NOTE TO EVERYONE:

Since there have been many times were I don't have access to a computer for weeks at a time, it has put me behind a bit. I am currently transferring from notebook to computer, and trying to finish the pictures as well. I'm sorry for the delay and will try and get up to date ASAP.
thanks, ALEXIS

DAY 159

I wake up to the knock of room service at my door with breakfast. After eating breakfast I leisurely get dressed and pack up anything I took out. I go check my mail and such trying to pass time till the van from Earthwatch comes. A little while later the van comes, I pay the porter and then get onto the van. Here the rest of the group is already in the van since one person came from another hotel and the rest flew in today. Before starting our journey, we stop at a gas station so we could fill up the van for out trip. Of course since it was going to be a long one, we also got some drinks and some snacks too. 4 1/2 hours later we stop at the gate to the property were I think to my self "Oh thank G-D, we're finally here." Well that shows you how much I knew, LOL :) By now it had already gotten dark and we still had a 20min drive after entering the gate to actually getting to the buildings. We finally get to the building complex, when I thought that maybe there is no end. We just drive for the rest of eternity, there is no end, it's like the Energizer bunny, we just keep on going, and going, and going... We are all pretty tired when we get there, so we keep the evening simple. Durning dinner we do the whole, "Hi, my name is... I'm from... I do... for work/school, I like..., the reason I'm here is..." stuff like that. After dinner we have the rest of the evening to do what ever we like. Which I spend organizing my stuff so I have easy access to everything, but have most of thestuff still in the stuitcases. I read for a bit, then hit the sacks.

DAY 158

Today is a travel day...... you know what that means. A good laugh, that's what it means, LOL :) Well I'm sorry to say that I will somewhat be disappointing you all today. Only a little blunder happened. The reason for the little drama today is because the flight from Johannesburg, South Africa, to Windhoek, Namibia is only about 2 hours. So there isn't really the time for anything to happen. So I slept in till the last possible moment I could and then got dressed. I waked up the road to the bakery that Marnie and Jeremy kept raving about. After eating brunch I came back and packed up the rest of my stuff, with just zipping up my last bag whn my ride to the airport came up. I drove to the airport with two other people and then went to find which counter was for my flight. So I walk in and look at the screen to se were to go, the only blunder that I had at the airport was that I started going the wrong way down the corridor. I figured out my blunder pretty quickly, and turned around. After checking-in I went to a book store, bought a book and postcards, and stamps. I got throught the check-in and security faster than planned, so I had plenty of time to relax. After writing the postcards I went to the little post box next to the store and mailed them off. Before headed to the gate I stopped to get a hot chocolate and a snack for the flight. I had a smooth and quick flight to Winhoek, Namibia. I arrived at the airport and got my bags that weren't first, but thankfully were in one of the first couple batches, so I didn't have to wait long. Before doing anything I went to the money changing place to change some money. I give the lady both Euros and Rands. She shanges the Euros and then asks me, with complete seriousness, "What do you want me to do with these?" I chuckle and look at her and am like, "what do you mean, what should you should do with them?" Your a money changing place, so I guess the answer would be to CHANGE THE MONEY, lol :) She then tells me that South African Rands are accepted currancy here (Namibia used to be owned by South Africa). She tells me this as if it's like 2 x 2 and I of course should know this little bit of information. Not that she's mocking me or anything, more just straight foreward thought I should know or something. I get into a taxi and tell hime the name of my hotel. We then drive for about an hour or so, but feels more like 2 or 3 hours. The reason for the ride feeling like it took forever, was that we are in the middle of no whaere, so the road is long and straight, with no changing scenery. Oh, the scenery by the way is really pretty. It technically is a desert, but has some desert-y trees, some random bushes, etc... It's pretty baron, but at the same time very majestic and very like the scenery you would see in the Lion King. We arrive at the Windhoek Country Club Resort and a porter comes and gets my bags. I then see that I don't have enough cash on me, so I go inside to the ATM. I get one of my debit cards out and pop it into the machine. I put in the PIN # and then instead of going to the screen asking how much money you want, a messages comes on saying that something isn't working, etc... and that I have to contact a bank branch, so on and so on. I then realize that I put in the debit card that I had to close the account on a week or so ago. See I didn't want to throw it away, but I never got around to putting it in another safe place, that is other than my wallet. I then have to get someone from concierege to call the bank to have someone come and get it. This is because since the card is of a closed account, the ATM ate it, for security reasons I guess. Well I felt bad for the taxi driver and didn't want him to wait any longer, so I had the front desk pay and then have them put it on my bill. Well since nobody from the bank could come until later, the front desk said they would call my room when someone arrived. I then went to my room were there was a fruit basket amenity there, with a little welcome card adressed to me. Now maybe in this hotel the give every guest a personiled card with an amenity, but in my expreience, working in room service in oneof the best hotel on South Beach, even the "not so special fruit basket" is not given out to every guest. After this I went out and spent a couple hours out by the pool reading some more of my book. The pool area was really cool. See the hotel is in sort of a "C" shape and having the middle of it be were the entrance is.Then the open part of the shape is were the golf course starts, and in the middle of the shape is this green lawn with a winding river making a circle in the middle. The land that is in the inside of this river is were the kidney shaped pool is located. In the middle-ish/end of the pool there is this huge hollow rock formation, with a waterfall. The part that I liked was that to get to the "island" you had to walk over the huge rock, that was carved ino a bridge, to cross the river. A couple hours later I went to the front desk to get my card back. By this time it was gettting to be dinner time, so I went back to my room and ordered room service. Since I didn't really need to do anything tomorrow, I stayed up watching TV for a bit.

DAY 157

So I woke up and headed straight over to the computer place to finish my blog. I worked on the computer till a little after lunch time, when Marnie came to pick me up. She waited a little bit since I was almost finished and wanted to have it complete by the time I left South Africa. We then, with also Jeremy and Ayron, went to Rosebank. If you have forgotten about Rosebank, it is the place that I went on my first weekend here with Marnie and the other volunteer to go to that craft market. Anyways we first had to do two errands before anything else. The errands that we had to do was go to the Post Office and send a small package back of stuff that I don't need any more. I then went to the photo store and got my disposable cameras put onto CD's so that I could put them on the computer. Afterwards the four of us went to a restaurant for lunch. I have no idea, but it is all ways fun going to lunch, or any meal for that matter with the Staffords. After lunch, this is what I've been waiting for, we went to the theatre and saw the new James Bond movie :) They then took me back to the place that I was staying at and we said our goodbyes. I spent the rest of the afternoon on the computer tidying up my blog. making sure that everything was in the same font, etc... When the computer store closed for the day, I didn't want to go back to where I wasstaying, since there wasn't really anything for me to do there. So I walked down the street to Hyde Park, had a quick dinner, and then went to a movie. I know, I know you don't have to say anything. Tonights movie was A Good Year, with Russell Crowe. It was actually a good movie. I didn't think it was going to be a bad movie, but it was much better than I was expecting. I then headed back and finished packing, making sure that, except for the things that I would need in the morning that everything else was packed. I then read for a while, until I got to that stage were no matter how hard you try you can't seem to keep your eyes open.

DAY 156

Same as yesterday... worked on the blog till lunch, then went to the restaurant. Though today, instead of a strawberry smoothie, I got the tropical one. The tropical was good, but the strawberry one was even better. Afterwards went back onto the computer and worked somemore. Though I did take a break and check my mail, etc... so my brain could have a break from having to concentrate. The movie tonight was Friends with Money, which was odd, but still a realy good movie. It took a little longer to get to sleep today, but that was because the new JAMES BOND movie comes out tomorrow :) YEAH!!!!

DAY 155

Worked on the blog at the printing place all day again today. Of course stopping for lunch at thatbristo restaurant and having that AMAZING sandwich that I had the other day, YUMMMMM.........I then walked over to Hyde Park, had dinner and saw the Black Dahlia, which was amazing. Iknow that it probably has already come and gone in the US, but if you haven't seen it yet, go see it.

DAY 154

I got to sleep in today, which was very nice. This blessed event was because all I had to do today was catch up on this blog. Now if your wondering why I would have to catch up on the blog, but then you probably can count and realized that I haven't been up todate. This is because I only got access to a computer, let alone the internet about for an hour, once or twice a week. Thisamount of time only gave me time to check my email and other quick things. See even when I'm up to date on my blog, so I'm only having to do one or two days, it takes time time to uploadall the pictures and then actually type everything. Well because of this new no computer, whichcan I just say is just so wierd, I had to keep up on notebook paper. So now that I'm done withmy project the next 4 days will be dedicated to catching up on my blog on the internet. I worked soild today from after breakfast till lunch. I then stopped and went to this bristo-type restaurant that was in the same little business square as the printing place (like KINKO'S)that I was at using the computer. The lunch was so good that I decided that I was going to have lunch there tomorrow. While waiting for lunch I had a water w/ lemon, because if you didn't know lemon is very good for your body and cleaning it out...... and if you don't know me w/o ice as well. I have the biggest pet peeve about ice. This is my hatered towards ice; if you don't have a straw, when you lean back to drink, it clinks next to your mouth and get your upper lip and nose wet, and if you use a straw, by the time that you get close to finishing some, if not all, the ice has meltedand your drink is now watered down. I hate ice so much that I would rather have a room-temperature or warm drink that to have ice. Though that's the nice thing about refridgerators, YOU CAN GET THEM COLD, which then solves the problem. Well now that I've completely gone off topic. I also have a strawberry smoothie and the chicken sandwich with sun-dried tomatoes and pesto, WHICH IS AMAZING! After lunch I go back to work typing awayon the blog. When the store closes at 5pm I walk down the street to Hyde Park, which is a shopping mall , not a park. Anyways, I go to Wooly's (well the real name is Woolworths, but nobody calls it that) and get a light dinner, I'm not that hungry. Afterwards going down to the next floor and go to the cinemas. No don't laugh..... I saw Step Up. Now the only reason why I saw this movie was because it was the only movie that was playing at that time that I hadn't seen yet.Afterwards I walked back to the backpackers place and hung out there, watching TV and reading Holy Cow.

DAY 153

Not much to say about today. I woke up had breakfast and then we all went to go visit Marnie atthe hostpital. We couldn't pick her up since she was staying one more day for the drips. Even though she still wasn't feeling good, at least she was feeling a little better. After the hospitalJeremy took me to the backpakers place for the last 4 nights of my time in South Africa. I will still see them, but they had some family comeing to visit and they had no room for me. Also I needed the internet like all the time to deal with my pictures and Jeremy needed it for work. So it worked out to go to this backpackers place in town.

DAY 152

I slept in again today, starting my day off in more like the late morning/early afternoon. Afterbreakfast I went out by the pool and read some more of Holy Cow. When I had been reading fora while Jeremy and Ayron came out to play some cricket in the yard. But they sort of need at least 3 people. So I joined them, but first had a crash course in Cricket, which I would like tosay is not the easliest thing to learn. We then spent the rest of the afternoon playing cricket.Well a 3 person cricket game, which isn't really a game, more like a practice, but whatever, wehad fun. Later in the day Marnie said she wasn't feeling any better. See after the game we had gone to the pharmacist to get something for what we thought was just a really bad headake. Wellour Cricket was cut a little short than we would have liked because Jeremy took Marnie to the hospital. Well it turned out that it wasn't anything serious, but Marnie was staying overnight at the hospital because she was getting two diffirent drips.

DAY 151

I woke up a bit more on the normal side today, after which I finally had the energy to actually make something for breakfast and not just cereal. I played with the dogs outside till Ayron gotback from his swimming class, then played with him. At 4ish we all headed over to this restaurantcalled DORS to watch the game. This game im refering to was South Africa vs. England in Rugby.Onceagain we started on the drinks to get in the spirit of the evening. While eating dinner and getting a little tipsy we watched South Africa beat England 25-14. Because of the victory we started doing shots, first with a celebratory shot of Springbok (Peppermint Liqueur and Cape Velvet) and then the rest of our shot, well at least mine, I wasn't watching what Marniewas drinking, were Silver Bullet (Green Creme de Menthe and Tequila). We all went home and crashed for the evning.

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DAY 150

Because of yesterday and all I did and then we stayed up even later and just chilled, I didn'twake up till 4pm. I'm not even talking about walking up earlier and then just going back to sleepor something. I'm talking about I was deep REM sleeping till 4pm, now that's what I call tired.When I finally got up everybody had already left, Ayron at school, Jeremy at work and Marnie out doing errans or something. Well I spent the rest of the afternoon out by the pool, lying in the sun, reading Holy Cow. Then as tradition has it, we had Thanksgiving leftovers for dinner.

DAY 149

iiiiiiiitttttttt's TURKEY DAY!!!!!!!!
HAPPY, HAPPY, HAPPY THANKSGIVING EVERYONE!!!!!!

OMG, OMG, OMG, let me just tell you that today was soooooo busy, I don't even know how to tell you; but I'll try, LOL. I woke up and got off to a quick start, then Marnie and I went to the grocery store to get all the food for tonight.Now I realize that with normal people, they get the food before had, sometime in the days before. But no, we had to forget all about the day until the day. Well it did help that I was the only one remembering the day, since I 'm the only onewho celebrates it. At the grocery store Marnie and I go crazy, since being a culinary student, had to make everything byscratch. We get back to the house Marnie wishes me luck, which I need since I have to make a complete Thanksgivingfeast all by myself, all from scratch, without knowing the kitchen, and all in 3 1/2hrs. I was by myself doing all this sinceJeremy was at work, Marnie had to go to a meeting and our two guests weren't coming till later. Oh, did I mention that not only was I making this feast for me, Marnie and her family, but also two other people, one who I had never met.WOW, THANKS MARNIE FOR THE PRESSURE, THAT I DON'T NEED RIGHT NOW, just joking Marnie. I then get my recipes that I printed from my internet recipe box and then went to town on the food. I'm not going to go throught every detail about how everything was done because this is NOT the FOOD NETWORK, (LOL) though thatwould be cool f it was :) When it was getting towards the end and I just had a couple of more things left to do, peoplestarted showing up. We then made a party of it, so while I was in the kitchen finishing up and the table was being festivelyset up, we turned on some music danced around and had lots of fun. Besides the fast that I was in South Africa for the day, I think it will also be memorable, because of how much fun we had.When I had everything done and the only thing we were waiting for was the turkey to finish up, Ayron and I desided to make it more festive. We went into his room andgot out his colored paper. We made a Thanksgiving door sign, and Indian hats for everyone, 6 in all. Then to make it complete, we took out his facepainting crayons and made everyone's Indian look more complete. We then made a buffet of all the food that I had cooked and then sat down. Before eating we all went around the table and said somethng that we were thankful for.The best was when it was Ayron's turn, we asked him what he was thankful for and he then started saying his prayers, which just got everyone in stitches. To make the party even more of a party, we included a couple bottles of brut champagne, don't know what maker, but a least it was brut.while we were eating, they all had me tell them the story of the first Thanksgiving. Personally I think that their first Thanksgiving went really well. Oh, by the way this is everything that I made (remember everything was made from scratch, I even had to use a real pumpkin instead of canned, since they don't have canned pumpkin in South Africa): Herbed Turkey, Herbed Bread Stuffing, Gravy,Candied Sweet Potatoes (with orange, nutmeg, cinnamon, etc... yum,yum), Cranberry Sauce, Steamed Vegetables,Corn on the Cob, Sundried Tomato Rice Pilaf, Mixed Salad, Fruit Salad, Cinnamon Applesauce, Biscuits and then for dessert Pumpkin Pie (served with Vanilla Ice Cream). Oh, by the way that's 13 things in 3 1/2hrs BIATCHS!!!!

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DAY 148

Not much to say about today. I slept in till like 11ish, had a late breakfast and then hung out around the house checking my email, playing with the dogs, giving the cat a head scratch...... and ooooooo, started reading this book my mom sent me, called Holy Cow. It's bout this journalist lady who goes to India and vows never to come back. Then 11 yrs later her life somehow, I 'm not going to say how, takes her back to India. The book is about what happens when she returns. It is a very funny book, and I love the way it's written too. I know have a project for all of you, go to B&N, or your closest bookseller and buy it. The full title is Holy Cow; An Indian Adventure, by: Sarah MacDonald, published by Broadway Books.

DAY 147

A little after breakfast Marnie came over and picked me up and we drove back to her house. Once there I took out everything from my bags and cleaned them. More because somthing sticky had gotten on the bottom of my bag and since I was doing one, why not do the other one as well, right? While cleaning and organinzing and throwing awaypieces of paper, etc... that I didn't need anymore and was just cluttering my bag, did some laundry. Wow, was I inthe need for some clean clothes. It felt good to get everything cleaned and sorted out properly.

DAY 146

I slept in today since all I was going to was a motel not far from Marnie's. After making sure that I had everything, I headed over to the motel and just hung around doing some secretarial work. I would've normally gone to Marnie's but she had gone camping with Jeremy and Ayron and they weren't going to return till tomorrow morning. The only other thing that I did today was I walked to the grocery store to get something to eat. I could have taken a taxi or something, but I needed to waste time, and I also was in the mood for a walk.

DAY 145

Today was an extremly long day not because of what we did but because of the time that we spent in the car. After leaving Guinea Fowl Lodge at 6 something in the morning My guide and I drove the couple hours to our first place of the day - 1 word - ELEPHANTS. I basically spent the morning playing with elephants from baby to adults :) I arrived at the Elephant Sanctuary and joined this family who was also there. The first thing we did was pet and brush the elephants. Afterwards we went to the place in the woods were first we sat down and they told us thingsand had the elephants do tricks, like lying down, trumpeting, shaking their heads, bowing, lifting their feet at different times so it looked like the were dancing a bit, and at the end they even gave each person a kiss on the cheek from Tamba :) That was really cool, even though I had to borrow a WET-ONE from this lady afterwards. Here are some of the things that I learneddurning our little lecture. Unlike Asian elephants, you can't teach African elephants by using a stick but by treat rewarding. Also unlike Asian elephants, if you do use a stick to an African elephant it will just hit you back, and you will not come out a winner in the Smackdown. Asian elephants hide in danger, African elephants run, or if they can't run fast enough turn around and run towards the enemy, I guess in the attempt to run over them. Female elephants are pregnate for 22 months. When walking in a group the hold the elephant in front of them's tail. When they kiss you onccy your cheek it is this sort of sucking of their nose. It sounds gross but he use their nose for more than just the obvious, they also use it for talking, picking up stuff, etc... Thier spine is concave, just like a horse. The African elephant's ear is larger than an Asian, but still doesn't go high that then crown of the head, like an Asian elephant, the African's ear is also shaped like the continent of Africa. Also on the elephants the actual ear hole is infront of the actual ear "flap". The lower jaw bone weighs 41.89lbs, those extremely large tusksthat you see weigh 90 lbs. An elephants tauck length depends on the genes of the parents. Theirdung takes 2yrs to break down. In parts of South Africa, in the tribes, the smoke elephant dungfor medicinal purposes. Elephants don't eat their own dung, but if they have diahrea they eatthe dung of a healthy elephant to get the good bacteria to help them. The 3 elephants that weplayed with were Tamba (5yrs/1,433lb), Mabusa (10yrs/3,306.93lbs), and Cumba (15yrs/6,503.64lbs). After all this and even getting to see an elephants skull, I got to do the coolest thing. I got to go on a 20min ride on Cumba. I t felt just like riding a horse with high withers, bare-back. After this amazing time I sat in the restaurant and had something to drink. Near my table there were these really pretty birds. The nests the bilt were even cooler. The malesmake these nest out of grass, etc... into a ball with the opening at the bottom. This is a security measure, so no predetors can come inside. The even better part, that I think is funny, is that if the female doesn't like the nest then the male has to start all over again. After the elephants wedrove over to Pilanesberg. While on the rode to Pilanesberg we past a lot of Platnium mines, which was cool. Our stop was this huge resort place called Sun City. This place is really it's own city, it has a huge casino, waterpark with a beach that had fake waves, 4 huge hotels, 2 clubs, a 5 screencinema, a huge lake, a HUGE golf course, which Africa's Major played on the course, and even a wildlife park. I was going to play at the waterpark, but it started raining so we looked around and then had lunch there. After lunch we went to Kwena Gardens Crocodile Sanctuary. Where I saw the biggest crocodiles ever in my entire life, including TV. After spending an hour or so there we went on to our last and bestest adventure. We drove to the Pilanesberg National Park. Here I went on a 2hr SAFARI!!!!!!!! While on the safari I found out that elephantseat 24/7 and only stop to drink, they also never sleep. There was also at one point that we had to stop the car since the view was AMAZING!!!! I t looked like it should of come out of The Lion King or something.On the safari we saw: Elephants, Giraffes (and albino one), Zebras, Springboks, Hartebeasts, Gnu (other name; Wildbeasts), Wort Hogs, Ostriches, Male Lion, and tons of birds. By the time we left the park was kind of already closed (oops!) and it was already dark. I then arrived back at Guinea Fowl Lodge and watched the sundaynight movie while I ate dinner.

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DAY 144

Today is my last day at the zoo, so after my normal morning routine, I became the papparazzi. I hadn't brought my camera to the zoo the entire month, well now that I think about it I did a couple times, but I hadn't taken that many pics.So I then went around taking a ton of pictures from around the zoo to the animals to posing with the animals myself. I also got to play some more with Monster, Sabatian, and Kimberley, which turned into a major photo-op. I then had an even longer lunch today, spending more time paying with all the Tea Garden birds. When I got back to Guinea Fowl Lodge I spent the rest of the day packing. Even though I wasn't getting picked up till Monday, I was going outtomorrow at 6:30am and wouldn't be returning till 9ish at night. Which at that time all I would want to do is either read,watch TV, or go to bed.

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DAY 143

This is starting to become a pattern , I got another big project today. Today I gave the Bengal Tigers cage a complete cleaning. Before getting started though I quickly did the tortoises and the iguanas. Then I started on on my project. This time the tigers were still in their sleeping quarters so I didn't have to worry about having to put them away, LOL. I first started by wraking up the stick and large stones. Then I mowed the lawn, and got to use that really cool grass cutter that is two plastic strings that you use to go around trees or rocks. I know it sounds pathetic that I enjoyed it, but I did. Then while all this was going on the pond was being drained. I then got to clean the pond, which actually wasn't that dirty, but you know that if you don't clean it every so often, even if it's clean that it will get really dirty. I enjoyed that because I did this with this other girl that comes to volunteer a couple times a month. So while we were cleaning the pool, ummm.......we sort of started a water fight. This other girl that I was working with today, we bonded instantly, for no other reason than she was also American. Now not trying to be byist or anything but I think the reason why we bonded so quickly, even though she's like 14yrs old, is because we understand eachother. Even though that English is one of the officiallanguages, it's like how British English is not the same as American English. Also there would be times that something would happen and I'd make a refereance to something or make a joke of some sort, most of the time people wouldsort of get it, or not get it at all. This was because I would be refering to things that are in the US and not here so they usually wouldn't get it. But she would get most of them, but I think only because she knew what I was refering to. Alsoit was interesting to talk to her, because the reason why she was here in South Africa was because her mother worked in the American Embassy and they were living here for 2yrs, well they had allready been here since last september, so only one more year. Then she will be moving back to Washington, DC, well that's what she hopes, since her mom could technically go to another country, but she wants to live in the US again. Anyways, now that I've completely gotten offtopic, we then put the hose on and filled up the pond again. but since this pond was MUCH BIGGER than the crocodileor duck pond, it takes a while to fill back up. So since the two tigers were dying to come out, sounding very patheticwith their whinning sounds we looked back up the gate and let them out, to which they were VERY GRATEFUL. WhenI say very grateful, as soon as we opened the door the flung out, like the had been launched, and started playing with the hose and while the hose is flining all around playing with eachother. Well if we weren't already wet, we would have been when we were watching them, because of that damn hose. We then went to lunch and had a very fun time playing with theTea Garden birds. After lunch we both went and skimmed the feathers off the duck pond. This probably took longer thanit should. The reason for this was that the pool skimmer thing was temperarily missing, so we had to use rakes, which are still affective, but do take longer. Then helped out with the feeding and went home and slept past dinne, so as when I woke up my dinner was sitting in the microwave so I could heat it up.

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DAY 142

After the usual feeding Theresa and I went back to work on the bathroom. We started out by putting on the second coat of paint and also a coat of white on the windowsills. Since it was a little windy today the paint to longer to dry. While we were waiting we went out to the hardware store and got these wooden planks, about 3 or 4 inches wide, with this indent thing on the top so it looked pretty and and plain. When we got back to the bathroom we got to exercise our carpentry skills, which actually were pretty good, if I say so myself. We measured and cut and even had to do some geometry, because we were doing that thing were the ends extend out at an angle so that they fit in the corner like a puzzle. With the paint now dry we took the screw driver and put whole in the wall, were we wanted to put the wood planks. This took some time since, except for the one wall that was painted Just in color, the wood was going everywhere that the two colors met. Even in the stalls. After nailing them into the wall, which took some time since some of the places, we couldn't get a the nail in straight into the cement so we kept breaking the nails or the screw on the screw driver that turns everything (sorry I'm not up on my carpentry lingo). We finally got all the wood in place and then before going further sanded it all, especially the corners. For some reason the nails to make it not look so tacky, put some wood filler over the nails, so it just looked liked a long continuous piece of wood. Then to make it even more pretty we put this really nice dark wood stain on the wood. While that was drying we had our lunch break. There were these really nice head shots of like 5 or 6 animals from around the zoo that had these nice, thin, black frames around them. To finish off the bathroom and make it look complete, we took the pictures and hung them on the one color wall. Those pictures really made all the difference. With there still be time left in the day I went to go help Lawrence with his project that he was doing in one of the owl cages. Well everything was doing fine, until we started moving the large branches. That's because one of the big ass branches fell on my head. At first I blacked out for like a millisecond, then all I could see was silver stars. After the stars went away I thought I was OK so I went back to work. But as soon as I took those few steps forward I got this huge pounding headache, so I put my hand up to the spot that hurt. I felt this huge bump about the size of the circumfrance of a golf ball. The big shocker was that when I brought my hand down, it was covered in blood. OK, maybe not covered, butthere still was a lot
and it took a couple tissues to get it to stop. In the end it was OK and I didn't need anything for it, well other than pain killers. I spent the rest of the evening lying in bed watching TV, since I didn't have the energy, or the will for that matter, to do anything else.

DAY 141

Today we actually had really good weather, nice and hot. Today I spent the whole day in the bathrooms, and not for the reason you think. Let me explain, the bathrooms are brick and the cemcent part is painted white, so the bathrooms have a very unfriendly and industrial feel to them. So today Theresa and I worked on the bathroom to make it a little less industrial looking and feeling. We first took everthing off the walls like the toilet paper holders and the towl racks. We then went on sanding the whole place, which actually wasn't that bad. First off it's only a three stall bathroom and second we had found this electric sanding in the tool shed, so it didn't takethat much effort, more the time it took to do everything. Afterthis we had to wash all the walls, the worst part was the windowsills, damn those things were dirty. They looked like they werepainted a light brown/creamy off white color, but really they were painted a snow white color. We then go to do the fun part, after painting the wall, the one that had nothing on it just a painwall this pretty med-dark rose color. We then took this color and painted the rest of the walls, including inside the bathroom stalls, and only the bottom half. While the paint was starting to drywe took some of the color and mixed it with some white, so as to make the same color, but just a couple shades lighter. We then applied this color to the upper half of the walls, and with only a couple little spills, thankfully we still had to put on another coat so it was fine. Since it was so muchspace that had been painted, it took a while for it to dry. One thing that did happen while painting in the stalls, was that we couldn't get the ladder around the toilet, because of space, so it wasn't that stable. In the mist of painting the top corner of the stall, which ment that all my weight was at one end of the ladder, I had a almost fall, but saved myself by putting my hands on the wall. Ofcourse this was the wall that I had just finished painting. Which ment that I got paint all over my self. It definately made for a good laugh. I spent so much time in the shower trying to get the paintoff. By the time I got out I looked like a raisin, LOL. After dinner I watched In Justice, which is like a combo of CSI and Law & Order put together; very good show.

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DAY 140

ok, so the weather is slowly but surely getting warmer and I can go backto wearing flip-flops and only wear a light jacket instead of a heavy down one. well after doing my usual tasks of feedingthe tortoises, crocodiles and iguanas, I went and cleaned the iguanas cage. Suprisingly this wasn'tthat bad because they didn't really make a mess. I basically swept their carpet and then changedthe newspaper at the bottom of the cage. afterwards I was given a task that would take up most of the morning. i had to clean out and organize the walk-in fridge, now your probably thinking UGH! why on earth would she want to do that. Well no matter what you might think this is the type of stuff that I love to do. I had actually asked Renee if there was any work that I could dothat included cleaning and organizing, because I just get a natural high from this like this. SeeI will sometimes clean and organize my room because I'm bored even though my room already looks like a museum. I started by throwing away any bad fruits and vege's and then putting the rest and the baby chicks on the table out side the fridge, only leaving the hanging horse meat in the fridge, since they are quite heavy and all bloody, etc... When I was taking out the watermelons one dropped in the tub of ice cold water under the cooler, and some of the water splashed all over the side of my leg. Between the loud sound of the watermelon dropping and thetemperature of the water I made a blood currdling-like shriek. Of course Lawrence was standingright there ans saw this whole thing happening. Then because it was sooooo funny (this is said in sarcastic voice) it became the funny thing for the rest of the day, LOL. Anyways after cleaningthe fridge out, which took a while since there was some horse blood on the floor that was very stubbern and took forever to get off. I then put the food back in nice organized manner.When everything all organized, I realized that we actually didn't have that much food left, so Iwent and got the list of everything that was supposed to be in there, and then gave Eddie the list to go get the things. With a little over 30min before lunch I spent that time sorting the chicksfor the crocodiles. At lunch today we had quite a laugh. This little Tea Garden bird, Squacky, and appropriately named at that, has this problem of pulling out his feathers. Now when birds do this it is usually because their scared and then they start pulling at their feathers. Well Squacky had just come from an inviornment that must have made hime scared since the only feathers on his body left were on top of his head and his wings. So to help him regrow the feathers on his bodywe put one of those plastic cones around his head, you know the ones you usually see on cats and dogs after they've had an operation or something. This new look of Squacky's was a very pitiful sight, but a very cute pitful sight at that.It definately made for and amusing afternoon. Afterlunch I put the load of fresh produce that Eddie had just came back with, filling up the walk-in to the brink. I then cut up some fruit and when all the produce and meat was cut up and put intothe right bowls; I helped feed the Chacma Baboons, some of the birds, both the Ringtailed and the Ruffed Lemurs and then the Bengal and Siberian Tigers and then gave the biggest ribs I have ever seen to the Lions. When I got back to Guinea Fowl Lodge I took a nap and later watched CSI: Miami and Without A Trace.

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DAY 139

Today after doing my tortise, etc... duties I started on today's project. I did gardening today. See there are spaces in between the animals cage and the fence to keep people a certain distance from the animals. In this space they have little gardens. So my job today was to weed the plant beds. The gardens that alredy had flowers and plants in them I just had to make them look pretty. Then the one's that didn't have anything or the plants couldn't be salvaged was given new flowers and plants to put there. At lunch I played with the Tea Garden birds, what's new, LOL. Then kept on working till 4:30pm where I was dropped off at Guinea Fowl Lodge.

DAY 138

Before I go any further I would like to wish my daddy a very happy birthday, with many hugs and kisses. So before going any further please sing along (you can sing in you head if your to embarrassed)
HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU! HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU!
HAPPY BIRTHDAY DEAR DADDY! HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU!!!
Today I went to MuseuMAfrica, Constitution Hill, and the Apartheid Museum. MuseuMAfrica is a museum about everything and anything to do with Africa. We start at this one exhibit that has a video and then photos of the birth of Johannesburg. From drawings of the first settlements, to a town that looks like it came from an old Western, to a little bit more civilized town and how it all revolved around the market were the cattle were sold. I think that’s funny a whole big town revolved entirely on cattle. Then how it just kept on growing to what it is today. The pictures in the middle were really cool looking and then in the middle of the room where photographs of different places and people taken around Johannesburg and its suburbs, these photographs were amazing, they were so beautiful, had with lots of impact. Then there was also this exhibit on some of the South African tribes. That was really cool since they also have some of the artwork of these tribes. Then the rest of the museum was just other exhibits of different African things, but the aforementioned were my favorite. The next place we went to was Constitution Hill. Here besides the obvious, things like the court house, etc… there is also a prison there, both a women’s and a men’s prison, all here in the middle of the city. Though they aren’t used anymore, they are now open to the public. Now you probably wondering why on earth would someone in their right mind want to go to a prison on their own free will. Well here is your answer: there have been many politically famous people who have made these prisons there home for a while. One of the more famous of the lot was Gandhi. It was really neat I got to be in the same room that Gandhi made his bedroom, were he ate and were he went for his daily dose of fresh air. IT WAS AWESOME! On the was up to see the courthouse, which I was looking forward to seeing, since apparently it has a really pretty interior, but it was closed, we saw something that we were totally not expecting. So my guide and I were walking around the corner and we saw 7 or 8 men all dressed up in very nice suits standing face towards the brick wall and a small group of people taking their picture. You could tell that this was a professional shoot, because of the camera equipment that the photographers had. But there was just one thing that was off; all the men had their pants dropped. So when I tell you that what we saw when coming up to the courthouse, you now see why. My guide said that the picture was probably some sort of modern interpretation or something of what happened to the prisoners. See one of the things that happened in the prison was that everyday the prison guards would have all the prisoners line up against the wall, butt-naked and then one-by-one have each one do something embarassing, well even non-embarrassing things become embarrassing, when your but naked and being humiliated by the prison guards. Well after finishing the visit, we went to our last stop of the day, the Apartheid Museum. Well this one one of the coolest museums ever. After paying we get two cards, my guide, who's black get the card that say European (white), and I being white, get the card that says Non-European (non-white). Our first place we go to there is a security gaurd that looks at our cards and shows us which door to go through. This was done so that you could get a feel of what it felt like haveing to go through seperate doors just because of your skin color. Now even though we had to go through seprate ways through the first exhibit, they were the same things that we saw. We then went up this large ramp with the huge, life-size mirrors, with people on them. These people are people who were around during the Apartheid or ar decendents of people who were alive during the Apartheid. Oh, forgot the first part was inside and the ramp was outside. We then take these spiral stairs down one floor and into the main museum. We walk in and go to our right, well we can't go left because it's blocked off, so our only option is to go right. We entered this small circular room that had about 20-25 posters. Each poster was hanging from the ceiling in an outside circle and then an inside circle. On each poster would be a picture of a white, colored, or black woman on it with a brief story of what she did to help stop the Apartheid where she was. If you hadn't already guessed, all these women were some how in politics, either it be themselves, a spouse or family member, or even a friend. In the next room over, which was much bigger there was a picture gallery of the Apartheid. Through the years, throughout the countyr, and in all different points of view. The part that I thought had the most impact was the different points of views. You would see pictures from the blacks and colored's point of views and the next to it would be the same issue but in the whites point of view. After this we went into this small auditorium and watched a brief movie about the Apartheid. From there we went to the rest of the museum,which is a whindy pathway in and out of different rooms. This part of the museum, had pictures, movies, 3D sculptures, and even real artifacts from the time. The neat part about this was that it was like walking down a timeline. After this experience, there was this one last little room with recent paper clippings, from all different types of newspapers from South Africa. All these paper clippings were from things that happended that has some link to the Aparthei or is Apartheid-like in nature. When I ssaid that these were recent clippings, I wasn't kidding, they were todays papers. At first I saw the date and said, wow look it's the same date as today, November 12 isn't that cool. I then blinked and said "Wait a second, that's also the same year. Holy shit, these are today's papers!" This room led into this small, but very tall room, that had these huge boulder-type rocks and then on the wall had a huge South African flag, and on the opposite side of the room a large glass wall, with some peace poem in frosted letters. After this I was taken back to Guinea Fowl Lodge.

DAY 137

Woke up this morning not wanting to get out of bed as if I had had a very long night out partying or something. Well I finally get out of bed and out the door and arrive at the zoo. After doing my normal first-thing-in-the-morning routine I then helped out whoever needed some extra hands. See today everybody was doing a little spring-cleaning and everybody was very busy, not that they’re not normally, but today everybody was more. My only job today was helping out with the pruning. What I had to do was go to every cage and weed out all the plants that were dead and take the sticks that had fallen from the guys pruning the trees out to the organic recycling, and stuff like that. I played with the Tea Garden birds at lunch and had ½ of one of my sandwiches eaten up by a group effort, by Sam, Rex, Scarlet, and Basil. Later dinner I watched Taking Lives on the TV, you know the one with Angelina Jolie and Ethan Hawke.

DAY 136

I woke up at like 4:45am this morning, not because I wanted to, it was because I had forgotten to close the windows last night. So when I had moved and some of my leg had gotten out from
underneath the covers I got this huge burst of chill. It was this intense, sharp chill that quickly crept up my spine and waking me up completely. Since I still had a while till I actually had to get out of bed I just staid in bed and did that weird half sleep when you wake up a couple minutes before your alarm and you can’t get back to sleep since you know it’s just about to go off and are just waiting for it. It was sooooooo cold today at the zoo. I had on pajama pants underneath sweatpants, then on top had a t-shirt, sweatshirt, and then my Barbour jacket; then lastly on my feet I had on a thick pair of sock while wearing my UGG boots. Now that’s what I call a cold spell. This is supposed to be Africa man, WTF!!!! So today was filled up by gardening. Around all the cages there is a fence that goes around the fence that keeps the animals in, and then in that space between the two fences are small gardens. My job today was to make them pretty. I first had to run around to all of them taking out all the weeds and dead plants. Some of those weeds took a while since they were thick and deeeeep. Then had to nicely take out some of the plants that would be moving into some of the cages. After which I made the space nice and pretty straightening out the rows or planting new plants in the blank spaces. By the time lunch came around I had just finished. So I stopped for lunch and enjoyed the time with Theresa and Cheryl and of course Tea Garden birds. After lunch I finished with the gardens and then went around with the plants that were going to be replanted in the cages, and planted them. I then helped feed some of the animals and went back to Guinea Fowl Lodge.


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DAY 135

Basically did my usual routine, feeding the tortoises, and a couple days ago started feeding the iguanas as well. Plus cleaning the pen that the Black Swans, Sacred Ibis, etc… this included shovelling the mud that had formed at the shallow end of the pond and catching the stuff floating in the water. Thankfully, they had one of those nets that are used on pools, so it wasn’t that difficult to do. I also raked the area, which surprisingly didn’t take that long, well at least not as long as I was expecting to take with the amount of area that I was raking. When finished I went and got some baby chicks to feed to the crocodiles. This is very fun to watch. You throw a chick near them and then with a swift turn of their head and a snap, snap motion the chick is completely gone. One thing that I think is cool is how, up to a certain size of course, they can swallow the entire thing without chewing or anything. The best part of feeding them today was what happened when two of the chicks fell on this one crocodiles head. The first time it landed on his head I don’t think that it realized that the chick was there. Anyways, one of the other crocodiles saw it and in a quick, swift motion turned its head snapped it up and swallowed it. The second time this happened the first crocodile was not going to let this happen again, so as soon as he felt the chick fall on his head he threw his head backwards, so that it would be in the air. Then tipped his head sideways and then waited for the chick to fall, then the “snap,snap” and then went back to as if nothing had just happened and that he had been lounging in the sun the whole time. Of course this whole spectacle was not without all the water thrashing and what not.


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DAY 134

Today was the second of my 2 days off. Even though we only one thing, well actually it was one ting with two main parts. It still took the whole day, and didn’t get back till right before dinner. Today I went to the Cradle of Humankind. This attraction is distributed throughout the province into, I think, 7 parts. We went to the two of the main spots, which were also close to each other. It took about 1½hrs to get there, and we momentarily got lost. Not because my tour guide didn’t know how to get there, but because we had a slight detour, so naturally not being from the area only knew the one route. The first place we went to was this cave called Sterkfontein. This cave is in an area of 290m² were they have found fossils of hominids and other animals that are all around 4million years or younger. The two most famous being Mrs. Ples and Little Foot; the first being 2+ million years old and the oldest recorded fossil being the closest relative to modern human beings, and the second (closer to modern monkeys the humans) being the oldest, 4-3million years old, full skeleton, everything from skull to the tip of the toe bone, nothing missing. Both were found in the Sterkfontein cave. This area is a big Lyme mining area and miners wanting to mine there found the cave in 1860. At random parts of the cave there are holes or openings. This takes millions of years to do, since to make these holes or opening the ground below has to sink, which in turns makes the topsoil sink making these holes or openings. They believe the reason why Little Foot was found all in one piece was he was going through this area and didn’t see the hole and fell in. In turn dying and over time being fossilized by the ground, this is over millions of years, falling on top of him. The first of the two fossils to be found was first, through resent study; they are now thinking that Mrs. Ples is actually a Mr. Ples. She, or he, was found by chance by some of the miners who were working in the cave. Little Foot skull was found in 1936, and not till 1947 was his body found. The cave is 60m down and 500m long, going in a crescent type shape, and is thought to be 22million years old. There are lots of stalagmites and stalactites in the cave. One thing that I think is cool, is one of the rocks down there, in one of the thinner parts, has a hole shaped like a heart. So with the help of a light making a shadow, there is a heart on the wall, naturally :) Right before heading back up to the surface there was this lake, well it was called a lake but it didn’t look any bigger than a pond. The whole look of it could have come straight from the movie The Cave, it even came with a underwater tunnel that led to another “lake,” and had albino shrimp……. Just like in the movie, ummmm… kind of creepy, if you ask me. We then walked up to the surface and walked on this boardwalk back to the parking lot to drive over to the other place that we were going to today. Oh, I forgot to tell you something. As part of the tour, before entering the cave, there was this millennium sundial thing. It works the same way as the time clocks, working with the sun. Besides the time, it also has the month and day. This is how you can tell the time; you find the month and then put the metal stick on the day of the currant month and then the sun does the rest. The really cool thing was that it actually worked. The shadow said it was 11am and it was like a minute or two before. Ok, now back to the tour, so after the cave we drove over to Maropeng, this place is more hands-on museum, and all under ground. The top part, this means not underground, looks like a large grassy mound. The building on the inside though is much more. The ground floor is part of the museum, which then leads down stairs. Then the second and third floors are conference rooms, the fourth floor is a restaurant, and then the roof was made into an observation deck, which can I just say has amazing views, completely breathtaking views. Anyways back to the museum underground. So we walk down this winding ramp, with all these different facts about the human race or something to do with evolution, and how humans share 99% of our DNA and despite our physical and cultural differences we are in fact one species that share the same thoughts and concerns, etc… One thing that I did remember is that there are 6,800 known languages in the world, which is crazy. This ramp takes us to a little boat ride. On the ride we go through the four life-giving elements that combined shape the world. After the boat ride we go to this room were we get an audio-visual of the evolution of the earth and how it started with the gases, etc… turning into Pangaea, turning into what we know today. Then we go into this interactive room where cave formation and evolution as a science are introduced via various hands on interactive displays, audiovisuals and graphic panels. We kept on going and entered the main room where the first thing that we came to was this thing called Pathway to Humanity, where it explored the evolution of humans on visual displays, graphic panels and life-like recreations of species based on the original fossils and environment. Next was “The Sustainability Wall” the wall explores human impact o the environment and how, as the first species to control the environment, we are impacting on the world as we know it. Walking further along the corridor, we arrive at the “What It Means To Be Human” exhibit. This explores the 9 characteristics that make us human, and explored with the modern world and then the gradual build up of human/environmental interaction over time. Last, but certainly not least we arrive at the coolest part of the museum. This room, and we have to go through a metal detector and get out bags checked first, has a large display of fossils. These are original fossils on loan from different scientific and educational institutions that lets us have the privilege of viewing them and learning from them. Afterwards we went up to the restaurant and had a late lunch with the most amazing views. Afterwards, we went up to the aforementioned observation deck. Then drove back, to where were arrived at around 4ish. Spent the rest of the afternoon at Guinea Fowl Lodge.


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DAY 133

HAPPY ELECTION DAY!

Ok, so my day off is usually Sundays, but see since Renee or Flea takes me to the zoo when they don’t go, neither do I. See Renee and Flea’s schedule goes work for 7 days, off for 2 days. Which means every once in a while they both have the same 2 days off. Which means that this week I have today and tomorrow off. Tomorrow I have a full day a head of me, but today I’m just staying at Guinea Fowl Lodge. Because of yesterday I slept in till like 11am or something and then had a nice long hot breakfast, not the usual fast, cereal and juice. I then, being the OCD person I am, cleaned and reorganized the already organized room. Besides that I just hung out around the Lodge. Spent a long time talking to the fam and friends, and took a nap, stuff like that. I also sent in my absentee ballot. Now you might be thinking why would you send in the ballot on Election Day. Well the answer is, the ballots are accepted a couple months before and up till the day, but it has to be postmarked no later than the day of.


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DAY 132

Did another cage change today, this time though a bigger change, 2 different animals. The cage was going from two separate birdcages, to one big cage for the caracals (they’re a type of cat, if your wondering). While some of the guys were knocking down the brick wall separating the two cages, I had the task of taking out all the plants. But I had to be gentle since I would be replanting them later. While the guys finished with the wall I got to design the new cage, well help design. It was fun deciding were there house should be, were the trees and plants, etc… should go, were the big rock should go and where their tire toy should go as well. To no surprise, this took the whole day; actually we didn’t finish till 5pm, and hour later than normal. I had no energy by the time I got back to Guinea Fowl Lodge; I kept almost falling asleep while taking my shower. After getting clean I slept till dinner, woke only for the 45min it took to eat and then went to sleep for the night.


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DAY 131

Today’s Sunday, which means my day off. I spent the day with Marnie helping her out with all her errands. Now this may not seem like a very productive way to spend my day off in a foreign country, but actually it is if you think of it. See now were most people who visit South Africa only get the tourist perspective, I also get the local perspective. See I’m doing normal things that I would be doing in Miami, but with an African flavor. Which just makes it all that much better, there are also some things that you don’t automatically notice. Things like, in the grocery store there are things that you don’t even notice are different but they don’t have in Africa. Like I wanted to get cinnamon applesauce…… well that doesn’t exist in Africa, well at least not in South Africa. Like in the States they have like 10 or so different flavors of applesauce, but here it’s just plain old applesauce, and if you want cinnamon applesauce, like me, you have to add the cinnamon your self.


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DAY 130

Nothing out of the ordinary happened today, except I kept falling asleep, because of all the alcohol that I had last night of course. One thing was nice though, well I don’t know about the actual task, but the fact that I got to sit down for it. For a majority of the morning Lawrence and I had to sort through baby chicks. Now this doesn’t sound bad, and it isn’t that bad, but still isn’t the most exciting thing to do. What we had to do is take the baby chicks from one crate and separate them into two crates, bad and good. Oh, by the way they’re dead if you’re wondering. The gross part was, how we knew if they were bad or not is if they’re green, but you have to check by looking at their butts. So basically I got to stare at baby chicks asses for a couple of hours. Now when I say they are bad they aren’t actually rotten or anything, they just cant be feed to the animals. Except the crocodiles, so the chicks that are labelled “bad” are actually the crocodile’s food. Another thing that happened today was that the crow was much more talkative today then usual. Yes actually the zoo has two crows, one that is a Black Crow (which is the kind we have in the US), and a Pied Crow, which I think is from around here, but I could be wrong. Anyways, the Pied Crow talks more than the Black Crow, though he does his fair chair himself. The Pied Crow says (and this is spelled phonetically) Ah-Wa, which means “ NO!” in one of the South African languages. There are actually 11 official languages of South Africa, the 3 main ones being, English, Afrikaans, and Zulu. Both the crows are actually very good at impersonations. There best one is this one that sounds like a mother telling her child that they have to go and the child starts whining, not wanting to go. The best part is that they can make it sound like the two people are getting farther and farther away, like there leaving the zoo or something. The first couple times I heard this I actually thought it was happening and would look up from what I was doing to look for the mother and the child. They can also talk to you, like real conversations. Apparently crows, like cockatoos and parrots have a brain as advanced as a 4-5 yr old, so if you walk past their cage they will come up to you and say “hello”, if you say hello back, they will say “what you doing,” after you tell them what your doing they say “how are you,” you answer them and then ask them how they are and they will either say “bad” or “good” depending on the day, sometimes they will both say the same thing and sometimes they won’t. But the best part is after they say good or bad, they will then say “thank you,” and if you say thank you after you say good or bad, they say “your welcome.” So they’re actually very polite crows, they will also say “thank you” after you give them something to eat. They hole thing is actually quite amusing.


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DAY 129

Same old, same old. Now it may seem like I’m not enjoying myself or bored or something, but au contraire my dear friend. I’m completely enjoying myself, not bored and having a blast. Its just that I would get very tired and bored if I had to write the same thing over and over again, and I wouldn’t be surprised if you would feel the same way about reading it. There is something that did happen today, after the zoo though…… I’ll start out by saying that Marnie and Jeremy took me out to dinner. We went to this place called Primi Piatti, which is this fun restaurant that has this work men/construction feel to it. Like the waiters and waitresses were these orange work men clothes as their uniforms, and instead of the aprons to hold the checks and pens, etc… they had those work man belts, you know the one that holds the hammers and nails and leveller, etc… then there is the actual interior of the restaurant that has a very industrial feel to it, like with work signs and stuff. Oh, and our menus were put on clipboards and we had to check off what we wanted. After dinner is when the real fun began. Now keep in mind that I’ve already had a couple Sex on the Beaches to start me off with, and I would just like to add that the barman who made them must either have an unsteady hand or just likes to give away to much liquor, because there was a lot more alcohol then in normal Sex on the Beaches. Marnie decided that we needed to do some South African shots, the four different shots that we did were Springbok, which is the mascot of the national South African sport teams (consisting of: Peppermint Liquor and Cape Velvet), the Sowetan Toilet, Soweto is a suburb of Johannesburg, if you get my drift (consisting of: Banana Liquor, Nachtmusic, and Triple-Sec), Liquid Cocaine (consisting of: Jägermeister, Bacardi 151, and Goldschlager Cinnamon Schnapps), and Black Mamba (consisting of: Amaretto, Southern Comfort, and Jack Daniels). We both, Marnie and I, Jeremy can’t drink because of a liver problem so he was the designated driver, had a couple shots of each one, but I then had some more of the Black Mamba……those are amazing. It actually makes me cry, not even one glistening tear. Immediately after taking the shot I start balling like a baby or like after you cut like a million onions, and I got this immediate heat in the back of my through to. Then there is this whole story/dance thing that preludes to drinking the Springbok, that just gets funnier the more drunk you get, both in watch it and doing it. It’s this whole thing with how the Springbok, like an antelope, gets thirsty and goes to get something to drink. Before the story starts you have to put your hands on top of your head so it looks like antlers. So the story goes; The Springbok goes to look for something to drink (put on hand over eyes looking for something movement), gets lost (put hands back on head for antlers and paw ground with one of your feet, b/c your lost, your frustrated), finds something to drink but another Springbok finds it first so you fight over it (you and another person doing this “play” put your heads together pretending to fight like Springboks do, with the antlers), after fight you find another drink so now both of you have a drink, the next step is (still having you hands on top of your head as antlers) take the shot glass in your mouth and then tip you head backwards. Now the first time you feel silly doing this, but when you do this a couple of times (it also helps when you have a couple shots of something stronger too, like in my case Black Mamba) not only does the story get funnier to do, but then you start not being able to keep all of the shot going into your mouth, so some of it dribbles done your face, then you start laughing even more than you already are.


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DAY 128

Went to the zoo today, but alas nothing to report about today’s happenings. Although, I did get to spend more time playing with the Tea Garden birds today. This was because it was raining, and not just lightly either, like cats and dogs. Now the reason why we weren’t working in the rain was not because we are wimps or something. See we do work in the rain, but when it rains in the bucket loads that it was raining today, it is very hard to do anything else. We couldn’t even feed the animals either. This was because even if did decide to feed them they wouldn’t eat it and then the meat would go bad and it would be a big waste. So I did as much work as I could do in the rain, like washing dishes, cleaning the fridge, stuff like that. And then I had like a 3 hours for lunch. To top the day off, if that could happen, there was a school group of children, who were probably in like the 3^rd or 4^th grade. Now I know that large (let me reiterate this, there were 100 kids that came, yes you read right, 100) school groups book ahead, but still you’d think that they would cancel or rebook, with weather like this. But, noooooo…they still had to come. So we had a zoo outside, and a circus inside (were the covered picnic tables are)……what a combination, LOL… oh I forgot to say that there was also lots of loud thunder, and even the occasional lightning.


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DAY 127

Rabbit, Rabbit, Rabbit…….don’t ask…… if you don’t know, don’t ask, you won’t understand. Nothing really to report about today. Did the usual things. Though one cool thing happened, I got to so some gardening next to the Eurasian Lynxes and the Leopard. Well actually the gardening wasn’t the exciting part, it was the fact that they let me pet them. I even gave Shazeem, the Leopard, a belly rub, which was SOOOO COOL!!


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DAY 126

HAPPY HOLLOWEEN
Now I know that Halloween is not a Jewish holiday, but even though it started as a Pagan holiday, turning into a Christian holiday, it had become so commercialized that it really has no religiousness any more. Anyways, I did all my usual stuff, everything the same except for the crocodiles. This is where I felt like I was starring in an episode of the Crocodile Hunter. My actual task was cleaning their little pond that they have, but before doing so, had to put tAhem into their house. This was the part that I felt like I was on the show, trying to get them into the house, since it was a beautiful day they didn’t want to budge, so it was a little bit harder than just nudging them with a broom, like normally. After we got them into their house I first drained the pond after which I took a scratchy broom, you know the one where the bristles are made from plastic. There was this dark green slime that covered every inch of the pond. Since the bottom of this small pond was cement it was actually no that hard. I basically took the broom and scrubbed everywhere, this loosened up the slim. I then took the hose and sprayed over everywhere, so most of the slime went away and all that was left was the slime that was in the cracks. So I then went back with the broom and went to all the areas that still had slime and scrubbed away. I then rinsed the broom off and also the pond, which now looked so much better, being now grey and all. I left the hose running to fill up the pond and then let the crocodiles out, and who were very happy to do so.


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DAY 125

Today I had another big job, thankfully not as bad as the crates but still big. After feeding the tortoises I started on the project. My project today was converting this particular cage from Tea Garden type birds to baby owls. Now this doesn’t seem like it would be that big of a task but it was, more because of the little details and also getting things sometimes meant walking across the entire zoo. This is what I had to do; first I had to look for wire cutters, which took longer than it should of. When I finally found some I went around the whole cage, thankfully not that big of one, and cut the wires holding up the toys, sticks, and logs around the cage. Then I untied the bird feeder, which took a little time since the three knots were tight and they were just above my reach, on a chair. After clearing everything out of the cage I took the toys into the back and the wood to the organic recycling at the far end of the zoo. After which I then raked up the ground and went on a search for nice wooden stumps. I found 4 nice stumps and small logs. I then placed them around the cage with one corner with nothing in it for the carrier that was going to be there for their home. And then found this large red feeder and put some water in it. After lunch and playing with the Tea Garden birds I went to the Cold Room and washed the animals dishes, after which I helped cut up fruit and meat before distributing it throughout the zoo. I got to feed the Spotted Eagle Owls again which was fun. I went back to Guinea Fowl Lodge and did some laundry, and took a nap while my clothes were getting clean.


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DAY 124

Today was my day off, so I didn’t go to the zoo. Instead I met up with Marnie and this other volunteer, Jenny. Voluntours has a handful of projects around South Africa. Jenny was on the project that the volunteers work at this primary school in this rural town a couple hours outside Johannesburg. She had spent the night at Marnie and Jeremy’s house last night, since she was going back to the UK this evening. Well just because she was leaving tonight didn’t mean that she couldn’t do anything in the morning. She wanted to get a couple last minute souvenirs for some family before leaving, so since I didn’t have anything to do today and they were going to go to Sandton City to do this, I went with them. Sandton City is its own city, and actually quite large, but is still considered part of Jo’burg. After parking the car we went to meet Jeremy at work. Well not exactly, Jeremy’s main job is a real estate agent and they were having to some of showing in the Nelson Mandela Square. It was this big tent with pictures and info about every property that they were selling. Plus most of the real estate agents who were selling them were there. So basically it was a slight mad house. While waiting for Marnie to get what ever she needed to get from Jeremy I looked at some of the properties that were up. Since this was the best and one of the most prestigious real estate agents in the country they had some really nice houses, though they still had there fair share of the average houses there were some NIICCCEE… houses. Like there was this one property that was this large house with quite a bit of land, a 6 stall stable an outside ring and a small pasture, and some other small building, and all this for like 6.2 million Rands. But the even cooler thing about it is is because of the exchange rate that price is only a couple thousand above 8 hundred thousand, so basically not even a mil. We then left and went to Rosebank Local Market. Which is located in the 2 story covered garage of some mall. Every Sunday the parking garage becomes a place were local artists, etc… can come and sell their things. Before going to the market we had to stop in the mall and go to the pharmacy, I had gotten some fever blisters on my lips and they were getting bad enough to need real drugs, the ones that you have to go to the pharmacist for. We then headed out to the parking garage and walked around looking at all the different things that people are selling for a couple of hours. They range from beaded artwork, woodwork, jewelry; things made from jade, etc… all that come from indigenous South African tribes. By then it was time for lunch and I was getting kind of hungry. On our way over to the food area part of the market we passed this man who had made guitars out of used oilcans and were now selling them. They sounded exactly like a normal guitar and they were really cool looking. After listening to him for a couple minutes we continued on our way to the food were we stopped one more time before getting there. This was because this one particular stall was selling random memorabilia and they had some US license plates for sale. One of them was a Florida plate so of course I had to take a picture. For lunch I decided I wanted Thai, which was a good choice, one thing that I did really like from my lunch was these fried banana pieces with poppy seeds, that you dipped in a coconut syrup thing. It was sooooooo good. I then got a fresh fruit smoothie from this other stand before we continued on our adventure though the craft market. After spending the whole afternoon at Rosebank we went back to Marnie’s and had dinner there. Before it got to late, Jeremy drove me back to Guinea Fowl Lodge.


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DAY 123

Not much to say today… Did the normal feed the tortoises, clean this or that, feed this animal and that animal, and of course play with the Tea Garden birds during lunch. I also got to check my emails, etc… this afternoon when I got back to Guinea Fowl Lodge. I don’t even remember the last time I hadn’t checked my email like every day. There have been times were I didn’t heck it, but that was because I didn’t feel like checking it, but this was because I didn’t have access to a computer let alone the internet.

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DAY 122

READ BEFORE GOING ANY FURTHER: PLEASE NOTE THAT THE CONTEXT OF TODAYS BLOG IS SAD, EMOTIONAL, AND GRAPHIC. IF YOU HAVE AN EXTREMELY LARGE HEART FOR ANIMALS AND/OR HAVE A WEAK STOMACH PLEASE SCROLL DOWN AND READ THE STARRED SENTENCE AT THE BOTTOM OF TODAYS BLOG. THANKS, ALEXIS

Today was a sad day, it might not come out as if today had an impact on me but it did. Well it started out, as a good day, me finishing the crates, couldn’t put them in the shed till the afternoon, since it was still being built, but still finished the cleaning part of it. Well about an hour before lunch Eddie, he and his wife own the place, told me we were going to get the horsemeat for the animals, since we were running low. Now keep in mind that I realized that they cut up the horses there at the zoo so it could be the freshest possible. But what I was about to experience was something totally different. Eddie and I drive to the vet’s office and drive in the back entrance with the truck and flat bed trailer in tow. When we arrive the vet is still inside so I say hi to some of the horses and give them some love, the vet then comes out with a stable hand and a horse, I turned my back to them and gave my attention to the horse that I was presently petting, when all of a sudden I heard the most loudest and most rattling sound ever. I went momentarily deaf; it was only for a couple of seconds, but still. This was made, if you couldn’t already guess, from a gunshot. Now I know guns are loud and they’re still loud on TV or on the news, but in real life, OH MY G-D, is that fucker loud. After which the second, and thankfully last horse came out and the same thing happened. Now the vet reassured me that these horses needed to be put down and that they wouldn’t kill them if it didn’t absolutely need to be done. I didn’t want to go into detail with him with what was wrong with the horse, because then it would get to personal and I would then burst out crying. So I left it at that, so there would be as much emotional distance between the horses and me as possible. I have this thing that I can’t cry in public, not that I don’t want to, it just doesn’t happen, but as soon as I’m by my self, Niagara Falls comes out. There is though, once in a very rare blue moon that I will cry, but that something has to be something huge. This was one of those times that I cried. Well actually I didn’t, but because I made myself not cry in public, not because it wouldn’t happen naturally, like normally. I then had to help load them onto the flat bed. I would just like to say that a horse’s head is heavy in the first place, but when it’s dead, whew, well that’s just another story…… When we were loading the first horse the second horse’s leg was still flailing and the stomach still going up and down. Now I know for a fact that when any living thing is shot at close range in the brain that they die instantly, with little or no pain. I also know that after that living thing is shot it dies, but the muscles and organs, still work for a couple of moments. Even knowing this you still momentarily forget that and think that they’re still alive and suffering. Another thing that was more just plain gross than sad, was what happened after they died. Everything came out their noses. There was still a lot of blood that came out of the mouth, eyes, and the where the gunshot was, but let me just say the nose is where all the action is. Besides a couple buckets worth of blood, both liquid and more compact, there was also some white thing, well it was mostly red, but that was from all the blood, you could tell that its original color was a light grey/off white color and this was all coming out the nose. One thing that really got me going and that it took more then ever not to cry, was the look in the horse’s eyes. Just staring at you looking so innocent and desperate, so before going any further I had to go to both horses and close there eyes, even though I still knew that they were dead, it defiantly helped. Before loading the first horse the vet did something. The one thing that I did know about the first horse was that he had some injury on top of why he was being put down for. So before loading him onto the flat bed the vet did an autopsy, and since they didn’t need any aesthetics or clean cutting instruments, since the horse was already dead, he did the autopsy right there on the grass in the back of the building. This part I think I was more fascinated then anything else. Not in a morbid way, but in a vet student or something way. So apparently the injury was in the area of where the left shoulder meets beginning of the stomach area. See I don’t know where exactly but that’s where the vet was cutting. Anyways so he cuts through the skin and, what seems like endless, layers of fat and muscles. To where he starts looking at something, but in the process I see the different layers of the muscles and some kind of organ, well I think it was more than one, but still I was looking at the inside of a horse. I mean I’ve seen the inside of a horse before, but in like vet books and some of my riding books, and then maybe on Animal Planet or something, but never in real life, which besides the sad factor of the horse being dead, it was really fascinating and I was all into it, but of course not in a morbid way or anything like that. Anyways back to today, after loading the horses and washing off my arms and legs of blood, etc… Eddie and I headed back to the zoo were there was some of the zoo people waiting for us so that they could cut up the horses and put them into the walk-in fridge. Since I had missed my lunch hour, I spent the next hour on break, but as you might expect didn’t eat my lunch. I spent the time playing with my new friends Sam and Rex, who by the way are cockatoos and are Tea Garden birds. After my lunch break I put the now clean crates into the finished shed, with about 40min left in the day helped with the feeding. I feed some of the vultures the crocodiles and the Spotted Eagle Owls. Those were fun to feed, because they were at the stage in their life were they are learning to fly. So what Laurence and I did (oh before I forget he works here at the zoo) was we stood at the opposite side of the cage were I would hold out my arm and then Laurence would hold a baby chick (and yes, the chicks are dead) near my arm and then start calling the owls over. Then one by one the owls would fly onto my arm get the chick and then fly back to the perch that they were sitting on. After each of them, I think there were 6 or 7, had gotten one chick we scattered some more around the cage and then left. Before leaving for the day I put the crates into the finished shed. I went back to Guinea Fowl Lodge and spent the rest of the day watching TV all curled up in bed. I know this doesn’t sound very productive and not something you would do when visiting a foreign country, but if you read everything above you would know why. I then, with no dinner, went to bed after watching TV and everything was just mushing into one.

******SUMMARY FOR PEOPLE WHO HAD TO SKIP TODAYS BLOG: I FINSHED THE CRATES AND PUT THEM AWAY, 2 HORSES DIED, I HELPED HAND FEED SPOTTED EAGLE OWLS.


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DAY 121

Woke up a little tired today, but nothing a little caffeine couldn’t help. I arrive at the zoo and get put in charge of a lovely task -1 word- crates… Ok, so let me try and explain this. In the back they have a small snake room, a rat room, and a place where there is an area to wash the bird bowls. Then the rest of the area is cages of all different kinds of small birds (the tweet, tweet types), and then there are a couple of other types of animals back there that are only temporarily at the, because there normal cage is getting something done to it, or their mating and so their put in the back so there is no disturbances. The rest of the space it taken up with all the different crates that the animals come in just lying around in no particular order and some still have the straw in it from when the animal was in it. There was this one area that was not being used so they were in the process of putting up metal beams and then putting up metal sheets for the sides, roof, and doors. This was going to be the new home of all crates. So my task was to wash out all the crates and then when the new shed was completed to but them in an orderly fashion between plastic and wooden and large and small into the shed. I did this till leaving at 4pm and still hadn’t finished. This was because even though most of them didn’t really need anything more than a wash down, I would occasionally come across a bad one that would take a while to get clean. Plus on top of that there were an abundance of crates in the first place. At lunch today I met these two other ladies that volunteer at the zoo, but volunteer in another way. See both these ladies had donated one of their birds to the zoo, but still were attached to them and wanted to visit them. So they would both come every day or every other day take the Tea Garden birds out of their cages and onto the different perches in the Tea Garden and play with them. They started coming during the summer, both not knowing the other, but since coming to the zoo and volunteering with the birds had become friends and now came together to play with the birds and even sometimes would buy things like rope or plastic chains, etc… for the birds to play with. Oh by the way their names are Theresa and Cheryl, since I’ll probably be mentioning them many more times throughout my stay here. After lunch I continued with the crates till it was time to go home. I then spent the evening watching some TV, CSI: NY to name one :), and also took a little nap before dinner.

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DAY 120

Now I feel like I’m back at school again, I mean in the way that I’m having to get up at 6am and not only be up but be ready to work. At 7am Renee came to pick me and take me to the zoo. My first job this morning was the tortoises. Apparently I will be taking care of the tortoises for the rest of my time here. I will start with the tortoises then move onto whatever other takes that I need to do for that day. Ok, this is what I do as my tortoise job. I first go to both eating spots and any food that is still there I put in the bucket. I then empty the water bucket and take it over to the hose. I then throw away the food that’s in the bucket and go back to the water buckets and clean them. After filling them back up with water I then go to the cold room (this is, if you couldn’t guess from the name, where the walk-in fridge is) and get the scraps of fruit, left over from cutting up the fruit for other animals food, then distributing it around the two areas were the water dishes are. Then, of course, if I see a tortoise while walking to each area I will stop and give it a couple scraps. Now if your wondering why I would have to find the tortoises, that is because they don’t live in a cage they roam free throughout the zoo. See even though the zoo is still a big size it’s still a small local zoo in the end, which means that there are only so many people that come per day and that it is not as chaotic as a larger, mainstream zoo. Which in the end means that the tortoises can roam free around the zoo. I did some random odd and end jobs around the zoo, you know racking up this, fixing that. Then at 1pm we have our lunch hour. While eating lunch I played with the Tea Garden birds. The Tea Garden birds are the Cockatoos, African Greys, and other small birds that used to be owned by people and lived in homes. These birds where then donated by their owners because of many reasons, but all the reasons boiled down to they couldn’t keep them any more. Be it, the were moving out of the country, they now didn’t have the time to feed or play with them because of work, etc… either way all the Tea Garden birds all came from pet shops at one time or the other. After lunch there is only two more hours in the day before going home. I spent those two lovely hours doing a little weeding in one of the flowerbeds next to the lion’s cage and then cutting up some horsemeat for the carnivorous animals and then helping Renee feed some of the animals.

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DAY 119

I woke up, w/o an alarm clock I might add, and had a nice leisurely breakfast. It was so nice walking up at whatever time I wanted. While I ate breakfast Marnie goes over the orientation papers concerning everything and anything about the project. Afterwards I quickly pack up the couple of things that I had taken out of my bag and then Marnie and I head over to Guinea Fowl Lodge. Guinea Fowl Lodge is the name of the place that I will be staying at for the next month. Now I know the name makes it sound all grandeur and all, but it’s not all that. Ok, now I’m making it sound like it’s a piece of shit. Ok, here it is, there is the main house with sort of a mother-in-law apartment attached to it, (which is where I stayed). Then across the driveway there is one large room, separated into two smaller ones, which is the laundry room and storage. Then if you walk a little away there is another building, which is like two small houses attached to each other. The place runs like a small B&B and usually the guests that come through are business people who are attending a conference or something. You will get the occasional tourist like me, but that’s like once in a blue moon. Anyways, after dropping my stuff in my room Marnie and I head over to the zoo. We arrived at Lory Park Zoo around lunchtime. After meeting Renee, who she and Flea would be the two people looking in on me, I sort of shadowed her for the rest of the day (being all 3hrs of it). Helping do this and that, and feeding some of the animals, etc… At 4:30pm we were done for the day, at which point Renee took me back to Guinea Fowl Lodge. I then spent the rest of the afternoon unpacking and organizing everything till dinner. I ate dinner with the owners of the place Moira and Derek. After which I watched a little TV (cough, cough, CSI: Miami and Without a Trace, cough, cough) and then went to sleep, since I had to wake up at 6am the next morning.

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DAY 118

I had to wake up really early this morning to catch the shuttle bus back to the airport. I went down had some breakfast and then went to the front desk to check out. Another really cool thing that happened, at check out not only was dinner free but also breakfast. So I got to stay in a really nice hotel 100% free, can’t get any better than that :) I then took the shuttle back to the airport, took my bags up stairs to check-in and re-check-in my bags. It was nice; since it was so early in the morning I didn’t have to wait in any lines or anything, just walked right up. With the rest of my plane, I took the airport train to our terminal and then waited at the gate for like 1½ hr. The trip from Madrid to Johannesburg was 10hrs OH MY FUCKING G-D!!! See if it wasn’t for my day yesterday and everything that happened then the 10hrs would be fine. Ok, maybe not fine but still bearable. Unlike now, were all I wanted to do was get to South Africa with no more problems and no more waiting. I am thankful that the person sitting next to me was nice and pleasant to talk to and didn’t have any of those annoying habits that you hope your neighbor won’t have. They showed 3 movies on the fight down and then also had one of those pictures where you can see where the plane is at that moment. The movies that we watched were; The Devil Wears Prada, The Break Up, and some Spanish movie about this woman who becomes blind and how that affects her, her family, and her life, both positively and negatively. I thought 10hrs on a train was bad, it’s even worse on a plane. Because at least on a train the scenery changes. On a plane it’s like… look a cloud… another cloud… another cloud… and… oh look…… another cloud. At a little past 5pm we finally landed in Johannesburg. I get my bags, which are thankfully one of the first, so I don’t have to wait long. I go through customs with no problems and didn’t have to wait long since the only people in line were from my plane and they had 10+ lanes open. I get out into the main part of the arrivals hall and look for Marnie. Marnie is one of the people who own and run Voluntours. See it’s a very small business, nothing like Earthwatch. For example their office was once a spare bedroom in their house. I wait for Marnie for a couple of minutes and then decide to give her a call. They probably don’t know when my new arrival time is, since I had to leave it in the hands of my mother to call or email them the new information and apparently it didn’t get done (no offence Ima, love you still). Well I can’t find any payphones and I’m like how can an airport not have any payphones. I then realize that it is because they have a pay phone store, sort of like the one that I went to in Marrakech. I then was able to call Marnie and tell her that I was here. She told me she was at home and about 30min away. While waiting for Marnie I stay at the phone place and call some people to chat and say hi while I’m waiting. I find Marnie and we walk to her car, which is a lime green Renault. It sounds bad, bat actually it fits the car, it’s like how some colors that look really bad on other cars looks good on the VW Beetle, same idea. Since it’d be to late to bring me to the B&B that I will be staying at while at the zoo, I go home with her and sleep in there guest bedroom. We have a quick dinner and then hit the sacks……

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