We're Going on Vacation

Merry Christmas, everybody! And Happy New Year! We know Christmas is still over a week away, and we haven’t lost track of the world that much. But in terms of wishing everyone happy holidays, this is our last chance. We leave this week on our vacation to Mozambique and Swaziland. To say that we are excited is an understatement. Come Sunday, we will be lounging on the pristine beaches of Mozambique for the next week or so. On our way back to South Africa we’re stopping off for a couple days in the tiny kingdom (yes, kingdom) of Swaziland. After that, we’ll be ringing in the new year with several other volunteers from our group in one volunteer’s village. All in all, we won’t be back here at our site until the beginning of 2012.

We are also excited because once we get back here we will, hopefully, become very busy with projects. We’ll have a few days to catch up on sleep before the new school year begins, and we’re optimistic about being able to help out at the primary school. Last week we attended the end of year ceremony for the primary school that included graduations for kindergarten and Grade 7 (high school begins in Grade 8 here). The principal seems to really like us (he gave Matt a 6-pack of Heineken out of the blue), so things are looking good at the school.

Well anyway, we won’t be posting anything here for several weeks. Happy holidays!

Week Three in KZN

Food: We are treated as management at the hospital, which means that our meals are provided for by the kitchen staff. For the most part, this is great. We definitely save some money by not having to cook every meal ourselves. Plus, it’s nice not having to cook all the time. The food is usually fairly traditional South African food – rice, beans, mealie pap and MEAT. This country definitely loves its meat. If we eat any more chicken, we’re afraid we might start crowing.

Names: Many volunteers are given new names in the local language of their sites. Yesterday, we received our Zulu names. Matt is now Sbusiso (Sbu), which means blessing. Sara’s name is not quite so traditional. She was renamed Zahara, which is an extremely popular South African singer. News of our new names is spreading quickly, and we have heard lots of “Sanibona, Zahara!” and Sanibona, Sbu!” in the last 24 hours. (Sanibona means hello.)