The Tour Is Over, Say Goodbye...

I seem to be really good at leaving people hanging! Haha. I completely forgot that the last thing I wrote on this blog was that I was going to East Africa, leaving everyone on baited breath, only to never update on whether I made it out alive! Well I did manage to make it out alive...barely. Haha.

Rather than try to summarize a month's worth of travels through Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda and Zanzibar, I have instead posted several of the emails that I sent my family while I was away. So unfortunately there is nothing new to read for any of my relatives browsing this blog, but for the rest of you, I assure you that it's worth reading those entries if you have the time. I have titled them by the date that I sent them to my family, so it will be just like I am still there. But I'm not still there by the way, I am happily back in Canada, where I have been for the past couple of weeks, trying to finish my thesis by my publishing deadline. Life isn't quite as exciting bumming around in track pants in my parents' basement while I stare helplessly at a blank computer screen, but I have awesome pictures to relive the best moments of my trip. Speaking of pictures, I have made a few albums with the best pics from the 2,000 or so that Maggie and I took. Here are the links to those albums for anyone who is interested:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2306647&l=04173&id=58000997

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2306697&l=bd8ef&id=58000997

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2306705&l=50aac&id=58000997

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2306715&l=8333d&id=58000997

The craziest thing I have ahead of me right now is trying to figure out how to re-integrate back into Canadian life. I know that I am a very different person than when I left on my South African adventure a year and a half ago, but figuring out in what ways I am different is difficult. At a time when it seems like all my friends are getting married and having babies, or at least starting out in their lifelong careers, I feel like I've stepped through a time warp while I was gone. What do I think I should be doing with my life at 24?? Will I continue being a world adventurer who lives by the seat of my pants and doesn't have a 5 day plan, let alone a 5 year plan? Or will I hunker down for awhile here in Canada - maybe get a "normal" job. Stay tuned! Haha. I will say however, that "settle" is not in my vocabulary...neither is "normal" really. Haha. When people asked me what I do for a living when we were travelling, I finally got sick of trying to explain what my degree is and what career options I was considering and I began to just respond with: "my career is living". So that's what I'm going to do!

APRIL 28, 2008 (We're Not Leaving Yet)

So we were supposed to be on a flight back to South Africa last Friday, but we kind of decided that we love Zanzibar too much and wanted to spend more time here, so we managed to get our flight changed to this morning. Hopefully that will be our last flight change, although people are trying to get us to take on a managerial position at one of the resorts around here! Haha. We are having such an amazing time here, weather has been pretty great and our friends from the safari (Nina and Adam) met us here and so the four of us have been spending time together. Thursday, we went snorkelling at some amazing reefs. Had another water-related scare however...we were in a pretty beat up wooden boat with some Rastafarians who were pretty high. Not that big of a problem, however, as we were coming back from the reefs, we sailed right into a huge storm and had to trust a bunch of half-baked dudes to get us and our boat (which was leaking) back safely. They threw a huge tarp over our heads and we just stayed underneath it, more to avoid seeing what was happening than to keep dry! Other than that we've just been relaxing and partying. We did have some major excitement the other day though...we found a German guy on the side of the road who had been riding his bike, when he was hit with a plank of wood by a 14 year old kid and knocked off his bike unconscious. The kid then stole his bag, including his passport, money and camera, while he lay there bleeding and unconscious. We took him to the police station and to the village doctor, as well as called our friend Nina, who is a plastic surgeon, to come and help take care of him. If we hadn't have found him, he may have died, so we were pretty blown away by how you can just be meant to be in a certain place at a certain time.
Last night we celebrated the final night of our trip together with our friends, Nina and Adam. Adam went and bought some tuna and 4 octopi from local fisherman, fresh out of the water. We took them to a random little shack on the beach, where we paid some locals to cook it all up for us. We just sat at a little wooden table right on the beach, watching the sun go down as we drank wine right from the bottle (or box) and gnoshed on the most amazing seafood dinner, cooked in a coconut sauce. We then spent the rest of the night singing every single song that we could possibly remember the words to, while the local guys provided backup on their makeshift drums. Definitely an amazing way to say goodbye to an awesome trip and awesome friends!
Now it's back to Cape Town for a week, where we will have to say goodbye to more awesome friends that we have made there, before heading back to Canada via Amsterdam for a day. As amazing as all of this has been, I definitely feel ready to be home again.

APRIL 21, 2008 (Safari and Zanzibar)

Not to rub it in, but I just finished having a one hour full body massage for $8 and then swam in the Indian Ocean as I watched the most amazing sunset... We are in Zanzibar right now and it's absolute heaven. After a mentally trying (although absolutely incredible) couple of weeks, we are happy to be in a place where we can just kick up our feet and relax. I guess I last left off when we were leaving Rwanda. What an interesting experience that was! Although I was super stoked to be saving a few days by flying into Mount Kilimanjaro, I was more than slightly apprehensive about flying on yet another African airline. I was appeased when we purchased our Rwandair tickets in a very pristine looking office and even more impressed when the airport seemed very modern. I was told that we were flying on a 737, so I was also comforted by the fact that the plane was not too small........or so I thought.....I popped my standard lorazepam pill prior to our boarding call and as we walked out to the runway, I reached for the pill bottle to pop a few more when I realized that our plane was no more than a very small prop plane!! This is a nervous flier's worst nightmare! The plane only had about 20 seats and was probably made about 25 years ago! All I can say is that it took a lot of drugs and a lot of mental meditation for me to make it through that flight. When we arrived in the Mt Kilimanjaro region, Maggie and I went for coffee and took interviews for people who would like to offer us safaris. Yes, we took interviews. We literally sat in the coffee shop and one by one, people came in, gave us their sales pitch, we took notes, we thanked them, and then we excused them and welcomed the next company in. After a few hours, we came up with an amazing deal for a 3 day safari in the Serengeti and the Ngorongoro Crater, plus two nights of free accomodation in Arusha thrown in. We set out for the Serengeti with 3 other travellers...a girl from the UK and a couple who was from Canada/Norway. Everyone was really cool, which is very important when you are confined to a small landrover together for 72 hours! The excitement began the first day, as we entered into the Serengeti. No words can describe it. It is hands down the most incredible game drive a person could ever come across. We drove for hours through incredible savannah, with blue skies, lush vegetation and roaming animals as far as the eye can see. We were particularly lucky at this time of year to have caught the very famous wildebeast and zebra migration in action. Many people told us that we might only be lucky enough to catch the tail end, but we managed to see the million or so animals migrating from beginning to end. What a sight! There were wildebeast and zebras lined up for miles and miles...it was straight out of the Lion King! We also saw an abundance of giraffe, hippos, lions, hyenas and various grazing animals. By 6pm we were not permitted to drive anymore and so we stopped to set up our tents at a campsite for the night. We were confined to our tents as of 10pm due to the potential for predators invading our campsite. We thought our guides were kidding when they told us this until we had an encounter with a lion in the wee hours of the morning. The lion was heard breathing loudly and brushing up against the tents! Hyenas raided our garbage not long thereafter! Unfortunately, Maggie was quite ill on that first night, so we ran into a real problem trying to scream and wake up our guide because we were not permitted to leave our tents on our own due to the potential for being attacked by a lion! On the second night, we stayed at the rim of the crater and thought we would have less predator issues to worry about. We learned otherwise however when Maggie and I attempted a trip to the bathroom late at night, only to find ourselves staring face to face with a buffalo only a couple of metres away...note: buffalo are one of the most aggressive animal species in Africa! We had to lock ourselves in the bathroom and make an SOS phone call to our guide to come and scare the buffalo away. Later that night we were confined to our tents yet again as an entire herd of buffalo decided to raid our campsite! Day three was spent in the Ngorongoro Crater. The crater was once a volcano that collapsed and is now an incredibly diverse ecosystem that is home to a lot of wildlife and a lot of tourists! We spent the morning driving around the crater, observing elephants, flamingos, black rhinos, hippos, lions, hyenas, etc. etc. We even got to see lions shagging and an elephant's 5th leg!! Haha. After a fantastic time on safari, Maggie and I set off on yet another crazy bus trip and a boat trip to get ourselves to the island of Zanzibar as quickly as possible! The bus trip wasn't too bad, but the boat trip was horrid since we found ourselves herded below deck with a hundred other travellers, most of whom spent the entire 2 hour trip chucking into plastic bags. Thankfully, Maggie and I were not sick. We spent our first night in Zanzibar in the port city of Stone Town. What an incredible vibe this place has! It's literally the Middle East mixed with Africa. The narrow winding alleyways entice one to just get lost for a few hours, taking in the beautiful old architecture and inhaling the scents of the spice markets. We made friends with a local young man named Omar who showed us around the city and took us to visit his home in a local village. Of course, it was beach and not city that we came to Zanzibar to see and so we were anxious to get on a bus and head to the north end of the island where we currently find ourselves faced with expanses of white sand beaches, booze and good company. We plan to unwind here over the next few days, absorbing our experiences from the last few weeks, before we head back to Cape Town on Friday. Life ain't bad!! Haha.

APRIL 15, 2008 (Rwanda)

It's been awhile since I've updated and a lot has been going on, so I will fill you in on the most important stuff... We spent our last couple of days in Uganda chilling with local friends who we met and getting toured around on the backs of their motorcycles. We literally had our own personal tourguides for free, which was a lot of fun. We then boarded yet another overnight bus and made our way down into Uganda, arriving in Kigali (the capital city) last Saturday morning. Kigali is a lovely city and presents itself as much cleaner and safer than Kampala (in Uganda) did. Of course that cleanliness and safety comes at a cost though, as Rwanda has certainly been a more expensive place to travel! Going back in time for a minute, when we were at the end of our stay in Uganda, I got the joy of testing out developing world health care, falling ill with a kidney and bladder infection that required medical attention and lots of drugs. I do have to say one thing for the health care system there though - they roll out the red carpet for Mzungus (white people) and they are a hell of a lot faster than in Canada...I got a doc visit, blood tests, urine samples, and ultrasound all taken care of in 1 hour, including getting the results and the medicine. And the diagnostics and the medicine only cost $50 to boot! Anyhow, after dealing with these health issues, Maggie and I decided that we needed to upgrade our accomodations in Rwanda to one with our own bathroom and a hot shower. Thus, we have had to pay a bit more money, which is why Rwanda has been more expensive. After all of that, I think my kindeys are doing better, however, the medication gave me side effects which have presented other problems, thus requiring more drugs. In sum, East Africa is kicking my ass! We arrived in Rwanda to the tail end of the national week of mourning for the Rwandan Genocide. I cannot express to you how much of a big deal that is in this country. The mood is very solemn, people look very sad and serious, and everyone is glued to 24/7 radio and television programs covering the Genocide. We had the honour of being able to go to the Genocide Memorial during this week, which made for a particularly sad and eye-opening experience. When we arrived at the Memorial, there was one of numerous week-long burials going on there. The Memorial site has all of the victims who were killed during the genocide buried there and as more remains are found, they get buried with the others during these annual mourning periods. Inside the Memorial we were greeted with great seriousness by a woman who instructed us how to proceed through the exhibitions. As we walked around, viewing the history of Rwanda up to the Genocide, through the Genocide years, we were brought to tears by the graphic images that we saw and facts that we read. All throughout there were also many videos of survivors who are the same age as Maggie and I, telling of how they watched as their siblings and parents were raped, tortured, brutally murdered and thrown down sewage wells and how they are trying to cope today. It is very difficult for me to make sense of what I experienced at the Memorial and to convey it to you, however, I will say that it was a horrid feeling to try to relate to people who were 11 years old and running from bullets and machetes, frequently in the hands of their neighbours and family friends, while I was in the comforts of Canada playing with Barbies and worrying only about which shoes to wear so that I would be cool at school. As we walked through the Memorial, about a hundred people from Rwanda came through as well, crying and often going into fits of sadness. As proud as we were to read about Romeo Dallaire - the UN peacekeeper from Canada who tried to sound the alarm about how extreme the situation in Rwanda was - that pride was overwhelmingly deflated by a feeling of great embarrassment for being part of a humanity that completely and overwhelmingly neglected and turned its back on Rwanda. I can only say that staring into the eyeless skulls that lined one room, I will forever be haunted by the sense that living by the Xhosa word "Ubuntu" (which means: "I am because we are") is the only way forward for humanity to be spared of such wretched crimes against one another. Perhaps the most haunting image of all for both Maggie and I was a room that displayed clothes found on numerous victims - young and old. We shivered when we saw the clothing of a young boy, hung as though it would have looked on his young body, with the words "Ottawa, Canada" written on it. I apologize if this is upsetting to anyone, however, it does not begin to convey even a fraction of the experience and I urge anyone who ever has the chance to please visit this incredibly important Memorial. On a far more pleasant note, Maggie and I departed Kigali on Sunday to head up country to where we would go gorilla trekking. Rwanda tourism still has a long way to go, so getting to the area was a bit interesting...we took a minibus for 2 hours to Ruhingerhi and then another minibus (the kind that is stuffed full of people AND animals) onwards to Kinigi, where we rode on the backs of motorcycles for the last 5km to our guesthouse. Riding on the back of a motorcycle in Africa can be scary enough, yet alone riding on the back sans operational helmets and avec large travel backpacks, day backpacks and sleeping bags on our backs! On Monday morning, we hitched a ride with some very nice women from Canada and the USA to our departure site. There are a few groups of gorillas that people can go and see, so we were divided into small groups with 2 guides each. Our group had 6 people. Each day they only allow about 30 or 40 permits to go and see the gorillas and you are legally restricted to 1 hour of viewing at a maximum closeness of 7 metres, so as not to stress them. Our group fortunately only had to hike for an hour or two through the dense rainforests to find our group of gorillas. We had a bit of difficulty finding them at first because it was raining, so they had moved from the ground up into the trees, but when we did find them, it was absolutely incredible. Because of the density of the forest where we were, we definitely ended up being way closer than 7m from them. In fact, at times we were only a metre away, making for an absolutely surreal encounter. As our guides used their machetes to clear away the dense bamboo and brush, we all excitedly tried to remain quite and still as we observed a number of the gorillas. At one point I got a video of a young gorilla charging at us and coming within only a few feet of us! We were all desperate to see the silverback of the group - the largest silverback in the region. At 260 kg, we thought that he would surely be quite the spectacle. Unfortunately, he refused to come down from his perch up in the trees. Our guides were amazing however...they let us stay with the group way past the legal limit, for about an hour and a half, and by the end, they were so desperate to get us a chance to see the silverback, that they cut back some bamboo and let us climb up into the silverback's perch. What a sight that was! I was the first to climb up the bamboo and stare face to face with a 260kg male gorilla only a couple of metres away! Absolutely incredible experience and at a proximity that most people could only dream of. At one point, as one of the other girls in our group was up the tree with the guides, the sillverback let out a large hollar and began to charge...the poor girl almost fell out of the tree!! Gorilla trekking is incredibly expensive, but definitely one of the most incredible experiences someone could ever have and the money that they charge people is the only way that they can be sure to conserve the endangered species at the site where Diane Fossey spent her life observing the mountain gorillas. Tomorrow morning we are boarding a Rwandair Express flight to Mount Kilimanjaro back in Tanzania, where we hope to do a safari in the Serengeti, before heading onwards to Zanzibar. This will prove to be an absolutely AWESOME flying experience for someone who hates flying as much as I do! At any rate, we are having a great trip and we hope that we continue to have amazing experiences for our last week in East Africa!

APRIL 10, 2008 (A Metal Boat in a Lightning Storm)

It's been a few days now and I am able to sleep through the nightwithout seeing rushing water everytime I close my eyes (just jokingMom)! On Tuesday, Maggie and I spent the day in Kampala, checking outthe city and trying to plan our travels. We went to grab a Coke fromthe food court at a mall there and ended up spending the craziestafternoon in the food court. The man who we bought a Coke from was aCuban dude who is living in Uganda and trying to start his own Cubanrestaurant there. He told Maggie and I that he would give us a freeCuban cocktail. Well one free cocktail led to an entire free tour ofalcoholic Cuba...we sampled the best Daiquiri, Sangria, Pina Colada,Mojito and Pina Colada version 2.0 that I have ever had...followed byshots of whiskey. We were then joined by an Indian man who ran theIndian food stall and he brought us over a free serving of cheese naanbread. It was the weirdest afternoon ever, but we got a ton of freedrinks and food, so who can complain!
Yesterday we drove out to Entebbe to spend the day at Ntamba Island,which is home to Jane Goodall's Ugandan chimpanzee sanctuary. We hadto prove that we have had a million vaccinations and that we do nothave tuberculosis. I had already had a TB test to go to South Africa,but Maggie needed an xray, so we arranged to go to a hospital inEntebbe first thing in the morning. And what a hospital it was...itwas a level "B" hospital, which meant that it was for poor people andlet me just say that thank God there is no such thing as a level "C"hospital. You could not pay me enough money to have any medicalprocedure there. The patients there were the sickest people that Ihave ever seen in real life. It was scary. However, Maggie's xrayonly cost $10, so we can't complain.
We had some issues hiring a boat to take us out to the island, whichis an hour's boat ride out on Lake Victoria. Eventually however, wemanaged to find a couple of guys to take us out in a little metal boatwith a 40hp motor. All was going well as we set out on the lake, butI was slightly nervous about the seemingly ominous-looking sky in thedirection we were headed. As we got farther and farther out, I becamemore concerned, because we were headed for one of thegnarliest-looking storms I have ever seen! Seriously, we tookpictures of it, cuz it just looked insane. As I was nervouslyscanning the sky, I saw a sudden flash of lightning and I nearlyjumped out of my skin. We were in a metal boat, heading into a crazylightning storm and we had to head further into the storm for another45 minutes before we would get to the island. I started panicking andscreaming at our boat captain, who didn't seem to understand what Iwas trying to tell him. Maggie and I frantically tried to spell outthat it is an incredibly stupid idea to drive a metal boat into alightning storm (especially since this metal boat had a metal cage ontop of it) and that we needed to find a way to go around the storminstead. They still didnt' understand us. They kept telling us notto worry, that our boat wouldn't capsize. This may play a closesecond to the level of fear I felt during the rafting experience. Icouldn't even look. I had to stare into my lap and pretend that I wasin a happy place and not in the middle of a lightning storm. Thestory has a happy ending though, since obviously we managed to make itto the island safe and sound, albeit soaking wet from the pouringrain.
We had an amazing day on Ngamba Island, doing the Keeper for a Dayprogram. Essentially, this island is home to 42 orphaned chimpanzeeswho have been rescued from various situations in Uganda, DRC, andother nearby countries. They often arrive at the island emaciated andnear death and are revived by the keepers and released into the foreston the island with the other rescued chimps. The chimps are not tamedor trained. They live wildly there, other than stress-relievinginteractions from the keepers. Throughout the day we assisted thekeepers to prepare food and to feed the chimps (the chimps get most oftheir food naturally from the forest, but are also given supplementsto ensure that they are rehabilitated effectively). We also got tocheck out their medical facilities and learn just about everythingthere is to know about chimpanzee behaviour. It was a truly awesomeexperience! We also got our names put onto plaques that will beposted on the island since essentially we were making a large donationto the facility by paying to do the Keeper for the Day program withthem.
We are currently back in Jinja to see the source of the Nile and somewaterfalls. We will be leaving via bus to Kigali, Rwanda eithertomorrow or Friday, where we plan to check out mountain gorillas, theGenocide Memorial, Diane Fossey's grave sight and some volcanoes.

APRIL 7, 2008 (Holy Crap, I'm Happy to be Alive)

Holy shit! Today Mags and I went to Jinja to white water raft the Nile at its source. I can now safely say that I have swam in the Nile at both ends of it! First of all, let me begin by saying that upon arrival I learned that this white water rafting experience is second only to the Zambezi river as the gnarliest white water experience in the whole world. Secondly, I will say that the Ottawa river is not even one fraction of the intensity of what we encountered today... We began the day boarding a bus with 16 Christian missionaries...no comment at my first reaction to that. When we got to the rafting centre we were joined by another two people as well, making our total for the day at 20 people. We had to split into three boats, which we had to designate as "Mild" or "Wild". The missionaries all decided that they absolutely had to be together in two rafts, which left only four of us in the last raft. Fortunately, Mags and I were paired with two really cool people from Montreal, Canada, so our boat was Team Canada for the day. The Nile river at Jinja is designated as a Category 5 rapid experience, which is the most intense they will allow rafters to do, however, the river itself has Category 7 rapids, which only kayakers are allowed to go down. In the morning, we hit 6 rapids and our boat was definitely the more ballsy of the three. We hit all the rapids as hard and as wild as possible. On the third rapid of the morning, we were primed to hit a Category 5. Man, we did not know what we were in for! We went down the rapids first and essentially there were 4 major static waves to hit in this series of rapids. We were hoping to get to the last one before we faced any major intensity, but our boat was so light with only four people that as soon as we met the first major wave, our boat went right up and flipped. Like this wave was literally the height of our boat. We had practiced a bunch of times how to deal with flipping and getting stuck under the raft and air pockets, etc., but holy shit we were so unprepared. When we hit that first wave we were launched into a major series of rapids and there was nothing we could do but try to scramble for the surface for air. This proved to be utterly impossible for me. As soon as I hit the water the wind was completely knocked out of me. I fought against the next three major waves crashing down on me and the swirling rapids in between to get to the surface but I didnt' know up from down. I ended up getting thrown under the raft and I punched hard to free myself. I got a brief attempt at air before being thrown under water again and then I found myself sucked under the raft yet again. I managed to calm myself long enough to find an air pocket but I could not for the life of me catch my breath. I was still surging through the rapids under the raft and the wind was still knocked out of me... SERIOUS NOTE: Of all the crazy stupid intense adrenaline rush things I have ever done, this was the absolute closest to death that I have ever felt. I honestly thought I was going to drown on the friggin Nile today. All of a sudden, when I was under the raft trying to breath, I felt two arms grab me. At first I thought it was a fellow rafter who was panicking and I honestly kicked them away cuz I was like screw that it's every man for himself until I can catch my breath! Fortunately, on the second attempt, the arms pulled me out from under the raft and out to the surface. It was my guide and he just looked at me and said, "just breath, it's okay". He had the most panicked look on his face, which made me panic even more as I grasped to get my breath and make sense of the situation. All I could think was, holy shit, I have lifeguard training and I almost died and my guide is shitting himself and there is no one else around, am I going to see at least three other bodies upside down unconscious in the water? Fortunately, as my guide frantically tried to orient himself with the situation and flip the boat back over, we spotted Maggie and the two others who had been rescued by kayakers. Apparently, I had the worst go of things, getting stuck under the raft and not being able to free myself long enough to get to the side in the gentler rapids. I literally got stuck under the raft and surged into the heart of the rapids for the next three waves. The next two boats to go down also flipped, but they did so on the last rapid. Our problem was that the guide expected us to only flip on the fourth and since we flipped on the first, we had to get through the rest of the rapids out of the boat. I can only say that you guys have to see the pictures in order to understand what we are dealing with. I shit you not, that was the scariest experience of my entire life. I would rather jump off the Bloukrans Bridge 100x over than do that again! After lunch (where incidentally we lost one of the people in our boat who sustained a concussion during that crazy boat flipping experience), everyone got their wounds fixed up and we set out for the afternoon series. We were assured that we would not get flipped out until maybe the last rapid of the day. Bullshit. The second rapid of the afternoon, which was a Class 5 again due to tons of rocks, our boat guide decided that our boat was more extreme than the others so after going down a 3 metre waterfall (which none of the other boats did), he paddled us down a different channel than the other boats went down. Again, our boat was too light to handle the rapids and although we made it through the first set, our boat totally flipped on the second set again. This time fortunately I did not get stuck under the boat but I still got the wind knocked out of me. By the end of the day, we hit the most intense rapids of the day. We literally had to get out and carry our raft on land past the Class 7 rapids, which made me want to shit my pants just looking at them. We put our boat in at the end of that set, considered a Class 5 and surged down...all three of us were absolutely terrified by this point, begging our guide to keep us from flipping at all costs. I actually sat at the back of the boat (as the strongest swimmer nonetheless) and begged our boat guide to grab onto me as soon as we flipped in case we flipped. Fortunately however, we muscled it out and managed not to flip. Even more fortunate (for us Canadians at least...not for the missionaries), there was unlimited beer awaiting us at the end. Anyhow, craziest experience I've ever had. Mags and I are going balls to wall here in East Africa. We are hoping to go to Jane Goodall's chimpanzee sanctuary tomorrow where we hope to be keepers for the day and help to feed and provide medical treatment to orphaned chimps. We will keep you updated.

APRIL 5, 2008 (We Made it to Uganda)

Well after an exhausting 2 days spent on a jam-packed bus, Maggie and I have finally arrived alive in Kampala, Uganda. From a perfect rainbow arching over the road as we left Dar Es Salaam in Tanzania to the perfect sunset greeting us as we neared Kampala, the trip definitely had its highs and lows. The bus ride from Dar to Nairobi, Kenya was gorgeous. Tanzania surely has the most stunning countryside I have ever seen. With blood red soil and lush tropical greenery, it kept us mesmerized for hours. We got particularly excited as we saw giraffes saunter by us down the road and as the magnificent snow-capped peak of Mount Kilimanjaro came into view. There weren't very many stops along the way so we had little food and drink to sustain us, however, dehydration seemed like a better option than regular use of the holes in the ground that served as public toilets! We reached the Kenyan border as the sun was setting, the darkness fittingly mirroring our uncertainty of what lay ahead in that country. There were regular stops as army or police personnel boarded our bus along the way. Due to the darkness we saw little of the Kenyan countryside, but we reached Nairobi by about 10pm. It was then that we discovered (much to our dismay) that the bus would not be continuing on through the night and that we would have to wait until 7am the next morning to catch the bus to Uganda. The bus station was in a really dodgy area of town and so we decided it best to sleep in the bus station overnight. We were the only white people, which being Africa obviously isn't a surprise, however it made us feel as though perhaps we were doing something stupid that more savvy backpackers wouldn't dare do! A man named Joaquim befriended us and took it upon himself to look after us for the night. He helped us to get food and he slept close to us in the station's waiting room. Not that I slept...I had one eye open the entire night. The next morning we managed to find our bus to Uganda. It looked like it was ready to fall apart on the inside and out and it sounded like it too. As soon as we hit the road though we figured out why...they send the crappy buses on the road from Nairobi to Kampala because the roads are so wretched! You haven't lived until you've stared death in the face aboard a bus from Nairobi to Kampala. Armed with our sleeping bags as makeshift airbags, our nerves were shot as our bus lept from one side of the road to the other, then off the road into the ditch, then through the air as we raced over crater-sized potholes. Add encounters with speeding trucks that read "Danger: Petroleum" every 5 minutes and heart-stopping passing with only millimetres to spare between a truck and a sudden drop and we were in for one hell of a ride! But, T.I.A. (This is Africa) they say. The Kenyan countryside was beautiful, but we were happy to get across the border to Uganda. We heard that obtaining visas at the border could be a difficult task, so we were a bit nervous as we stood in line to talk to the immigration officer. She turned out to be the nicest person we met so far though and even offered to let us stay for an entire month because surely any less time was not enough time to see all the beauty that her country has to offer! As we merrily strutted out of the immigration office with our stamped passports, our smiles quickly faded...pinned to the bulletin board on the wall was a huge sign that read: "Ebola: don't be afraid, be educated." Yeah fucking right. Maggie and I held our breaths for the rest of the 4 hour bus ride to Kampala. We are FILTHY, hungry and exhausted, but we are finally in Kampala, Uganda safe and sound, drinking a couple of bottles of cold Coke at a backpackers' hostel. We have no idea what we plan to do in this country or even where we are going tomorrow, but we have a phone number of a friend's sister who lives in Uganda, so we are going to try and call her and then go from there. We will keep you updated!

APRIL 3, 2008 (Arrived Alive in Tanzania)

Tanzania is a really interesting place. For me it is kind of a mixture between Niamey (Niger) and Cairo. If you saw where we are staying you would laugh. It is down an alleyway in what looks like the slums, but our room is clean and the staff is really nice and helpful. On our way from the airport yesterday, our taxi driver got a flat tire. I immediately jumped out of the car when he opened the trunk to get out the spare - I know that trick! Flat tire, trunk is open and passengers can't see out the back window and then someone steals all your luggage! At any rate, all was fine. At our hotel, we met a man named Felix who told us the good places to go and eat and offered to be our driver when we need him. Last night we went to a restaurant around the corner for some dinner and the waitress sat us with a German girl who is here doing research for her PhD, so we had some nice company. We hung up our insecticide treated bed nets and went to bed really early (mostly cuz I had to sleep off my drug-induced haze). We awoke this morning to people banging on our door. Maggie answered the door and came back in the room to tell me that we needed to find our passports because there were three immigration officers at our door checking passports and visas! A little bit of a scary scene to wake up to, but apparently they come around to hotels everyday checking to make sure that people are staying here legally. Today our driver Felix took us to the bus station to book our coach bus for tomorrow morning. We leave at 6:30am tomorrow (Friday) to Kampala, Uganda via Nairobi, Kenya. It will take us two days to get there. We have contact info for family members of our friend Anthony in Kampala, so we will call them when we get there. We also bought a cellphone today which should work in Tanzania and Uganda. Anyhow, we are doing well and Felix is taking us to go for beers at the waterfront tonight. Will be in touch probably when we arrive in Uganda. Still not sure about whether or not we are going on to Rwanda, but will let you know.

Tanzania, Uganda & Rwanda

Just when I thought my life couldn't get more crazy, I'm off for what will arguably be my biggest adventure yet! All of the visitors are gone, my roommates have gone home forever and Maggie and I are about to depart South Africa for a 3-week excursion up to Tanzania, Uganda and Rwanda. We leave Tuesday evening for Johannesburg where we will catch a flight to Tanzania. We will then make our way up to Rwanda for some gorilla trekking and to Uganda to see some chimps and to perhaps go white water rafting at the source of the Nile. Then we'll head back into Tanzania again to go on a safari, scope out Mount Kilimanjaro and hopefully get some rest and relaxation on a beach in Zanzibar before flying back to Johannesburg. If after all of that we're still in the mood for adventure and are not too worn out, we may take a one week trip to Madagascar to check out lemurs...the only place in the world where they exist in the wild!

Maggie and I are both super excited to see new sights, experience new cultures and meet new friends. Along the way, I will do my best to update this blog with where I am and what I'm up to. It's gonna be awesome!

Cheers!

World's Highest Bungee Jump!

Yesterday I jumped off a 216m bridge. That's 709 feet, about the height of a 70 storey building, and 40% of the height of the CN tower. I did this utterly stupid activity at the Bloukrans Bridge bungee jump, which is near Plettenberg Bay, South Africa. This bungee site holds the Guinness World Record for highest bungee jump in the world.

Let me take a minute to remind everyone that I HATE heights. My biggest fear is falling, which is why I hate rollercoasters for that feeling of falling that I get in my stomach, and why I hate flying for the fear of falling out of the sky. This fear has never prevented me from going to Wonderland with friends or making a dozen international flights in a year, however, I would much rather take repeated punches to the head than have to endure that horrid dropping feeling in my stomach. My previous adventure-seeking has led me to try hang-gliding, parasailing, and skydiving with no problems. I loved all of those activities because they spared me having to feel that dropping feeling in my stomach. In fact, the only reason why I made the decision to go skydiving was because I heavily researched the sensations you feel beforehand and was satisfied with the general consensus that you feel like you are in a wind tunnel, not plummetting towards the ground. This turned out to be true and I loved skydiving because I felt like I was flying, not falling.

Since I had gone skydiving, which I consider to be one of the most significant extreme adventures that a person can do, I figured that I didn't even have to do bungee jumping because I had surpassed it in extreme-ness. Last year before coming to South Africa however, my brother (Trevor), my friend (Maggie) and I were looking up extreme things to do in South Africa when we stumbled upon the Bloukrans Bridge bungee jump. We got nauseous looking at other people's jump videos on YouTube and decided then and there that it terrified all of us so much that we simply HAD to do it when and if we all ended up in South Africa together. Last year, I stopped at the bungee jump on a road trip with friends, however I refused to jump then because I vowed that if I was ever going to do it, I was going to do it with Maggie and Trev (which seemed like a safe bet to never actually happen since it seemed less and less likely that Trev was going to come to SA). And now here we are a year later, with Maggie living with me here in South Africa and Trevor visiting us for a couple of weeks. Judgment day had arrived.

I spent the few days leading up to our jump preparing Maggie and Trevor for the fact that I was probably not going to jump with them. I had played the scenario of me standing on the edge and jumping 216m over and over again in my head for the past year and no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't seem to force my brain to accept the idea of me jumping off. The morning of the scheduled jump, we all went ziplining in Tsitsikamma forest, along with Maggie's mom who is also visiting. I was 100% positive that I wasn't going to jump. We arrived at the bridge at midday and I watched as Maggie and Trevor nervously made last minute bathroom visits and signed their lives away. The men who got Maggie and Trevor suited up razzed me for not going jumping as well. They managed to convince me to spend $5 to walk out to the bridge with the others and make a decision about whether or not to jump out there. The walk alone was terrifying. We had to walk down a path littered with signs warning us of deadly cobras along the path. Then we had to walk along a 200m suspended cage, which had an open mesh floor and sides. Stupidly, despite being told otherwise, we all looked down! Out at the bridge, I sat patiently as Maggie, Trevor and the other jumpers were assigned their jumping order. One by one I watched as each jumper was called up to the platform, had their feet bound and were carried out to the edge. Maggie jumped second and Trevor jumped fourth. Both looked incredibly nervous. They stood on the edge as two men held onto them and counted down from five and then over the edge they went - sometimes with a loud scream and sometimes silenced by fear. We all watched them drop on a video screen from a camera that was positioned over top of them. Both Maggie and Trevor came back grinning from ear to ear. They both exclaimed that it was the best thing they had ever done in their lives and that it was way more intense and a way bigger adrenaline rush than skydiving. They said that I absolutely had to do it or I would regret it forever. I spent the next half hour on the bridge, trying to find one ounce of potential regret in myself that might make me want to jump. I couldn't find any. I just really didn't want to do it. I knew I would absolutely hate every second of it. They even strapped me in to take a peek over the edge, but still, I wasn't budging on my decision. Maggie and Trevor were disappointed with me and as we made the walk back off the bridge to the registration centre, they razzed me about how I was going to regret my decision. "Fear is temporary, regret is forever," they kept telling me (that's what's written on all of the souvenir tshirts you can buy). While they were watching their video recordings and purchased their DVDs and photos, their jump leader came in with certificates to hand out. The certificates said that they had completed the world's highest bungee jump. Suddenly, I was overcome by envy. I wanted a certificate!! Haha. I didn't want to be sitting around with Maggie and Trev as they recounted their experience to all our family and friends and proudly showed off their certificates. We had all done all of our other extreme adventures together and now they would have one up on me. I simply had to get one of those certificates for myself! I walked up to the registration desk and asked the woman if I could join the next group going out. Maggie, her mom and Trevor all looked stunned, but quickly capitalized on my sudden change of mind and scrambled to get me out there as fast as possible before I changed my mind. They even each paid to come out to the bridge again with me to give me moral support.

Fear was gone from me as I walked back out to the bridge. Mentally, I was like steel. I was jumping and even though I knew I was going to hate every second, I kept repeating to myself : "this too shall pass". All I had to do was endure a couple of minutes of hell. I watched as 4 or 5 people jumped before me. Then suddenly, the jump team signalled to me that it was my turn. I stood up and calmly walked over to the platform. I sat quietly as they bound my ankles together and attached the bungee cord. Then, before I knew it, two men lifted me up and carried me out to the edge. "Whatever you do, don't hesitate," they said. "And don't look down." .......too late for that, I had already been given a glimpse over the edge when I was there before with Maggie and Trevor. I knew what a gorge looked like from 216m in the air already. There was no turning back now. No time for hesitation. I was jumping. The second that they had me at the edge, they started counting down: "5, 4, 3, 2, 1, BUNGEE!!" And then suddenly, I was swan diving out into nothingness... and then falling...and falling....and falling. As I accelerated from 0 to 125km/h, I groaned as the wretched dropping feeling in my stomach consumed me. I just kept begging for that feeling to pass. And then, a few seconds later it did and all I could feel was the air rushing around me. I opened my eyes and looked down at the ground flying up towards me. I felt so disoriented. Then, just when it felt like I had been falling forever, I felt the bungee cord pull on my ankles. Contrary to how it looks, my body didn't snap and flail all over the place when the bungee cord stretched to its max. It was actually a very smooth and very comfortable feeling. My body floated back upwards to 80% of the initial jump height (about the height of the Victoria Falls bungee jump) and then plummetted downwards again. I sort of yo-yoed like that for a minute, which felt like an absolute eternity. I was so disoriented and I was crying, telling myself that it would be over soon. "You're okay, you're okay," I kept saying aloud. Finally, I felt myself stabilizing and being pulled upwards. One of the men on the bungee team lowered himself down on a rope from the bridge to where I was and pulled me into a seated position. I threw my arms around him in fear from being suspended, dangling above the gorge. He laughed when he saw my tears and how badly that I was shaking. "It's okay. You've done it. You never have to do it again," he said. We were pulled up to the bridge platform very quickly, where I was lifted up onto a grated floor. I sat there, trying to compose myself so as not to scare the other jumpers who hadn't gone yet, but I couldn't help but notice that my legs were shaking as I laced my fingers tightly around the grates in the floor. I stumbled back to Maggie and Trevor and threw my arms around them in a big hug. They told me they were so proud of me for doing it and I agreed that I was proud I had conquered the world's highest bungee jump, but that I would never ever ever do that again! As I walked back to the registration centre to buy my DVD and photos (I needed proof to remind myself that I did it because my mind had immediately tried to block the traumatizing experience from my memory!), I excitedly accepted my certificate from the jump leader. That's all I wanted. That piece of paper with proof that I had jumped. Maggie and Trevor laughed at how all it would take to get me to do something I didn't want to do was offer up a certificate for it.

I'm so glad that I jumped, but I only did it for the personal satisfaction of knowing that I did something that I was terrified of and that I hated so much. When things seem really shitty or we are faced with a really bad situation or are stuck doing something we really hate, we just need to remind ourselves that "this too shall pass". If I can endure my worst nightmare, I can endure anything. We all can.

The Final Chapter

Well sports fans, it has been quite awhile since I have posted on here. Many months actually. I am sure many of you have come up with some creative ponderings about my whereabouts...did she run off and marry a local rugby star?...did she get kidnapped by a pack of wild baboons?...did she give up her former life to become a member of a local bushman tribe? Well, unfortunately my last few months, while great, have not been quite so adventurous. Here is a brief summary of what went down after I returned from Egypt in October: my friend Dawn came to visit for 2 weeks...I got to drink champagne on safari and pet a cheetah...my roommates and I made 5 trips between us to the Wildfire tattoo and piercing salon...I had a birthday...Ilya's basketball team won the championship...I entertained a group of travelling political delegates from the UK and Canada...my mom and her friend Trish visited...I got to drink champagne on safari and pet a cheetah again...some of my friends left South Africa forever...I went home in December for Christmas...hung out with the fam and friends and conducted some research...spent the month of January trying to get an extension on my study visa...returned to South Africa a couple of days ago.

This time around, the vibe in Cape Town is very different. I have returned with my friend Maggie for one thing. She will be living with me in Cape Town for the next couple of months, after which we will be travelling to some other exciting African countries, such as Madagascar, Tanzania, Rwanda, Uganda and perhaps Ethiopia. For now though, my main priority is finishing up my thesis!! Oh and tanning... Jen (aka MacKay) is also back after a month of travelling with her boyfriend Jon. The two of them, plus Maggie and I, are all living in our house by the ocean in Hout Bay, since Ilya left to go back to the USA. We now have full Canadian representation in our house, which translates to more beer in the fridge!

On Monday, MacKay, Maggie and I begin a 4-week Boot Camp to kick our butts into shape so that Mags and I can climb Mount Kilimanjaro without having to hire shirpas to carry our asses to the top! The boot camp involves getting up at 6am, 5 days a week, for 4 weeks straight and getting screamed at for an hour. Sounds like a blast! I had better have buns of steel and a 6-pack by the end of this!

Anyhow, hopefully these last few months on the Dark Continent will inspire some amazing adventures and inspirational life-ponderings. I will keep you posted!