It’s been about a week since I’ve been in Durban by now, and the adjustment period has been fairly smooth overall. I have realized how much I take MSU’s electronic registration process for granted, as I have been running all around the UKZN campus for the past 2 to 3 days obtaining signatures for classes that will hopefully all work out. In fact, technology in general has become such a common thing in the states, or at least where I am, that it’s difficult getting used to not having it.

Over the weekend, I went down to the beach front in Durban for a quick visit on Friday, and then the entire group was driven out to a very nice beach in a place called Umhlanga on Saturday. It is visually obvious that there is a lot more wealth in this area, but while lying on the beach (I was to chicken to get in the water, plus I preferred to not lose my bathing suit to the very powerful waves) I noticed that there was nearly equal proportions of Whites, Blacks, and Indians there that day, which I thought to be interesting. In most other places that I’ve seen thus far, races are distinctly separated, and a lot of that has to do with economic class standing, so it was something noticeable to me to see everyone together in one common location.

While at the beach, I had a conversation with one of the students who is on our trip, but he is studying at the Pietermaritzburg campus, about an hour west of Durban. He is a studio art student, and much older than the majority of our group, probably in his late twenties. He is from a university in Montana and has lived a very interesting life up to this point, but his philosophies towards his time here, or even just his life and future in general, were intriguing. I would be stupid to not follow up and plan a few small trips with him. Not only is it beneficial to have a male accompany you in this country (unfortunately, and something that is difficult for me to deal with because I pride myself on being fearless and independent), but I think that I would enjoy his company, as well as one or two other people that I’m living with right now, on a weekend trip somewhere.

After the beach, we drove back into town and went to dinner, all paid for by MSU via John, which was nice. We ate at this casino complex that has a lot of restaurants, as well as a casino. It was decent, a buffet style venue that played Justin Timberlake’s newest CD on repeat the entire evening, and had a fair amount of local food and curries to eat.

On Sunday, my flat mate Dani and I took a walk around our neighborhood. We walked down the street we are living on, Manning, to the Musgrave shopping center, which is basically like a mall right in the middle of a neighborhood, but with every possible shop you could ever need. There is a fairly inexpensive internet shop there which will be my backup when I can’t get free, albeit archaically slow, internet on campus. Then, we continued down a street called Musgrave, which curves through wealthy neighborhoods overlooking the city skyline and harbor, with estates sitting on hills behind tall brick walls and wooden garage doors. While I know that this is not really an accurate portrayal of the country, it is a reminder of its history and I do find the architecture and scenery beautiful. While we have architectural gems in the states, there is something drastically different here. Perhaps it is just the tropical feel, or the rolling hills, but I have to believe it is also to do with the immense feeling that this place is the collision of drastically different cultures. Anyway, we eventually got to a coffee shop, and to Dani’s disappointment, it did not have wireless, but we still took a break and had something to drink. We did find another coffee shop across the street, but as it was closed, we couldn’t check on the wireless status. We then began to head home, were we walked along a road that borders the Botanical Gardens, but we didn’t go inside.

My goal for tomorrow is to walk back to the Gardens, as it is only about a 25 minute walk away, and explore that place, maybe do some reading that I have been neglecting and get some tea. Plus, I NEED to start taking pictures before I get yelled at by people for not doing so. I’ve really only taken about ten photos in all, partially because I don’t feel the rush to capture everything in a picture since I have four and a half months left. Plus, there is no better indicator that you are a tourist when you take pictures of an ordinary neighborhood to those who live here.

I’m going to try to use this to update people on what I’m up to instead of sending out emails, hopefully with picture accompaniment…but no promises. That might take a hour to accomplish on the computers on Howard Campus!

So leave me comments and I will try getting back to you, or if you want, you know my email and I can answer any personal questions, such as how to take a shower with a hand held “garden hose” that only has two settings: cold or burning hot, but the hot is out of commission recently because the overhead water heater (the “geezer”) has decided not to work properly, but rather overflow at random times, flooding the bathroom. (A little frustration about that…)

But after all, it is Africa.

emily

p.s. I promise pictures within the week