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Published: November 14th 2012
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When I eventually prised myself away from Coffee Bay, I took the shuttle bus back up to Mthatha. There I found a minibus going to Durban. This was the first time in South Africa I had gone back to the traditional African way of finding a minibus, taking my seat and waiting for it to fill up before we got to go. It took about an hour for it to fill up and, perhaps not too surprisingly, I was the only white person on it. It really could have been any country in Africa.
It took about 7 hours to get to Durban after we were delayed a couple of times for over half an hour each time because of some works they were doing on the road. It was 9 o'clock on a Friday night as we reached Durban, when we got pulled over by the traffic police, for what I wasn't sure of. It was a bit concerning being in an unknown part of Durban at that time of night, with all my possessions on my back. One of the policewomen helped me out though and got me in a minibus-taxi that roam around Durban, which was going
in the direction of the hostel I was going to.
This ride wasn't without incident, when the conductor and a passenger got into a debate about whether he had paid or not. This continued on to the street and they exchanged a few punches, before the passenger ran off and the conductor returned the bus and resumed his duties as if nothing had happened.
I had been in contact with Jack from Australia, who I had first met months ago on the boat from Egpyt to Sudan and had travelled with for quite a while. By chance, he was arriving in Durban that day as well. We had a few beers at the hostel and then were taken to a nightclub later on by the barman in the hostel called La Vida. This was a bit of a surreal experience, as nearly everyone in there was white. I think you would see more black people in a nightclub in Dublin!
The previous night felt all the more surreal, when I went for a walk around the city centre the next day. All the white people were conspicuous by their absence. At first, I didn't think much of
Durban, as the area I was staying down near the u-Shaka Marine World, is fairly run down. But as I ventured more and more into the city centre, I began to like Durban a little. It certainly is nothing on Cape Town, but I found it to be an interesting enough place. Unfortunately, it was fairly windy the days I was there, so it was impossible to enjoy the beautiful beaches.
On the Saturday evening I was there, Durban's local rugby team, the Sharks were playing a Currie cup match in town. Myself and Jack decided to go check out the game played at the 'Shark Tank'. It is a fairly impressive stadium, which is right beside the Moses Mahiba stadium, which was built for the World Cup in 2010. Like a lot of South African cities, Durban is left with an outstanding stadium, which is rarely, if ever, filled for sporting occasions. At least in Durban, the stadium is used for bungee jumps and other adventure activities, so isn't a complete waste.
We were late getting to the ground and when we got to the gate without tickets, they let us in for free. We saw the
whole second half, which the Sharks one easily, with 3 tries scored right in front of us. Later, we went to another backpackers' hostel near Florida Road and then to a nightclub called Origins, which was a lot better than the one the previous night.
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