Long overdue update

We have been staying quite busy in Pietermaritzburg (PMB) between doing our research and spending time with our wonderful “digs mates” (South African term for “house” mates =). Since we have updated in several weeks we will just give you some highlights:

Visits to Durban: Because we had been isolated from our group for long enough and we had a few things to do in the office we planned a weekend trip back to Durban (1hr away). This weekend included a long walk and short swim on the beach, visiting with our group members, watermelon martinis, and a lovely Italian dinner with our digs mates who brought us back to PMB. The following weekend we returned to Durban with our digs mates to go to Essenwood Market (in a beautiful park with lots of food, art, and live reggae music) and have a smancy meal from a restaurant that had a R150 (gasp!) spending minimum where we had frog legs and quail…yes it was that type of restaurant but it was all actually quite yummy ;)

Movies: We finally had a chance to go to the GATEWAY MALL (previously the largest mall in the SOUTHERN HEMISPHERE) where we saw the incredible movie “Milk”. Becky cried 3 times. We also had the chance to see the French film “Amalie” which was such a wonderfully feel good movie =)

Midland: Just north of PMB is a beautiful mountain region known as the Midlands where our digs mates have taken us many times. We have gone on a waterfall hike, to a brewery, and to several cafes (our favorite is Piggly Wiggly which has a shop where we discovered plastics covered floral couch purses. Yes, we just said that. They really entertained Stephanie).

Wine: Wine is definitely a big thing in South Africa. We went to a wine tasting hosted by a group of young Afikaners where we learned all about the qualities and process of making Cabernet Sauvignon. It was unique and educational experience on several levels.

PMB friends: we have spent a lot of time eating and drinking with two friends of our digs mates, Jaques (an Afikaner IT guy) and El Roy (a Colored/Indian anesthesiologist) both at our house and theirs and out in PMB and in Durban. We also have finally made it to a PMB night spot with our friend Tracey who is a Student Worker at Ujamaa.

Brr!!!: PMB is COLD, especially now that winter is approaching in South Africa! And PMB is much colder than Durban so we’ve enjoyed the warmth of our visits back to the coast….but then again we haven’t missed the nights of sweating in bed…

30 seconds: We’ve played this fun board game a couple times where you have 30 seconds to describe 5 words on a card without saying the words to your teammates and have them guess as many as possible. Once when we were playing with our housemates – one of whom is from Belgium and who does not typically say very much because he is shy about his English (he really doesn’t say much to us Americans which we were afraid was because he simply does not like Americans but is perhaps because our accents are too difficult) but he was amazingly good at this game (apparently the Belgium education system is far superior to the American or South African systems because nothing was out of his range of knowledge) he was so good that when it was our turn at the game and Stephanie was trying to get Becky to guess the rapper “50 cent” by singing his song “candy shop” and Becky simply stared blankly back at Stephanie, he immediately burst out with the answer which amazed the entire group and brought much laughter!