Surrounded by beauty! All I can do is be amazed!

The photo on the left is the mountain in the distance. I stood at the very top of the mountain peak on left:) The picture next to it is one of the incredible views of the Atlantic from way up!

The past three days have been full of sunshine and beautiful sight seeing!! We started our weekend off by taking a climb up Lion's Head Mountain. Rock climbing to the most beautiful view I have ever seen!!! We sat at the veryyyyyyyyyyyyy tip top of it. We were surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean and the City of Cape town.

<-- other members of the group on the climb down!

Six of us made it up to the top and hung out for a while.

Later that night we went to a restaurant called Mama Africa with the other study abroad group from California where we were encouraged to try "game" food. Interrrrrrrrrrresting night! After that a few of us went to an outdoor hang out spot called the Waiting Room and we hung out on the roof of a 4 story place in the middle of down town underneath the beautiful African sky!

Sunday we were blessed again with sunshineeee!! We headed out for a day of ocean and amazing views. We did the Cape peninsula tour, stopping at lots of bays. We went to visit the penguin colony! They were so funny! They were called jackass penguins because of the noises they make, but they were hilarious to watch. They were everywhere! About 9,000 just in this colony alone!

We next traveled to the Cape of Good Hope which is considered the southern most tip of Africa! My words cannot express the beauty of all this! I cannot wait to show everyone my pictures! We had lots of free time to walk around and take pictures and enjoy the day. We were warned about the baboons here! We werent allow to take bags off of the bus because the babooons are known for "mugging people " They were actually described as gangsters, haha. Luckily, i had nothing they wanted!

On Monday we had class, and we all presented our historical briefs then we hopped on the 2 oclock boat out to Robben Island where Nelson Mandela was in prison for 18 years. After reading his autobiography since we have been here it was amazing to be walking the same halls as he did! We saw the garden he started, the lime quary which he worked in, the tennis court he helped build, and the cell he was in 17+ hours a day. Our guide was an ex-political prisoner named Sparks who was in prison during the time Mandela was. All of the tours are either given by former prisoners or guards, so it is amazing what we got to learn from people who experienced everything first hand.

To the left is a picture of Mandela's cell (sorry i cannot figure out how to rotate pictures on here!)

On the boat ride back we got to watch the sunset on the ocean for an hour! breathtaking!!

And here is the view of Cape town from the middle of the Ocean! Table mountain (the big flat one;)) Is the one that we a few of us are going to go climb tomorrow if weather is nice and we have time.

I cant believe I have been here for a month and only have 3 days left here! There is still so much left that I want to do! I guess this means that I will have to come back.. :)

Anyways, not sure if I will have time again to post before I return back to the States!

Get ready America!

Penguin love!!

"Do your little bit of good where you are; its those little bits of good put together that overwhelm the world. " Desmond Tutu

The top left picture is two cuties from the preschool in Langa who loved having their photo taken! The rest of the photos are of the murals we did! The top right is the Xhosa words for house and mom. Directly below is the amazing crew that turned a plain white wall into a fun, educational and positive learning center. What a day!!!!! Included in the mural are the SA flag, animals, people, soccerball, hands, friendship, love and the English and Xhosa translation.

To the left here is the rainbow wall and the word UBUDLELWANE which means FRIENDSHIP. and below translates to COMMUNITY OF THE RAINBOW NATION. We had fun getting messy here!

Welll! the days here keep going faster and faster!! We just finished our time with the Olive Leaf Foundation. Friday and Monday we did the mural in the resource center. I am sooooo excited about it! Everyone helped out and did a fantastic job, we had a great group collaboration!! Everyone claimed they had no artistic ability but they lied! :) We only planned on doing one wall that they originally asked us to do with the word alphabet on it, but we ended up doing so much more! On Tuesday we split into groups and went to visit preschools. We took toys and games to the kids and just got to play with them for the whole afternoon. Some of the kids were only two!! Some of the cutest kids I have ever seen!!! We of course did not speak Xhosa, and the children did not speak English, so we did a lot of dancing at first. it was so much fun! The little kids did what ever we did! They sang us some songs, and we sang them some. We did a lot of repeating games with rhythms and clapping. They just seemed to be having so much fun! We then got the toys out, some colored, some did puzzles, the little girl I was hanging out with was having the most fun by sucking on a pink crayon... and did not appreciate it when I took it away from her, but then I think she forgave me because she took a nap on my lap. :) It was sooo much fun! Seeing how schools here were ran was really interesting. There was over 30 little tikes all in on room that was soooo small.. There was hardly enough room for us to be in there with them. The whole place was ran by one,sometimes two women. We also went into a weaving warehouse/shop where women work and do everything by hand. They make a large percentage on what is bought there and this is how many of them support their families. Their work was incredible! I will miss all of the people we met through the OLF.

Last weekend was also really fun! We got to experience the Cape Town night scene. Zwai, someone who works with OLF took us out to lots of different places. We spent most of the night at a place called Zula's listening to a band called Rudamentals, and some really fun reggae type music.

The most valuable experiences here have been through talking to locals. Hearing how their life has been and what they have been through. There is so much to do, listen to and take in here!

The rest of this trip will be jam packed with more amazing experiences. I really hope the these rainy mornings stop! We were going to go to Robben Island today but the boat could not take us because the ocean was too choppy. We rescheduled for Monday so I hope its a nice day!! I really want to visit the place where Nelson Mandela spent 18 years of his life.

It's incredible how much I have learned in the past 2.5 weeks. About South Africa, about people in general and about myself!

We have been lucky to have amazing guides such as Luke and Arlene who have pulled so many strings to get us places. We have even managed to be allowed into Parliament tomorrow and Friday! Today was President Zuma's first address and we all watched him speak on TV today and tomorrow we will be in the room while the opposition has their turn, and Friday we will be in there to hear Zuma's response. It's all so surreal!

This weekend is all dependent on the weather! We will be joining a group from a university in California who just got into town here for a hike up Table Mountain! I have been looking forward to this since we arrived in Cape Town!! And Sunday will hopefully be the tour of the Cape of Good Hope and the penguin colony, as the weather has kept us from going other times :( PRAY FOR SUNSHINE HERE!!!!!!!!!

I cannot believe that we only have ten days left here! There is still so much to do! Tomorrow before Parliament I am going to go to the Art Museum, Planetarium, and Slave Lodge Museum.

Much to update on soon!:)

African Love!!!!!!

Cape Town Love!

The first picture is from the safari in Kruger National Park. Momma giraffe and baby gifaffe are just crossing the road! I cannot wait to show everyone the hundreds of photos I have!

CAPETOWN UPDATE:: This city is beautiful! The picture to the left was one of the most breath taking views I have ever seen at Blyde Canyon. We stopped here last week on our way from Kruger park to the airport in Jo-burg. I LOVE CAPETOWN! The more we see of it, the more I love it! Weather has been so nice and sunny, we have been lucky considering it is winter here and that normally means lots of rain and wind off the ocean, but today was our first taste of that! It was NOTHING to us, used to good ole' central IL weather. We have been doing lots of class in the mornings. We have finally got through Nelson Mandela's Long Walk to Freedom. Tomorrow we have our first discussion over the next book we read The Madonna of Excelsior. I have to start/finish our next book by Monday because somehow it is hard to find time to read in a city this beautiful! We have three more reads in the next two weeks!

Yesterday we started our volunteer service at the Olive Leaf Foundation http://www.olf.org.za/ . Yesterday we got a brief orientation to the program. They do a lot to serve the community of Khayelitsha (ky-leetcha). We assisted in an after school program for kids who normally go home to no parents because they are at work. The township of Khaylelitsha is formed of hundreds of little shacks, but is rich in people! Everyone we have encountered has been so friendly. The children at the school spoke Xhosa, a native language that uses clicks, so we did have a language barrier but the kids were amazing! After some big group games outside we split up into groups. I was with some of the younger kids and we did finger painting and potato stamping! It was a great big mess but the kids had a lot of fun. They were so excited to have something to do after school. We then did a lot of jump roping and then our time quickly ran out! the day was a great success for all!

Today was our second day with OLF and we had a completely different experience. We were given pamphlets and magazines with information about HIV and AIDS and mass boxes of condoms. We split up with our guides and went into the shopping centres of the community and handed out information and supplies to people. It was an extremely eye opening experience just to be on the front line of trying to spread education about health and safety. The responses that we got from people ranged from laughs, "what are these for" to some very grateful people! Overall though, today was another great success! It is so incredible to be here learning the history of the country and actually have the opportunity to be out giving something back.

I am sooo excited for tomorrow!! We are doing a mural painting at one of the resource centers. They gave me a sketch of what they were thinking and I am getting ready to work on the design a bit tonight! I will definitely post some pictures when I get time!

This weekend we are doing a tour of the Cape of Good Hope and visiting penguin island because it had gotten rescheduled. More updates are soon to come!!!

emails always welcome @ klwaters@eiu.edu

love you all!!!!

=)

safari-sogoody!

We have just gotten into Cape Town yesterday and it is AMAZING! We are surrounded on a peninsula by the Atlantic Ocean and the Indian Ocean and beautiful Table Mountain(which we will be climbing here soon!) is in the view of our hotel! Everything has gone perfectly so far! We we in Jo-burg for the first few nights. We visited townships and met incredible people. Then we traveled on to Dennilton, a couple hours away to get to our first volunteer location. We were to help out at an orphanage called Youth with A Vision.
My words and pictures cannot do this place justice!! I have never been more happy to be anywhere in my life as that place. The children were absolutely great. They were all so happy. The first day we were there they showed us around and we got to join in on their Sunday worship service. Those kids had the best voices I have ever heard! The next day we went back we helped out by cutting grass, with a single tool (much more difficult than a riding lawn mower). The orhapange had 25 kids who were the sweetest kids ever! After doing some work there we had a big Soccer match! It was so much fun to be running around with them! Some of them could surely play in the world cup!! (which by the way will be in south africa next and i can see the stadium being building from my hotel!) it was such an incredible two days there!

We got to venture onward to Kruger National park where we went on a 2 day safari (some of us who were sick only went out one of the days) but we saw tons of animals! Giraffes, elephants, lions & cubs, babboons, monkeys, wildabeast, pumba, impalas, and many more! I have really good picutres!!

Now that we are in Cape Town we have just been touring it a bit today and I am excited to get out and do more service work in this beautiful community!!! Mountains, Ocean, EVERYTHING all right here! :) its amazing!! Tomorrow we are seeing tons more and going to the penguin island!! I am excited to finally be settled in one place for the next 3 weeks instead of packing and traveling every two days! But its been great so far! Hopefully everyone on our trip can get and stay healthy for the rest of it! We have much to do!

I hope to update more often here! And post some pictures as soon as I can! There is much to tell and show you all!!! I love emails and chats on skype if you have it! Just let me know:) Our time is 7 hours ahead!


ALL OF MY AFRICAN LOVE!!

The day is finally here!! It's a rainy day in Chicago, so I suppose we will just hop on a plane and get to London! We will be touring the city all day tomorrow (probably on 0 sleep) and then tomorrow at 7pm (London time) we will start on our flight to South Africa for about 11 hours and arrive in SA the following morning!

I am so excited!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! =)

everyone should get skype so I can talk to you while I am gone! Send emails klwaters@eiu.edu. I would love to hear from you!

London Love!!!