Spring Fest 2010!

Since the very first day we got here, locals have been like, “Oh! Have you heard about the Spring Festival coming up? Its so great you’ll be here for it!” and Im thinking… awesome. Big spring celebration, sounds like a great time to be around town. Apparently it brings in unprecedented levels of tourism to the area and people come from all over Limpopo. Even some people from Jo-burg come! This must be some great event!

At some point I was warned that it probably wasn’t like the fairs I was used to in America. SO okay, I erased the tilt-a-whirl from my imagination, and moved more into the livestock and baking contest kind of fairs. No biggie. I was still assured it would be a good time and it was great I’d get to see it. Even when someone finally admitted that it was just people setting up booths in the town hall, I kept my hopes high. There would be excitement and lots of people. One (of the two) local taverns advertised a Spring Party for a week. I was jazzed.

Well, the Spring Fair has happened! And I hurried down to the town hall see the booths. Okay… the pride and joy of Haenertsburg, nay, Limpopo tourism is… a craft fair. Not a good craft fair. Not even an especially big craft fair. This is more like those weird Christmas craft fairs in the gym they take elementary school kids to so they can buy gifts for their parents (I personally went for soap-on-a-rope shaped like a football for my dad and Christmas earrings for my mom). I’m not kidding. Besides the tables of homemade soap, jam, watercolor landscapes, and the occasional baked good, there was a woman who really believed in the power of pyramids and wanted to share this with anyone who would listen and had adorned her booth with some plywood pyramid frames to show you what she really meant. Another entire table (which I never actually saw manned) was devoted to those metal umbrella things you put over food when you eat outside to keep the flies off; each one painted white with glued on fake flowers. I was disappointed to say the least (although I still attended the spring party along with a couple dozen other tavern regulars). It wasn’t a total loss, however. The highlight of my fair experience was a personal hula hoop lesson from some people who had come to help their mom at the “pay point” and had finagled their hippy way onto the schedule. I was the only person who came, by the way.

South Africa… more like a Dutch retirement community than you might have guessed

Have you been to the Kruger park?

sunrise at the campsite
me and an elephant, aint no thing.

We went to Kruger National Park a week ago. Now you may be picturing me bouncing around in a land rover through fields of zebra and lions, but sadly this is not the case. It’s in fact more like when your family drives around town to look at the Christmas lights. There were 5 of us packed into an Opel. We just drove around through Africa style woods and plains and saw lots of birds. We also saw lots of elephants and zebras and plenty of cool things, but it hardly even felt like we were in the bush.

Except that the first night, when we arrived at our camp site, which btw had been arranged by a tri-city group of Rotarians we were joining, it was dark, and hyenas were already on the prowl around the fence. They just circle all the fenced camping areas waiting for stupid people to throw raw meat and scraps to them. Awesome. After our traditional Braai (ie BBQ) and lots of Afrikaaners shooting the shit, we heard some awful noises coming from the bush and of course ran towards them. A man shown a floodlight on the ruckus just in time to see two hyenas finish ripping an impala apart and begin to devour it. For those who don’t know, hyenas have powerful jaws used to crushing bones, which they then just eat (and thusly pooping bright white). So we watched and listened to the sound of their meal; bones breaking in their mouths. It was amazing.

We heard and saw some really wonderful things that weekend. A civet, really far away sleeping lions, elephants charging the car, baby rhinos (who by the way are once again dwindling due to poaching problems, crocs, hippos discussing who’s river it was, and so on and so forth. You should try it some time (although Ngorogoro in TZ is way better).

DJ fail.

So I had an epic fail as a DJ on Friday night. Truly noteworthy.

Here, your 21st birthday is when you are truly a full blown adult and its a huge deal. So on Friday we ended up going to Luka's 21st. It was down some road so bumpy and terrible we had to park our car by the "tar road" and our friend Danny gave us a ride to the party in his "bucky" (ie truck). When we got to the party everyone we knew from Haenertsburg was there and a bazillion people we didn't even know existed. At one point our waiter from the local restaurant we'd just eaten at showed up. It was that kind of blow out. It was also "Cuban themed," btw, which as far as I can tell just gave people an excuse to wear hats.

Anyways. There was a crazy dance floor that all the young types were stumbling around on, and being my slightly-inebriated self I decided I was done with "African House" music and wanted to change things up. I was shown the iPod by some kid who insisted that he had just chosen an awesome playlist and everyone was gonna love it and I should leave it on. The first song was "Le Freak" and people were jamming, but up next was "Mr. Jones" so I felt free to find something else despite the fellow's warning to the contrary. Being the party genius I am, I found my solution early in Ace of Base. KILLER DANCE PARTY CLASSIC "I saw the sign." Just thinking about those opening few lines of synthesizer gets my singing along juices flowing. I wait until "Le Freak" fades away and press play ready to be cheered for by my adoring new South African (but remember... white) fans.

Dead silence. And confusion. I watched in horror as the gyrating bodies slowed to a halt. African crickets filled the air. No one had ever apparently even heard the song. The guy came rushing over to save the day, confused as to why I would have done such and thing. Ruining everyones good time. Quickly he clicked back to his playlist. "la, la, la, la, la, la, la...." Mr. Jones by the Counting Crows came booming through the speakers, and people... lost... their... shit.... Cheering and singing and drunken jumping up and down. For the counting crows. WHAT THE FUCK. The mother fucking counting crows. Don't get me wrong, I like that song too... but I am still flabbergasted. So I've given up on trying to have any sort of musical exchange with these (white) South Africans.

Hopefully the results will be better with the kids who get to play Djembes and Marimbas and Kalimbas. Some real music can be appreciated.

Out in the world again.

Well after a long stint of time spent lounging around Lawrence, KS I'm crossing oceans again.

I'm currently living in Haenerstburg, South Africa. Stop before you picture me living in a hut and eating bananas off a tree in my backyard. This is more like some tiny town in rural Eastern Europe. I'm surrounded by pine trees, due to the long standing lumber industry here, and white people who speak english. I'll be working with black africans and helping to set up some community centers in areas that are more the dark continent you might normally picture, but I've yet to start on that work (tomorrow, fingers crossed). As for now, the biggest change for me has been remembering to drive on the left side of the road.

Ill write more soon, of course. MWAH!!