The Mall?

It is now Saturday and I am waiting around for some people to get back with the cars we are renting for the weekend. So Thursday Chelsea and I made our frist trip to green acres, which is similar to a mall plus a walmart built inside. We had to leave from a bus stop just outside campus and take that bus all the way to green acres. This is the first time I think I have ever rode on a public bus. We obviously had to ask around to make sure we were actually getting on the right bus, which we were. It only cost 7 Rand which is about 1 dollar for the ride and it was quite a distance. We had a seat and starting talking to a guy from Cape Town. He was telling us all about South Africa and what we should see and do while we were here. We also told him all about snow and how cold it gets where we are from and he was astonished. It took about an hour to get to the mall with all the stops and traffic we had to go through. Once we were there is was heaven. I was on the hunt for sandals because I barely brought any shoes with me. They were everywhere so I had an easy time. We got pizza for lunch and it was weird because this pizza place didn't have just a plain cheese pizza. That's all I eat so I asked if they could make it for me and they did. We got some gelatos for dessert and they were delicious. We had to taste test quite a few because most of them were made from the different kinds of candy bars they have there. Once we were all finished out next task was to find the bus stop to take the bus home. We must have ran after 5 different bus's until some old lady sitting on some steps nearby asked us what we were doing. We told her we were looking to go to Summerstrand (which is like the suburb we live in by the campus) and she pointed us in the right direction. We were then out on the main road where we asked a lady if we were in the right place. Luckily she was also going the same way so she said to follow her, which we did. While we sat and waiting for the bus, there was a kid selling some sort of fruit near by and it reminded me of the guy who sells pretzels in the middle of the road in Philadelphia. (That is a side note to all my family!) The ride home was easy because there weren't as many stops. I did notice at one point that I was the only white person on the bus, and to me that is what is so different here. I am considered the minority here, but I think I am getting use to it now. There is a lot of racism here even though apartheid has been abolished for almost 15 years now, but for the most part I haven't seen any instances personally. Although some people in my group of friends have experienced it and it has really opened their eyes. Once we got back to Summerstrand Chelsea and I walked to Kristens to make muffins for Helmut's birthday. We didn't stay too long because we had to shower and get ready for "ladies night!" Ladies night was a lot of fun this week, I think because there weren't as many Americans there as usual. I met some people from Durban that were really nice. Friday morning I always sleep in because I don't have class at all. I laid out on the beach all afternoon with Sara, but it did get chilly around like 4ish because the sun was behind many clouds. We road our bikes to the beach, but walked them back because we picked up Kristen from PicknPay which is right across the street from the beach so that she could come get her bike from Annie's. Kristen and Breana came over so we could discuss plans for the following day and ended up making some chicken and pasta for dinner which was delicious! I went to bed extremely early because Becca and I had a long run this morning (Saturday) and had to get up early for it. As we were running we passed by a guy I had met out dancing on Thursday night. He is a triathlete and will be competing in the Iron Man here in P.E. at the end of April. I was planning to go and watch, but now I have someone who I can cheer on! So now I am just sitting and waiting for the rental cars to get here so we can get on our way to Jbay where I think some surfing trials are taking place today and tomorrow? I feel like here, I hear a lot of rumors and I am never sure what is true or not. We never have proof that what everyone is saying is true so we just kind of go with the flow. There might not even be a festival, but since a lot of people said there was we are going to check it out. Until tomorrow! Cheers!