start at the bottom. (Sat. Jan. 22nd-Mon. Jan. 30th)

Mmmmk... So here is a post including every day since the last post I made. If you’d like to go in order of how things happened you should skip down to the bottom of this post and read upwards day by day. :) Have fun! :)
Monday January 31st 2011

I really get to post this today! Yay! You finally get to hear from me.

Today was good. Morning at the project went really well. The afternoon was awful. For our lunch we went to Morgan’s house and we saw his recording studio that he has there. He recorded each of us talking to a song that he had made. I will try and get it up eventually. It was so funny :) that has been the highlight of my day so far! :) life is good! :)

Sunday January 30th 2011

Today was great! :) I went to my church this morning! :) the people were great. It felt so so good to have a piece of home with me. I met some friends, they gave me a ride home, I’ll be going to institute on Thursday night :) there were 8 YSA’s In the ward... Um... It was good.

I went to church with Jean and Franklyn tonight at 6 it was basically a musical worship. And Jean gave a sermon. It was cool to watch. Her son Morgan and his friend Nathanial are in the band. They are so so good! It was such a great day! :)
Oh and I washed all my laundry by hand, it hurts trying to ring out my jeans! No fun.

Saturday January 29th 2011

Hopefully I get to post this today... The internet has been down at the cafe by our house. So far I have slept in and gotten ready and then I am headed to Cape Town to go to the waterfront (the tourist area) and I don’t know what I’ll do the rest of the day :) oh! P.s. I found a church that is only 2 miles away from me so Franklyn said he will take me there tomorrow morning! :) so excited! :)

So! I had a totally unexpected day! :) I was going to meet my room mate Jamie at the waterfront because she stayed at the SASTS house this weekend. Well first of all... The ride on the train to cape town was insane! Oh my gosh it was so so crowded! I have NEVER been so squished in my life! Not even joking. When a flood of people got off the train I was literally sideways crowd surfing and they were pulling me off the train and I had to grab onto a poll in order to not be taken off the train and trampled! It was bad. And now I know the difference between first class and third class. First class is more expensive so on the first class cars there is actually breathing room but on the third class cars there is no room because everyone has third class tickets because they are so much cheaper.

After I got to cape town I took my time and walked to the waterfront. I got to the waterfront at around 1 in the afternoon and I ended up leaving the waterfront around 6. While I was there I walked through pretty much every store that looked interesting. It was kinda fun! I also made sure to stop at every diamond/jewelry store I saw and I sat down with a worker there and priced diamonds! :) I was curious! :) so then around 4 I stopped at a diamond store that had some decent prices! And I found a diamond that I wanted. But it was a little more expensive than I had wanted so I went to another case of diamonds and asked about the diamonds that were already in a setting. Turns out the diamond pendants (necklaces) were 50% off that day! Woo hoo! So I found an even bigger diamond than the one I had seen before and it was less expensive, bigger, and a higher quality! I hit the jackpot! So after lots of issues with bank/withdraw charges and the bank putting a hold on my card because they wanted me to call them I was able to buy the diamond!!! All in all. The diamond originally cost over 9000 rand but my final price (with more than a 54% discount) was 3900 rand so in us dollars... This $1,320 diamond I bought for $490 fun right? And it’s a .40ct I/J VS1 set in a 24karat white gold pendant and chain :) so happy :)

The ride home on the train was crazy. Not only was I worried because I was on my own (with a train full of people) with a diamond in my bag and a crazy man was talking to me about how we are the perfect ages to get married to each other (9 years apart) eeew. And then he asked for my number so he could come meet me and fix my car or something like that... I dunno. But I was so glad to get home and be safe :) it was nice. :)

Friday January 28th 2011

Today was pretty much awesome :) we left the crazy crazy kids around noon and Jamie and I went into the city. When we got there we met up with some people at the SASTS house and then we went to the beach :) amazing. :) this wasn’t a huge beach we went too... It was mostly just a nook of sand but there were quite a few people toward the end and it was less than a 5 minute walk from the SASTS house. We stayed there for a while and then we went to an internet cafe and then out to a japanese/chinese/sushi restaurant. I got the sweet and sour chicken it was scrumptious. I also tried some spicy tuna sushi, it wasn’t bad at all and I would have ate another one but it wasn’t amazing. But I am anxious to try other foods here. The food that Jean makes is really good :) she makes an awesome cucumber salad with vinegar sauce. After we ate we went to the SASTS house and showered and then we walked to the world cup stadium! :) we were supposed to meet our host dad there at seven thirty so we were there at about ten til. But we called him at about 7:40 and he hadn’t left the house yet (which is about a half an hour away). African time.... We forgot. So he told us to just buy our tickets and go in. Well... We can’t buy tickets at the stadium, you have to go other places. So! Jamie and I went up to some cops/security guards and we asked them where we could buy tickets... They said we can’t but... Then they pulled some tickets out of their pockets and gave them to us! We tried to pay them for them and they said just enjoy! So we got in to this amazing game for free! :) awesome :) when we got inside it was the very end of the first game, so we sat and then later met up with some other girls from SASTS and started to watch the second game :) then Jean (my host mom) surprised us and said she had spotted me out right when she got there! Crazy, cuz it’s a huge stadium! So we sat with them for the rest of the game :) I bought a Cape Town Ajax t-shirt (the team that we were going for), they were playing against the swallows, a team from Jo-burg. We won 2-0. Yay Cape Town. And then we all came home! :)

Thursday January 27th 2011

Today was another hard day at the project. The morning was good because Olive rearranged a lot of things. She separated the older kids from the younger kids and it was way nice because the older kids were sitting two to a table and they had their little folders with their names on them where they put all their work. Olive was saying that this is a real treat for them (to have a folder/file of their own) she said she didn’t have one when she was in school until she was in 12th grade. Crazy.
The afternoon was awful! All the kids are mixed in the afternoons because the “afterschool program” starts and uses the other building/room in the afternoons. All the kids were off the wall and wouldn’t listen AT ALL. It’s really hard for me to deal with because I can do absolutely nothing about it.
Nothing else really exciting happened today. The internet was down today so we couldn’t get on on our way home from the project. We came straight home and then ate dinner and how I am typing up this post! Haha. And it’s taken forever, so enjoy! :)


Wednesday January 26th 2011

Today was a better day at the project, not sure why it was easier but it was nice... Well at least the morning was. Olive brought in a bunch of dress up clothes and the kids dressed up for quite some time, it was nice. :) I brought my big camera today and was able to get some good portraits, that was fun.
After the project today we went to the mall and I bought a cell phone for about 25 USD. Not bad! Haha so now I have a local number and I can get a hold of other volunteers and such. After the mall we went to a really nice italian restaurant and we each ordered a pizza because it was 50% off! Haha but then we didn’t realize how big the pizza was! Haha so we get to have some left overs! Woo hoo. Then we came home and got ready to go out. We met up with Richard, our waiter from the other night, and his friend Ebon. We played pool at a club/bar. After about two beers Richard was “drunk” didn’t really think that a full grown guy could get drunk off of two beers. But! It was annoying. I’m just glad that all three of us went because we were able to help each other. Ebon was really nice and toward the end of the night I think he was getting embarrassed because of how Richard was acting. We took a lot of pictures and it was fun and nice to get out but I’m glad we left when we did. We caught a taxi back home around 10:30 and hit the sack when we got home.


Tuesday January 25th 2011

Today was a really hard day at the project. The girls left around noon to go ride the cable car up Table Mountain. So it was really only me and Allouise. Olive was gone today doing something. There are two other ladies that are there to mostly clean and help with the babies, but really they don’t care to do anything else and it was really frustrating. Especially when Allouise left to have a meeting with a parent and it just so happened to be right when we were serving up the food! So we have like 40 little kids under 5 years old all eating RICE and more than half of them were eating it on the floor. I was sitting in the middle of these kids feeding Nathan the autistic one and I was swarmed by all the kids saying “teacha teacha!!!” and the other two ladies didn’t do a thing to help me... Not cool. So finally Allouise came back but then sat at the table to write letters to the parents and I was left to clean up and didn’t know what the kids were supposed to be doing. I finally gave up trying to make them be quiet and sit on the rug so I just settled with being there so the kids wouldn’t kill each other. Then Allouise saw that I was frustrated and asked if I wanted to go home, I said yes and booked it out of there. After I left I realized that I shouldn’t have left so fast... I felt kind of bad.
When I got the train station there were tons of people there. But when the train got there it was insane! We were crammed so so tightly into the train! And then the doors shut but then someone opened them again and more people tried to squeeze on! One of the people that got on though I recognized! It was so crazy because I have only been here for a week and was able to recognize someone out of so many people! But it was Nathanial, Morgan’s friend. It was so good to see a familiar face! Especially since I was alone on a train with a bunch of strangers. Nathanial walked me up the platform and then we went our separate ways. I was able to get to the internet cafe’ before they closed, so that was nice but then I came home and did my laundry in the sink and then hung it up. Then the girls got home, we had dinner and I think we went to bed after that...


Monday January 24th 2011

Today was ridiculous at the project. All the kids came back after a weekend of being with their families and had forgotten everything that we had gone over the week before! It was no fun. We had to start over from square one. It’s so hard trying to teach little kids respect when they go home after you have been telling them to do all these things and it is totally different from everything you are trying to teach them. It’s frustrating.
I feel like I am already as dark as I normally get after a whole summer at home haha. It’s crazy.
After dinner tonight we were all sitting there and Jamie and Jess spotted a mouse and Jamie got super scared haha... Oh man it was funny... So we told Franklyn and he put out some mouse poison or something. But the way Jamie reacted was hilarious... It made my night.
We did laundry last night and we used the washer they have here for us and then we hung them in the backyard to dry. They were on our beds this morning and everything was just as dirty as when we put it in the washer haha so we will be washing things by hand from now on. Haha.


Sunday January 23rd 2011

It didn’t feel like Sunday at all today because I didn’t get to go to church and that kind of put me in a funk cuz it made me miss home a bit more. When we woke up we got ready and caught a minibus (big van manned by two people who stop randomly and whistle and yell and people to give them rides, they drop people off within walking distance of where they want to go). We took the minibus to Green Market Square. It’s in the city and there is a little street market that happens at least on the weekends. We walked around the market for a bit, people were still setting up and saying “I’ll get you good price, you’re my first customer” and then they looked so sad when I walked away and wouldn’t buy anything from them. After walking around we got some breakfast at a little restaurant next to the market. I got a dish that was basically yogurt with granola and lots of fruit and a little too much honey haha. It was good though :) while eating we made friends with our waiter, his name is Richard. He seems nice :) Jess and Jamie are wanting things to do during the week and the little town we are in doesn’t have much to do so they exchanged numbers to do something sometime. After eating we went back into the market and I bought some more stuff. I got some over the shoulder bags! The ones I wanted to get before I came. They are nice. I also got a bunch of bracelets and such for gifts. I was also able to get some bracelets made out of ELEPHANT HAIR! I thought that was so cool. It looks like some kind of thin wood or lanyard or something. But they are pretty cool. Then we went to the waterfront and we got on a boat/fairy that took us to Robben Island (where Nelson Mandela was in prison). On the way out there I saw a man pointing into the ocean so I turned around just in time to see a dolphin jump into the water! It was so awesome! It just gave me this really great feeling and reminded me just how blessed I am to be sitting on a boat in the middle of the ocean in South Africa and seeing a dolphin in the water! It was awesome. We were toured around the island and through the prison by a former prisoner. It was kinda cool. Noting spectacular but I liked hat it was such a huge part of what South Africa is and that is why It was interesting for me. I was able to learn a lot.
The boat ride back from the island was kind of awful because it was super windy again. I had to cover my nose so I could breath evenly. Kinda crazy. But after we got back to the waterfront we walked about 20 minutes to the train station and then waited 20 minutes on the train for it to start moving and then rode the train for about 50 minutes until we got to the Retreat station. Then we had to walk another 20 minutes to get to our host family’s house. We were so so exhausted! We took showers and ate and then Morgan, his wife Celest and their friend Nathanial came over after they were done with church and we got to talking with them for quite some time. Needless to say, we fell asleep once our heads hit the pillow.


Saturday January 22nd 2011

I called my family this morning! It was amazing! :) I miss home.
I tried curling my hair this morning using my $20 voltage converter that’s supposed to work blew up at me... So I’m going to have to go without really doing my hair for the next couple months haha. I guess it’s alright though because after I’m done with the kids during the day I am a wreck.
I spent a bunch of money today at some street markets. We went to the waterfront ad went out to lunch and took pictures and what not. At the markets I was first going to just walk around and look at everything but then some things caught my eye that I had to get. I should have walked around more because after I bought some things I went to another booth and they had pretty much the same things for cheaper. But I definitely don’t feel bad about what I spent on everything. I got some amazing wood carvings, jewelry boxes, masks, artistic bowls and some earrings. I have to carry all these things around for the weekend because we are staying at a backpackers this weekend so I’ll be living from my backpack! :) After the market Jess and I went on the City Tour bus. This bus was a big red two story bus that drove around to all of the main city attractions and we could get off wherever we liked and then get back on and continue the tour. Jess and I got off at the front of Table mountain where you can get on the cable car and ride up. However, it was closed because it was so incredibly windy! We literally had to walk at an angle to get through the wind haha so we got back on the bus and rode to Camps Bay where we got off again. When I got off I was greeted by this beautiful African man with dreads. Found out his name was Joe and he was from Zambia. At first I just thought he was making small talk and then I caught on haha he was selling something! Haha they are so good at drawing people in here. It’s crazy! Haha. Well he got me. He was selling some beautiful paintings. I pointed to one of them and asked how much he was asking for it. He said like R250 or something like that but I just said no I can’t, sorry... But then he was like no just make me an offer... So I said R50? And he laughed at me and said how about 180? I said I couldn’t and we kept going back and forth. Luckily I only had R80 in my pocket! So I just pulled it out and said this is all I’ve got! And he was kind of stumped but then being quick on his feet he said ask your friend for 20 rand and ill give it to you for R100 so I bought the painting for 150 less than he was asking. It was awesome. And I love it :) we stayed on the beach for just a little bit because the wind was awful, we went into the sand to take pictures and it was blowing everywhere! And it hurt so bad cuz it was hitting our bare legs, so we went back on the grass and talked with all the guys selling the paintings. After a while my guy pulled out some bracelets that were really awesome... He was asking like 80 rand for them and I was like you wiped me out!!! He said make me an offer... So I pulled out the change in my pocket and it added up to about 10 rand. But then my bus came and I had to catch it so he put it on my wrist but I was like, I only have 10 rand! He said it was fine and that I would just have to come back and see him and then maybe I could pay him then! Haha. It was funny. But I really love the bracelet too haha.

After the bus tour we walked like 10 million miles to the backpackers. On the way we stopped by the world cup stadium and took a picture or two. We got stopped by a military man and he ended up giving us a tour of the military base/museum. It was super random, we didn’t even ask to go in... We said hi and then they said something to us so we moved closer and next thing we knew he was talking about giving us a tour. It was kind of lame haha but whatevs. After we left the base we kept walking to the backpackers. My face and arms got so so sunburnt! My nose felt crispy. Later that night I went and got sunscreen from a store across the street from the backpackers and it was really embarrassing buying sun screen being so burnt. I stayed in the rest of the night and a bunch of people went out clubbing.