http://www.travelblog.org/Bloggers/KyleKGillis/ Travel adventures in journals and photos from KyleKGillis en-us Thu, 10 Dec 2009 00:07:47 +0000 Thu, 10 Dec 2009 00:07:47 +0000 Before leaving for South Africa I was asked why it was necessary to go all the way to South Africa to study for a semester. Surely I couldnrsquot get a better education down there than I could get in America right Even at tiny Albion College a patrol boat college I could get a better education for a semester than I could in South Africa. My dad joked that some of my classes would include Spe http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/South-Africa/Western-Cape/Cape-Town/blog-348063.html More than any other trip I worried about travelling to Namibia the most. It was the first trip Irsquod planned purely on my own and I was going with no other American study abroad students. I tried comforting myself by saying that this is how true backpackers travel but my worries still lingered.But in the end I had nothing to worry about.I started early Sunday morning by taking a 24 hour coa http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/Namibia/Sossusvlei/blog-347738.html The countdown until I return home is now under a month and I canrsquot believe how fast the semester has gone. Irsquom looking forward to the cool fall weather in the U.S. South Africa is heading into the summer months and while many of you might be jealous to know that Irsquove been wearing shorts and tshirts for the past week Irsquove always preferred the cool fall weather over the h http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/South-Africa/Western-Cape/Cape-Town/blog-338819.html As we reach the end of October I have one month left here in South Africa and one more week of exam prep before my finals. The American media wants me to believe that everyone back home is depressed by the economy and that people are pillaging and chanting ldquoAttica Atticardquo in the streets so Irsquoll believe them. In an effort to take your minds off the struggling economy I creat http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/South-Africa/Western-Cape/Cape-Town/blog-336461.html ldquoTIA This Is Africa.rdquoDanny Archer Blood Diamond Early Thursday morning I boarded a Greyhound bus and made the daylong trek across the country to Durban on South Africarsquos east coast. The little red lines of the Indiana Jones map dotted as we stopped at many small towns and large cities along the coast. We stopped in Port Elizabeth where they are building another stadium for t http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/South-Africa/KwaZulu-Natal/Durban/blog-334152.html Not only does South Africa sit on the confluence of the Atlantic and Indian Ocean it also sits on the confluence of the first and third worlds. Cape Town and its neighboring suburbs are identical to American suburbs without Wal Mart or Costco. When yoursquore living in Cape Town itrsquos very easy to forget that just a few miles outside the city are township slums where poor blacks and colo http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/South-Africa/Western-Cape/Cape-Town/blog-331369.html When I returned from my overland trip to stormy Cape Town and my UCT classes I hit the bottom of the U. I may have slipped near the bottom earlier in the semester but when I returned we lost our internet for an entire week and my antidote for homesickness went with it. The internet was the oil to my Tin Man the cryogenic ice suits to my Mr. Freeze. It kept me smiling reading emails from famil http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/South-Africa/Western-Cape/Cape-Town/blog-328932.html ldquoThe political social economic and security situations in Zimbabwe are volatile and could deteriorate quickly without warning.U.S Department of State websiteWhere you're going is the only place in the world where the geese chase you.Ian Malcom The Lost World Jurassic ParkFinally I reached the third and last crusade of my Indiana Jonessaga spring break adventure. The day after raft http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/Zimbabwe/Victoria-Falls/blog-325857.html Author Patricia Shultz in her bestselling travel book ldquo1000 Places to See Before You Dierdquo remarks that the Zambezi River is one of the best rivers in the world for white water rafting partially because it is one of only a few rivers where you can go down class V rapids the most dangerous rapids. I read the Zambezi entry in Shultzrsquos book and I can honestly say from experience http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/Zambia/Livingstone/blog-324604.html Even though Irsquod already had a spring break at Albion when my family and I visited my cousins in Washington D.C and North Carolina my spring break in South Africa started with a 6 am flight from Cape Town to Johannesburg. The name lsquoJohannesburgrsquo has a negative connotation in many Americansrsquo minds due to the xenophobic attacks that took place in the city in the spring befor http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/Botswana/North-West/Okavango-Delta/blog-321230.html Albion College is a small liberal arts college in the southwestern part of Michigan hidden away in the rest stop side roads off of I94. Chances are if yoursquore heading west down 94 and yoursquove made it past Ann Arbor yoursquore likely headed for Grand Rapids Kalamazoo or possibly down into Indiana and across to Chicago. Likewise if yoursquore heading east yoursquore most likely http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/South-Africa/Western-Cape/Cape-Town/blog-315528.html So I started into the water. I'm not going to lie to you people I was terrified. As I got past the breakers a sudden calm came over me. I dont know if it was divine intervention or the kinship of all living creatures but I tell you Jerry at that moment...I was a marine biologist The sea was angry that day my friends like an old man trying to send back soup in a deli. I got about fifty feet ou http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/South-Africa/Western-Cape/Gansbaai/blog-313080.html The one lesson you learn quickly while studying abroad that isnrsquot taught in the classroom is patience. In America I took a lot of things for granted internet television Wal Mart Target fast food junk food home cooked foodmdashpretty much everything. Following my first month in South Africa I started to hit a slump where my proverbial batting average of enthusiasm was down. At our s http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/South-Africa/Western-Cape/Cape-Town/blog-310442.html Cape Townrsquos location is a geography teacherrsquos dream below the mountains on a peninsula and located at the intersection of the Atlantic and Indian Oceans. Unfortunately all these geographical features contribute to unpleasant weather in their winter months and this unpleasant weather caused high winds in Shark Alley in Gansbaai the site of my shark dive. The winds were so high tha http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/South-Africa/Western-Cape/Cape-Town/blog-307797.html 2 Way Travel sent us an email saying that they offered a student discount with a local shark diving company for the weekend of July 26 and that sign ups were limited to a first come first serve basis. I signed up right away excited about the possibility of coming face to face with something that could bite my head off. Unless you come into contact with a log splitter on a daily basis this opp http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/South-Africa/Western-Cape/Cape-Town/blog-305018.html Prior to coming to Cape Town I took summer classes at Albion and during our summer classes my friends and I went to Hardeersquos to eat their Monster Thickburger. I had been doing a research paper on the fast food industry and according to a nutritional chart I found the Monster Thickburger is the fattest of all fast food burgers. I joked with my roommate about wanting to eat it and before http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/South-Africa/Western-Cape/Cape-Town/blog-302199.html Fear is derived from uncertainty and there was plenty of uncertainty spinning within my mind as my flight landed in Cape Town. My global cell phone did not work in Amsterdam during my layover so I had sent my dad an SOS email to contact the service provider to see if they could straighten it out. Little did I know that in addition to being down one phone I was also down one credit card. I had http://www.travelblog.org/Africa/South-Africa/Western-Cape/Cape-Town/blog-300550.html