5, 4, 3, 2, 1.........BUNGEE!!!!!! South Africa

I'm pretty sure South Africa is my favorite country I have been to to this date. The first day we didn't pull into the port until late and we started our diplomatic briefing at 10 AM. This was good as usual, but a whole lot of warnings about crime in general because its level of crime is rated at Critical apparently. No worries, I had nothing bad like this happen to me! I started off with a SAS trip to Robben Island where Nelson Mandela was held for so many years. They had some neat videos they showed us on the ferry there and back which got us prepped for the visit. Our first guide was very funny, and a resident on the Island, he even showed us his house. His voice was so dramatic that it made everything so much more entertaining. He started off by making fun of all the different nationalities of the visitors, trust me he had fun with the Americans! He showed us around the general island and all of the important places, like the limestone quarry and such. This part of the tour was neat except for the fact that I have had a cold since the end of Namibia so I was coughing up a storm. It's mainly gone now, but still some remnants, unfortunately I did pass it onto both of the roomies and they are currently passed out in the room as a result. The second guide for Robben Island was a former inmate from the 1970s when a lot of teenagers were put in as political prisoners. He mainly did the tour of the prison area and shared many interesting stories about life in there. Of course we got to see Mandela's cell and I took several pictures, but it was definitely a heartening experience to start off with. Once I got back I ran into the mall which was near the port and grabbed a quick burger, they are better in South Africa than in the states, before I left for a theatrical performance of "Freak Country". It was performed at the University of Cape Town and it was this really neat dark comedy about a South African white actor who was flying to shoot a movie in some other nation. HE gets caught up in one of the more restrictive African nations when he has a magazine with some men that are not appropriately dressed, and says, "the President can kiss his a**," when the guards accuse him of it. It was actually really funny, but the message was definitely in there as well. This was really great because we got some local hors d'oeuvres which were AMAZING.

 

The next morning we woke up really early to leave on the "Shark Jumper" trip at 5 AM. The bus we got on was huge and even nicer than any of the ones I've been on yet. I slept through large portions of the 8 hour drive, but whenever I woke up and looked out the window you would see some of the most beautiful landscapes you have ever seen in your life. It would jump from huge mountains to flat farms lands in the matter of an hour or so. The bus ride went pretty fast except for when the bus driver started playing this hilarious South African musical which was really silly and not very good in general. That's when it seemed a little bit longer. We drove over the Bloukrans Bridge when we got there and instantly realized how high it was. The area all around it had amazing views and there was even a little restaurant you could hang out in and see people bungee from. Our bungelow was awesome too, it reminded a little bit of smaller versions of Outer Banks beach houses. It was so much nicer than we expected. After we checked in we just wandered around the area until we were weighed and harnessed. There was even a Red bull car that came around and gave us some before we jumped, and they hung out with us later that night too which was fun. I don't really drink Red Bull so it made me pretty jittery right before I went and it didn't help that it had started to lightly mist rain and I was only in a tank top with jeans. Afterwards I was shivering for a really long time because it was kinda cold and I had so much adrenalin going! The walk underneath the bridge to get to the main platform was probably the scariest part of all of it because you could see everything underneath and around you as you walked. Plus, there was a little bit of bounce to it which definitely did not make you feel secure. There were 3 groups that went and I was in the third, but the order in the groups was based on size, SO that means that I was the first one of my group to do the bungee jump. It is a 216 meter drop, or more than 600 feet, and the actual Bridge is about 300 meters, or about 900 feet high. The first drop was probably the best part of all of it, with 5 seconds of completely free fall, but the entire thing seemed to fly by. The surprising part was that you basically could feel no whiplash it was just that much adrenalin and fun! Afterwards I ran back to pick up the video and some other things and it looks so crazy now, I feel so proud that I actually did it! That night we just hung out at the restaurant and then chilled in our bungelows because we were basically in the middle or nowhere but we still had a good time.

 

We had to wake up early again the next morning, again at 5 AM, to drive to Gansbaii. It was about a 6 hour drive which I slept through a good portion of as well. I basically just ate some Nik Nask, which are basically cheetos, and some Fanta which was everywhere. They divided us into 3 groups for the Great White shark cage diving for our boat sizes. At our place they gave us a little food and had a nice curio shop along with a quick briefing. After putting on some sunscreen and getting our swimsuits on we got our life jackets and some silly orange jackets. I got to sit at the front of the boat on the way to Dyer Island for the great whites. I was again in the 3rd group which was all girls for getting into the cage. Our wetsuits were absolutely huge along with our swim shoes. My mask actually went over the bottom part of the face in my wetsuit which made it really hard to breathe once I was actually in the water. The water was absolutely freezing but you definitely got used to it and the waves were huge. It actually made a couple of people sea sick which is crazy considering how long we've been at sea. We only had one shark but it was a 12 foot angry male which was really cool. In both my turn and the last time it actually jumped out of the water a bit to get to the big, gross tuna head they were trying to attract it with. Apparently sharks are attracted to their grease more so than the blood which was interesting. We had a Marine Biologist on our boat so that's why we found out so much. They actually played a joke on my group by asking us if we wanted to see the shark up close, and they actually dropped the fish head into the cage with us, right in front of my face! If you listen to the video I would be the one uttering the ear-piercing scream. SO GROSS! Overall shark diving was really neat and we were pretty lucky because it isn't really the season for it. I ended up missing the Cape Town rugby game I wanted to go to because the bus came back too late, but I still had a good time.

 

I'm pretty sure I woke up early every single day while in South Africa, because we had to meet outside the pier at 7 AM to climb and abseil off of Table Mountain. Unfortunately we had to wait about 30 minutes just for them to pick us up but then we drove to the bottom of Table Mountain. We were a pretty big group with over 20 people hiking up the Mountain. It ended up taking us a little less than 2 hours, but most of my roomies made it in an hour or 1.5 hours. I'll just blame it on the big group for the sake of my pride I guess, what can I say when both of them are D 1 athletes??? I was staying with the pretty quick group for most of the hike, but when we got to the big gorge with the really steep steps I had to back down a bit. I definitely made it to the top and it felt great, but it was REALLY exhausting. Once we got up there we explored it a little bit and took a bunch of pictures, there are even little animals that live on the top! They are called Dassies and they remind me a little bit of groundhogs, but they aren't afraid of people whatsoever. We got some breakfast at the cafe and then prepped for abseiling, or rappelling, off the side. We went down about 112 meters, but it was a long wait beforehand so the anticipation made me pretty nervous. Everybody that worked there was so nice and really funny. They told us there was a "surprise" about halfway down the distance, which really was that the wall cut in so far that you just hung there lowering yourself instead of walking down. It was really scary at first, probably scarier than the bungee jumping, but the views were absolutely amazing and I really enjoyed the part I didn't walk down more because the views were so nice. Afterwards we took the cable car down which was neat because it rotates in a circle so everyone can get a good view. I definitely got some neat pictures up there! I got back to the ship and did a little shopping with Emily in the port after I had cleaned up from the hike and abseiling. After that I went out to dinner with roommie Megan and some other friends at this Italian place in the pot. The crazy part was that I actually had OSTRICH while I was there. I did want to make sure I had some form of exotic food while I was there. In addition, I tried their Bar One cheesecake which was absolutely amazing, ask me about it id you want the details!

 

The last day I got to sleep in a little bit and had to meet outside at 8:30 AM for my SAS trip to Khayalitsha township in Cape Town. Once we got there we went to Miss Vicky's Bed and Breakfast which is actually really famous. My friend Claudia had brought these little sticker bags she had made, along with some other SASers, that they were handing out to the little kids, but I swear they almost got mobbed over it. I bought this gorgeous painting there that a little boy and his brother made, it was of the township at sunset it it had actual aluminum among other recycled materials used to make the little shacks. After that we went to the craft market where I bought several other little trinkets and some jewelry which was really neat. Outside of the market there was a church service going on, it was Sunday after all, and some kids were playing on the playground outside. The kids were singing and dancing for us which was so sweet and then afterwards they played around for a bit. They loved taking pictures with us, one girl said she wanted to be a model like "Tyra", a girl after my own heart! We taught them some of our little hand games from when we were little girls, like "Double Double This This", which was so much fun afterwards, they couldn't get enough of it! After that we headed to look out point where you could see all of Khayalitsha and we heard some amazing singing coming from this one church service at the bottom. They were some people that were so moved that they were crying as they exited. The last stop was another Bed and Breakfast where we got a quick snack of their local donuts and some lemonade. They then led us around a small walking tour of township which was absolutely crazy. Everyone is so impoverished and living in this public housing, but they are incredibly sincere and happy almost. The crazy part was that the ANC, or African National Congress, was having a rally there for later that day when President Zuma was supposed to speak in Khayalitsha. Everyone was waving its flag and had t-shirts with his pictures on it. Buses drove by with people and kids even leaning out the windows with the flags waving. The crazy part of all of this is that Zuma is up for charges of corruption in their government! The people there were just so different from anything I've experienced before and it really shocked my entire time I had in South Africa in a good way. It made me realize the difference between the segregation that although it is not legalized anymore, it is still there. It was really amazing for me to see this almost everywhere, but most of the people were so welcoming nonetheless. After that I just grabbed some sushi really quick and then went grocery shopping for the longer portion of the trip before Mauritius and India, I needed to contribute to our triple's food pile! Live is going to be pretty busy with schoolwork for the next couple of days, especially with our first Global Exam tomorrow, but hopefully all will be well. I did do well on my Sacred Sites exam at least, I haven't gotten the Immigration Law one yet. Wish me luck and I can't wait for a day break in Mauritius and Sea Olympics afterwards!