleeping, which they could have done easily. All they wanted was an opportunity, a chance at social mobility like we have at least somewhat in the States. I want to help give them that opportunity. Fulbright? Yes? No? Maybe?

People discount the value of a good education. Ghanains will be quick to tell you why you’re a moron for doing so.