Settling in...

Now that the first week of classes has finished, I've began to settle in to this new lifestyle.  I'm excited for the classes I'll be taking this semester but I'm also dreading the assignments coming up.  Well it will all be over soon and at least my classes are interesting.  We have all settled in to our living situations now and it's been fun getting to know the girls in my chalet better.  Just to explain we all live in chalets on campus and each one has 4 bedrooms with a big bathroom to share.  I share my chalet with my roommate, Yui, and 5 other girls.  This week it was pretty easy to tell that we've began settling in because everyone has been waking up later in comparison to the first week and people are showing up to breakfast later too.  Aside from getting used to life here, we haven't had too many adventures, although we did have a fun weekend!

This weekend we celebrated two birthdays and also got to explore Pietermaritzburg a bit.  On Saturday, we woke up early and headed to the African Bird of Prey Sanctuary.  Before arriving at the sanctuary though, we stopped at the Pietermaritzburg train station.  We stopped at this train station because it is in fact the train station that Gandhi got thrown off of in 1893.  During that year, on the night of June 7th, Gandhi was riding first class on a train and he got harassed by officers because he was not white.  He was asked to sit in the other cabin because first class was only for whites even though Gandhi bought a first class ticket.  When Gandhi refused to move he was removed from the train at the Pietermaritzburg station and spent the night in jail.  This event fueled his fight against racial oppression and thus changed the course of history. At the train station we were told about the importance of the site and the story of why Gandhi was removed from the train, then we were able to take pictures before we went on our way.

So Cute! I want one!

Some of us girls at the Bird of Prey Sanctuary.

At the Sanctuary we got to see many different birds of prey, which basically means they hunt for food.  They had owls, eagles, kites, hawks, vultures and other birds I can't remember the names of.  When we got to the Sanctuary we were given time to walk around and look at all the birds.  My favorite birds were the owls and there was one owl in particular that I absolutely fell in love with.  It was a tiny owl, that was just a little bigger than my fist.  This owl was so cute, I wish I could have had it as a pet to cuddle up with but clearly that wouldn't be possible since it is an owl.  After seeing the lovely creatures we got to see a show, where one of the workers at the sanctuary talked about the birds and showed us some of their talents.  It was incredible to see how far and fast some of these birds could fly.  One thing that I found interesting was that in South Africa, they have more birds of prey than any other country in the world and you can often see some while driving around.  The show was very interesting and the sanctuary was in a gorgeous location above a valley.  When the show ended we hanged around and then we got to see the vulture feeding.  This was quite scary actually.  When we arrived at the vulture enclosure, the vultures were already screeching for food and fighting each other to be closest to the door.  When the worker finally arrived, she threw a huge chunk of meat in for the vultures and they became savages fighting each other over every little piece of meat.  I had never seen anything like this before and I was able to realize the impression I had of vultures before was actually quite accurate.  When the feeding frenzy was over we all returned to the buses to head to campus for lunch.

The Guys

The Girls

After lunch we went on one more adventure.  We went to a lookout called World's View.  This lookout allows you to see over all of Pietermaritzburg and it is also part of the original road that was taken by the South African pioneers.  At the lookout we spent most of our time taking pictures and looking at the incredible view!

Me and the Birthday Girl

When we got back from the lookout we had some time to spare before we went out to dinner to celebrate Janet's birthday.  Janet is one of the CLCs here, which stands for Community Life Coordinator.  She's basically like an RA, but she does much much more and she also a fabulous friend!  So for her 24th birthday, we all decided to go out to dinner and celebrate.  There was more than 50 of us going to the restaurant, so we clearly had to make reservations and order ahead of time.  Luckily, the restaurant did a fabulous job at accommodating us.  It did take a while for some of us to get our food, but what do you expect when you're in a group with 50+ people.  We spent a long time at the restaurant but it was fun hanging out and at 8 o'clock a DJ came and some of the boys had fun dancing to the beat.  Overall it was a great night out to be with everyone and celebrate a lovely new friends birthday!

The next day we went to church.  There are three different churches that we have the choice of going to, last week I went to Leizel and Reagan's church (they are both CLCs).  This week I decided to go to Janet's church.  I really enjoyed the church service and it reminded me a lot of church at home.  Which can be both good and bad, I think it was good because I was able to get a lot out of the sermon since it was a familiar style of service but it's also bad because I felt like I wasn't in South Africa and didn't experience any cultural differences.  So far, I think I will be going to this church though because even though it didn't feel much different then church at home, I was able to get a lot more out of it then I did at the other church.  But next week I'll be going to one more different church and then I'll decide from there which one I choose to stay at.  Everyone at church was so nice and after the service they brought us coffee and cake as we talked with some people. 

After church we had the rest of the day free but I decided to go to the mall with some others.  I had been to the mall a lot the previous week but every time we went I didn't have enough time to buy anything so finally we were going for a good 2 hours.  At the mall, I already knew what I wanted but I had time to try stuff on and also look in other stores.  It was a successful shopping trip and now I don't plan on going again for a while.

Gangsta Dance Party

Sunday night we had a dance party planned for one of the guys in our group's birthday, Enoch.   The theme of the party was Gangsta, so we all dressed up in our most gangsta clothes and had a blast dancing for hours.  Everyone had a great time at the party and we got to see some incredible dance moves!

Monday we went back to classes, I only had one class Monday though so I spent the rest of the day reading outside and doing homework.  It's been really hot and sunny here, and since there's no air conditioning the best way to stay cool is to go outside in the breeze or if your room is cool you can stay in there.  I chose to spend the day outside and take advantage of the gorgeous weather, even if it is hot.  Luckily, it isn't humid like it was when we first got here though, because then I don't know how enjoyable this heat would be.  Well Monday I got most of my homework done and what I didn't finish then, I finished after classes on Tuesday. Although, I still have much more work to do by Friday because we will be busy again this weekend.  On Saturday we are going to uShaka Marine World in Durban, which is basically a water park, amusement park, aquarium, and sea world all in one.  I'm so excited to see the sea animals and also be able to cool of on some fun rides, but until I can do that I have to finish my homework!  So that is what I will be doing all day today, homework! I miss you all and hope everyone is doing well!

God Bless,
Yvette