My first ever blog post and I’m posting it from Tambo
Airport in Johannesburg at 5:43 am. I’m not sure anything I’m writing even
makes sense because I’m so tired. The past week has been amazing and I have yet to reach my final destination of Kimberley. The first two nights were
spent in Harris cabin, a cutesy New England cabin in the middle of the woods of
Hanover, NH. As everyone was saying, it felt like we were in summer camp. We
played fun energizers and other get to know you games, with kilos galore. Kilos
are a clap pattern with a big WHOOO at the end completed by a group to praise someone or an event that just
occurred. Its been ridiculous of how cool everyone is in the organization. All
of the interns, former interns and staff included in the orientation were
awesome. All of this gushing is totally called for, people who know me know
that I don’t just gush for anything.
We
then moved into Pierce’s B&B which is as sleepy idyllic New England as it
gets. All the games continued along with more GRS games that are included in
the curriculum delivered to kids. The GRS games really made it concrete about
why I was there. All of the activities were super innovative but always clearly
made a connection to the lesson they were trying to teach. It also helped that
Sista B and Hooter were the most energetic, passionate people that were
teaching us. Our days were so jam packed that I didn’t have any time to shoot my
parents a phone call until the day before I left (sorry mom!).
Travel
was normal, meaning little hiccups here and there (mostly at bag check-in) but
ended with everyone making the flight. We flew from Boston to Dulles, to
Senegal to refuel, and then to Johannesburg. At Jozi, Nick and I spent the
night since our flights were not until the next morning. We went to a really
cool street near the university that reminded me a lot of Burlington, except
for the plethora of sushi places. So random I know. Well, we ended up at this
Indian restaurant that had the nicest people working there. Matthew, a former
intern was slicing and dicing paper the entire night, but that just gave more
entertainment for the night. It was great to get to know the Jozi interns a little
better since we’ll be spending plenty of time visiting eachother this year
since we are the closest sites to one another.
We
ended up having so much fun together that we didn’t end up going to sleep until
2:30 am…when Nick and I had a 4:00 am wakeup time. Not the smartest idea but
totally worth it. It was the perfect way to kick off our year in South Africa.
Nick and I unfortunately did not get the same flight since he left at 5:40 and
I don’t take off till 9. And that’s how I ended up by myself writing in Tambo
Airport. I’ve been drinking this super pulpy OJ and typing this blog entry in
order to stay awake. I’m still super paranoid about my stuff getting swiped,
consequences of growing up in one of the safest cities in America, you assume
everywhere else is crazy dangerous. Oh well, I’m prob just gonna grab a coffee
and hunker down to watch Prometheus (the only movie on my comp, not sure why
that’s the case). Anyway its been
a whirlwind of a week and I don’t see it slowing down anytime soon!
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