Blogs from KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, Africa - page 58

After one night in Durban we arrived via the Baz Bus in St Lucia. Believe us, one night was enough imagine Hell but ten times worse. Our Bus didn't stop at Red lights through fear of getting 'Car-Jacked' or worse and the morning we left somebody got shot in the head at traffic lights and all they stole was his Car. hmmmm......fond memories of Durban all round.........don't go there..........it's Scary!!!! (roll on Jo'Burg!!!!! We pulled up at Bibs Backpackers in St Lucia and were first of all taken on a free ride round the town via an open top truck. The place is beautiful, it really was something out of the Carribean, except for one minor detail. You weren't allowed to walk the streets at night. This is very common in SA but for different reasons, ... read more

Today our adventures included leaving our clothes in the closet of the hotel in Port Shepstone, where we were last night, and having to go back 120 km each way to fetch them - through a gridlocked portion of the N2 that had been diverted due to an accident and was allowed to start up again right after we had to get off . Fortunately, our things were still hanging in the closet! Thank goodness we haven’t been that forgetful very often on this trip. And we stopped at a store, got a few supplies including phone airtime, and came back to have cheese and crackers for dinner. The landscapes have been amazing, beyond description. We decided to get a small but good digital camera, because ours has been broken since we left Bloemfontein. Which means ... read more

Today is my last day in Durban. Ally, Helend and myself booked ourselves in to a pretty gross hostel in the down town part of Durban, so we could walk around the town and be close to the beach. We quickly realised we were in a pretty dodgy part of town when the guy in the hostel told us there were more places we couldn't walk to than those we could! We took a local minibus taxi thing to the Indian market which was only down the road but apparently not safe to walk to... Too be honest I think we'd have been safer walking than taking the taxi!! Got in to this thing which was totally bazzed up, with lowered suspension, stickers all over it to make it cooler than the next minbus and inside ... read more

Hey y'all - So I've entered two new worlds in one week. I'm not sure which is more foreign - blogging or MBizana, South Africa. They don't even have a drop down box for Mbizana on this freaking travel blog web site. A little background on the project and then some extremely intellectual observations about my experiences so far. I'm here six months on a UNDP (United Nations Development Programme) project. The UNDP's goal is to support infrastructure development (e.g. running water, power, sanitation) to help alleviate poverty. UNDP is focusing on two municipalities in South Africa because these areas are in very, very bad shape. The numbers (which we have been reviewing closely the last week or so) are pretty ridiculous - unemployment 75%, HIV/AIDS unknown, but at least 30%, illiteracy 50% and bucket sanitation ... read more

Its been quite a crazy and busy past month or so, so I apologize that I haven’t updated this in a while, but frankly, I had better things to be doing! Mid-June kicked it all off, with my parents and sister arriving and meeting me at the Durban airport. It was so awesome to see them, and such a mind trip as well, having part of my life in the states visiting me over here. It was also my first time as tour guide of durban, for which I was terribly underqualified, but luckily my parents couldn’t really tell that I was leading them in circles half the time. Experience is quite the teacher however, and I’ve now mastered the streets of Durban like no other. (Yet another in the inexhaustable list of reasons why the ... read more