A walk on the wild Eastern Cape

Well lets just say the past hour has been somewhat interesting and eventful. I had success at the library and found my books! After that, I felt as if I could conquer the world. Going with this new found confidence I was feeling I decided it would be a good day to take a Combi by myself, after all it was during the day, I was catching it from campus with other students and had too much to do to spend time walking. So I catch one and we all load up and we are driving and when the driver stops to pick someone up, all of a sudden the police are there (my first real encounter with the South African police- even seeing them, since I have been here). So they ask for his license and go around and search the mini-van. And this is one of the nicer newer vans. As I am sitting, huddling in the corner the tension in the car is so thick, as if everyone were holding their breath at the moment. Apparently his license was legit because less than five minutes later, we were off, still in silence. Another interesting moment. Good news though! I took my camera to the only shop I know of in Summerstrand and they were able to save my pictures! Thank goodness! So after paying for the three discs I headed to get some yummy chai from a coffee shop/cafe called Friends, and here I am now.
It's already after 3 and there is lots to do before heading to the rugby game tonight, but I had such an amazing weekend I couldn't imagine not getting on to update everyone! So I will try to go fast, but I want to do the weekend justice at the same time..
Oh where to start? I ventured out Thursday afternoon, finally leaving PE around 5:00. We knew we had to go fast, correction, at this point I did not know that the lights in the car sometimes decided they didn't want to work, so we knew we didn't have much time to waste so we got on the road and headed up the Eastern Cape to stay in East London for our first night. In East London (where some of my friends are from) we stayed at the Sugar Shack, and it was great! We slept in a dorm style hostel so needless to say I slept with my camera in my hand =). Next morning Malin was up at 7:30 so we were off to an early start! Couldn't find a place open for breakfast hardly anywhere, so we ended up going to Wimpys for breakfast, which is basically fast food.
We drove to Cinsta not long after and found our backpackers place there pretty easily, this one called Buccaneers. We checked in, unloaded and moved into our cute little cabin (equipped with everything including guicos, ants and crickets) and made our way down to the beach. It was very very windy but we attempted to canoe, Malin and I failed while Mirium and Lina were just fine. It's crazy, I still have to keep reminding myself- This is Africa!! The beach was amazing. Growing up we always went up north on the river to a place called the Sand Dunes and I remember loving it so much, climbing to the top and then 'sledding' down the dunes into the water.. well imagine going from those dunes to these magnificent sandy mountains just lining the ocean side... breathtakingly beautiful. Words nor pictures could even dare to do it justice. We were the only ones on the beach that afternoon. Kind of a calming peaceful feeling that comes around every once in awhile throughout life and when it hits, it's all you want to know.. amazing.
That night they had a Braii that we could sign up for and just about 100 or so people were there I would say. Quite the eventful night! Very very fun and met lots of locals and Dutch people! Oh, and some Americans too, mostly from Massachusetts and Maryland.
Saturday was a perfect day on the beach, we spent all morning there, then ate pizza, sat by the pool and drank a coke. At 3:30 we set off to the most adventurous horseback riding I have ever experienced. My horse's name was Girlie and she was a stubborn one! Kind of funny I got the stubborn one, eh? We spent the first half hour not moving because she just wanted to eat and wouldn't listen! Let me tell you more about the riding though..
1: we were barefoot
2: wore shorts
3: no trail (and beach)
4: we galloped/trotted/cantered==ran!!
So fun! I kept screaming when we were cantering so Girlie would run faster and faster. I should mention that these were horses that were once abused or abandoned or something along the sort, crazy indeed. We even had to trudge through waters and jump over little hurdles.
We got back just in time for some traditional Xhosa (with a click) dinner that they served at our hostel. Pumpkin spce and sweet potato soup, yum! then I can only guess what the rest was, interesting and tasty though. I am now an honorary Norwegian and Saturday was so funny because Malin kept trying to speak Norwegian to me, sadly I could not understand. It does make me want to know another language though, really bad. I loved when they would randomly start talking in Norwegian because it is actually because they don't want others to hear it!
Sunday morning we went to the Inkwenkwezi Game Reserve and had such a great tour. We drove around in a 9, or 11 seat jeep with three people from England and two from France, and our tour guide was awesome, probably just liked us because we giggled nonstop and laughed at his corny jokes. We road around this game reserve and eventually came to these gates and I'm thinking, what are getting ourselves into? We had to go through two seperate gated parts and into where the lions were, the tour guide even had to pick up a gun before going in. So we get a few rules like no standing up because the lions see the jeep as one solid figure, if you stand up then they can single you out and know that there are more, so being told this I'm bracing myself and in we went. We ended up seeing 6 out of the 9 lions- how can you explain how cool that is?! They were basically standing across the street from us kind of distance, so amazing. I'll work on getting the pictures up. We saw 4 elephants and got to feed them! Did you know that they are vegetarians? And their temperal lobe can show you what kind of mood they are in- if they are happy or sad or angry? Did you know that they are either right or left handed? (One was right handed, the other 3 were left). Also people can ride them and they prefer that because they get scared over the littlest things and so if someone is on their back, they feel safer. Did you know that they can lose their teeth up to 6 times and grow them all back? And after that, this is the sad part, they will most likely die of starvation? On a happier note I saw lots of Zebras and Giraffes and a whole family of cute little pumbas! Lots of different types of wild deer, Ostridges that I was scared were going to get me (not kidding!) and the two largest antelopes in the world. Yes, it was quite a wild adventure. I guess that's South Africa's version of a zoo. It was just scary off roading on this big truck kind of thing and sitting on the side, no windows no seatbelts no nothing except holding on, crazy.
It's easy to forget that we're in South Africa sometimes, then it's always the small things that remind me and bring me back... the locked restrooms at the gas station that a police officer looking guy has to open.. need I remind you that there are hardly any police around? We fill up with petrol, but someone else does it. Girls just wana have fun was playing at the gas station- ha. There are lots of KFC's and McDonalds here also. A curio is a gift shop and dorps mean a little town (town, not to be confused with township).
To the left! To the left! Even if I shouldn't have driven for various reasons, I did! It was so exciting (Megan- believe it or not I was actually comfortable not driving, but the girls encouraged me to, and what can I say!). I didn't think that I would ever try, but it wasn't bad at all! I've been learning a lot this past year about how sometimes I just need a lttle bit of encouragement and maybe a shove in the right direction sometimes. Life is good.
Well I spent all morning at the library reading and came to the internet cafe to write my paper which I still need to do. Longer than planned but I wanted to do the weekend justice.

Cheers!