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Published: February 1st 2008
Sad Face/Suitcase
This is Rebecca making a sad face and pointing at the source of her sadness: my suitcase.greetings from south Africa!
Sawubona!
I have been in South Africa for just about three days now- I have decided, after going back through my posts from last time, that instead of using this blog as a travel ‘diary’, I will use it only to document the things worth telling. This means if nothing funny, strange, wild, amazing, crazy, weird, sad, or extreme happened, I won’t tell more than a sentence about it- only things that can be told in ‘story format’. This is more exciting to write and read. Also, when I am 80 (or 40) and can no longer remember this trip on my own, I will look back and only remember the exciting things that happened and I will believe that I had the most amazing life when I was a youngen.
Car/Plane Jump
You can see from my plane window the car that is pulled up with the jumper cables attached the battery and running towards the underside of the plane... My plane ride there was long with not too much excitement really until I got to South Africa- my first flight was Newark to DC, my next was a straight shop from DC to Johannesburg, SA. This was 14.5 hours long, some crappy food mixed with sandwiches that my mom packed (thanks mom!), and some movies that were constantly pausing and skipping.
To go from Johannesburg (or Jo’burg as the locals call it) to Pietermaritzberg (PMB, where my campus is) we took the smallest plane I have ever seen- no exaggeration. If I saw it from one hundred feet away, I would have thought it was a toy. It had old-school propellers that made it look like it belonged in the Smithsonian Museum. All 40-odd passengers piled, complete with one loud drunk moron, and prepared nervously for takeoff. I joke but the flight was run by South Africa airlines which is a completely trustworthy company and there were several of these on the runway- all used for small, express flights. We waited for a bit longer than seemed usual and started to get curious. At this point, two highly ridiculous things happened. A car pulled up to the
Don't Vote
This is a stencil that I found on the inside wall of the political science building on campus. side of the plane, very very close underneath the body of it, near the wing. The car hood was popped upon and jumper cables were taken out. The cables were attached to the car battery and the other side went beyond my window- in the direction of the underside of the plane. While this was happening, a tank of something was pulled up on a cart towards the nose of the plane. After a few minutes, the captain began speaking, apologizing for the delay and explaining that “they were having trouble getting one of the trailers or works, but they were able to McGuiver something…” (direct quote). The car was there for a while, it was difficult to tell what was happening, eventually the car left along with the tank. The captain said nothing about the car and whether the plane was jumping the car or the other way around.
During the flight, the drunk passenger became angry with the only flight stuartess because she informed him that South Africa had recently (6 months ago) passed a law making it illegal to serve alcohol on domestic flights. She informed the captain and he announced over the loudspeaker that if
Black Power
I found this message written in the concrete on campus. he didn’t quiet down he would ‘turn this plane around and go back to Jo’burg”. The passenger calmed down.
We were met at the airport by Jenny Kawata, who works with Rutgers study abroad and is visiting the program for the first week, and Bill Guest, who coordinated with the US international students. They brought us to the hotel that we were staying at for the first night because we were arriving one day too early to move in. The hotel was a fancy hotel and casino- the rooms were big, fancy looking, and conspicuously dark in the rooms. Upon investigating, we (myself and Corey, the other Rutgers student on the trip- who I shared a room with) found that out of the 4 lamps in the room, only one had a light bulb and that bulb went out after 45 seconds. We didn’t really care, grabbed food downstairs, and went to sleep.
Wed, January 30>
The next day we went to get our housing information- after a long process- which was made longer by the fact that they had apparently lost the keys to the gate to one of the entrances to my dorm area- I
Night out
This is the first night that we went out- for a friends birthday and just for fun. We went to the local bar, called 'Get Lost'. got the swipe card and key to my room. The swipe card is necessary because security is very tight and I need to swipe once to get into the campus area and another time to get into my residence area- then a key to get into my room (there is no key to get into my building, the front door is open 24 hours, it literally doesn’t close- does that sound weird to anyone else?). The room is nice- it is a single, very simple but very sufficient. There is a bathroom close by, a shower down one level, and kitchen across the hall from me. The kitchen is shared by about 11 people in my section of the building.
Video tour here:
From there I joined orientation which was gears towards freshman, which meant it was a little childish but very well intentioned and the mentors (the upperclass who ran the events) were really friends, everyone asking our names, where we were from, and if we know Michael Jorden (well, duh, doesn’t everyone from America?). At one point I told someone I was from America and he said “Oh! House of 50?!” and I said “what?”
First Breakfast
This is me cooking my first breakfast with my new frying pan and other utensils and food- I made an omelet, it was fantastic. and he said “You know, the House of Fifty Cent!” .
It was extremely hot, and beatufiuly outside. Lots of grassy areas and so many amazing plants and flowers that I’ve never seen before. The campus is pretty small (though there are other parts that I still have not explored)- with many buildings close together and very few roads inside the gates. The university itself is actually very big- this is one of four campuses and the part of campus that I am describing is only a section of the whole thing, but still- it is the main part with the important buildings and it has a very comfortable feel. Of course, even as I write this, only incoming freshman and ‘mentors’ have moved in so far, so that may change in the next week.
Two of the student mentors took us American international students (which included the 6 of us from New Jersey and about 30 Californians-
) to the mall that is in town- we take a Kombi (which is like a Sherut, if you have ever been to Israel- its like a group taxi, you can hop on or off at your own will and usually pay a flat fee- the right was about 20 minutes and cost 8 Rand, which is about $1 (7 Rand : 1 USD). At the mall, I became friends with the Californians, who were all really awesome people (one girl has spent the last semester in Ghana and backpacked around in between semesters!!). At the mall I got a cell phone and a few other essentials, including sorbet that was ‘African Berry’ flavored- it was delicious.
For anyone who is interested, my cell phone is free incoming for me, which means I’d love to hear it ring but it will be expensive for you (though my mom got a pretty cheap phone card and I can pass along the info if anyone is serious about calling). If you are, let me know and I’ll give you the number- I don’t want to post it up on the web (dad- are you still getting spammed on your cell phone? that’s why I won’t post it up here).
That night all of the Rutgers students (only 6 of us in total) went out to dinner with Jenny, Bill, and Bill’s wife and daughter- paid for by our Rutgers ‘excursion’ fund- which is money that was part of our tuition- the other excursion will include a tour of entire Pietermaritzberg area, a trip to a traditional Zulu town, and a trip to a game reserve nearby (which all makes the dinner seem less cool- but a free meal is always appreciated). The other Rutgers students are all really nice- I hadn’t known any of them before this trip, other than meeting at a study abroad orientation.
After dinner I was walking back to my room, unsure of what to do at night other than go back to room and I ran into a few of the Californians who were standing around with a South African student, we stood and talked for a while about random things and decided to go into the residence lounge (they don’t say dorm here) and we played table tennis (ping-pong) and snookers (which may or may not be the same thing as pool- but we played pool and the sign in the room said snookers). We were later joined by a bunch more African students, I made a few friends (I was unable to remember any names except one of them, African names are hard enough to pronounce correctly, much less remember) and taught someone to play table tennis.
Thursday, January 31>
I took my time waking, experimented with the shower here (the temperature and pressure is good but there is no shower curtain and water goes everywhere…). I walked to the local shopping area (literally a three minute walk from the campus gates), grabbed some breakfast, and decided to do a preliminary shopping- I bought basic utensils and supplies/food for cooking eggs and making sandwiches, I had to carry everything back to my room in my hands so I stopped there and decided I’d do more shopping later. The kitchen is not stocked with anything at all and every person must bring his own utensils and buy his own food, etc. I have heard food has been known to disappear from the fridge, but each student gets his own cabinet with a place for a lock on it for everything else. (sorry nothing extreme happened on this shopping trip).
I went straight away to a meeting just for orienting International students- which means those of us from the US, a few from Europe, and a bunch from surrounding countries in Africa- Namibia, Congo, Malawi, Zimbabwe etc. I met a girl from Malawi who spoke six languages, and she said that I was able to pronounce her name very well- I do not remember it anymore though. Finally we got a lot of very useful information about signing up for classes (which is a more confusing process than any of you will care to hear about- but its all done on paper and with more bureaucracy than it took to start war in Iraq). I will get to do that tomorrow morning. We also heard stories from other international students, which was interesting and got sandwiches for lunch. yum. After some more welcome-to-university stuff (which was important to us but won’t be to you), I went with Sharifa, one of the other Rutgers students, to the Political Science department to see if there were spots left in this class that was very limited- it was a community service related class that we were supposedly signed up for already. We got and the woman working there told us that that class is not actually being offered this semester. That’s weird, it was Bill who told us to get see about getting into it.
From there we went to the international student support office to ask about Fine arts classes, because they were not listed in this semester’s course list- she directly me to go to the Fine arts administrator to find out what was the deal, I went with this girl Becca from cali, who was also looking to take the courses. This woman was very helpful and set down to explain that classes WERE being offered (wheh, that was a close one) but that the arts classes are on an entirely different schedule than the rest of the university (of course, it wouldn’t be easy). The studio courses are very intensive- one course, for example, is shown on the schedule to last all day (morning to night, with lunch break) for two days in a row. She explained that if we have another class during it, we can leave and come back, as long as we don’t have too many interfering classes- if we do, then we will have to drop the class. She also went down the list of classes offered this semester in fine arts and changed the availability for almost every single class- meaning that the information we had been given was ALL incorrect/out of date.After a very long inquiery session, we settled on which classes worked best for us, I plan to take a Ceramics student course and an Art history class on postmodernism. My other two classes will be Zulu for Non-native speakers and African Thought (philosophy). This is all subject to change. It seems to be that, in Africa, everything is subject to change completely without much notice.
After walking around the campus for a bit, Becca and I parted ways, and I headed off to Res hall meeting. My res hall is known as WOB- (which stands for William O. Brian… or O’Brian. I’m really not sure. But everyone calls it Wob). We were told the rules, which were more strict than I expected, and given a tour of the area. They had to explain how to use a microwave because some of freshman come from areas were microwaves, washing machines, and dryers are not common and might have been afraid to ask.
I went to dinner with the California guys who are living in my Res area (WOB is a complex of about 6 buildings, not just one. Each building has a letter (mine is A) and each building is divided in parts, which are also given a letter (mine is D) and each part has about eleven rooms, which are numbered (mine is 9). I live in WOB AD 9. Crazy.
Which reminds me- if anyone wants to send me mail, it should be sent to the international office- because they told us not to trust sending it to the res areas, it might not get to me that way. Send it to:
Mark Pruce
c/o The International Office
University of KwaZulu-Natal
Private Bag X01
Scottsville, Pietermaritzburg, 3209
South Africa
If you have any room left on the postcard, you can right be a message too. I don’t actually know about letters but I have heard that packages can take a long time and are expensive, just a heads up. I didn’t mind putting my address online because any spammer willing to send mail to South Africa deserves to get his advertisements out.
Non-timeline things worth mentioning:
So far, language has not been much of a problem- the classes here are in English so everyone must speak it to attend and most people speak it with little difficulty, though I heard some freshman are shaky with it at first. Just about every person speaks at least 2 languages- some many more. Most white people speak also Afrikaans and most black people speak Zulu, and often other languages as well. Just as was the case in India, the English is not American English- it is much closer to British English- which is sometimes tricky to pick up when spoken very quickly- it seems even harder for South Africans to understand American English though and many Americans are constantly being asked to repeat themselves. I think one think that I learned from Asia is how to make myself understood- which comes a little bit from altering my word choice and sentence structure, but more from speaking with a slightly South African accent- most Americans don’t even pick it up, but South Africans understand me better. One guy said that I had a different accent than the Californians and he could understand me better, but I’m pretty sure it wasn’t the Jersey accent that he was talking about.
That is it for me, its 11:35 pm (4:35 your time, except for you shira- we are on the same time zone!) but I have to get up early tomorrow to register for classes.
Hope you enjoyed- more pictures next time for sure!
~mark
(comments can be left on here, but if you want to email me directly use my email- which is my first initial + last name + at + g mail + dot + com (I really really don't want spam).
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Update! I got the photos and video to work!
In between when I wrote the post and now a few things have happened, not much worth long stories though.
Choosing classes was a very very insane process and is nowhere near complete- it involved waiting for hours and still not getting any classes. In the end, they told us all (int'l students) to just choose one or two classes so that we can officially be registered and then figure out the rest later. I got two classes, one of which I'm going to be dropping anyway.
I went out with a bunch of the Californians for a friends birthday- we went to the local bar called Get Lost and had a good time- I think we may have been a bit rowdy for their usual crowd but nothing they couldn't handle (and nothing compared to the guy in the bathroom that was surrounded by three security guards and taken out).
And this morning I woke up and made breakfast for the first time- my first official meal in the kitchen here- I made eggs and was pretty successful. See the pictures for those details.
More soon!
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Andy
non-member comment
Dear Mark, New Jersey is not too exciting. Can I come stay on your floor? Andy