Namibia

Its true what they say about Namibia; the desert bumps right up to the ocean! We started off day one by taking FOREVER to change our money. Then we worked really hard to negotiate a taxi price to Swakopmund because we knew that they all wanted to charge us far too much. After finally giving up we hopped in a taxi driven by a guy named Chico with a gold star in his tooth. He drove us the 25 minute drive to Swakopmund from Walvis Bay. The road had giant sand dunes on one side and the ocean on the other!

Swakopmund is a quaint little German town with all sorts of little shops and a beautiful beach! We started our day (Valentine’s Day) at the internet café where I wasn’t able to load any pictures : ( and then had lunch at a little café near there. I had a vegetarian burger that consisted of mushrooms, canned pineapple, cheese, and a fried egg…it was interesting to say the least. Then once we made a few phone calls, we set out for the day. We walked the practically empty streets to the ocean side where we found the Aquarium. It was pretty small with little tanks filled with pretty ordinary fish. Then they had one main tank with a tunnel that you could walk through. We made it just in time to see a diver get in the tank and feed the fish. There were lots of sharks and bigger fish and one or two sea turtles in the tank, one who was particularly hungry. He literally followed the diver and would go right up to the diver’s face until he was fed, he would swallow the fish whole and then go right back for more. The diver actually had to push the turtle away a few times! Then we went upstairs and found that you could look into the tank from above. While we were up there, the hungry turtle had found a new friend. He would come up and touch her hand and then swim back down. When she left, I put my head over the water ad he came up and gave me a kiss! It was pretty cool, but we didn’t get a picture : (.

When we were upstairs, we were joined by a group of chattering African school children crowdig around our feet and pressing their faces against the glass. We were surrounded and coldnt escape. Then their teacher, a yound English guy, asked them to let us through. He explained to us that they were a group of students from a very poor, rural village in Namibia. He said that they were seeing the sea for the first and probably the last time. Since we are both from California, we gave them first priority.

We left the Aquarium with a humbled feeling and set out to climb the tower in the middle of the town. We figured out that to get the key to the tower you had to go into this little shop and pay some small amount of money. Well it turns out that that shop was the best in all of Swakopmund. I had more fun at the shop than I did climbing the tower! It was run by these amazingly nice women who fill their store with all sorts of crafts and jewelry and gifts made by different collectives throughout Namibia. They know every single one of their craft makers personally and most of the proceeds go to some sort of Women’s tuberculosis village or another. I got some really great stuff there and we talked to them for a long time. We later found out when we got back onto the ship that our dean had also visited the shop and that the women had raved about us to him! They were so sweet!

Anyways we met up with some friends at the shop and then set out for more exploring. We went to this craft market near the water that was a bunch of blankets all laid out next to each other and covered in all sorts of trinkets. We did all sorts of bargaining and saying no thank you until Ashley found something she liked. So we started to bargain with him and we got him down to 50 Namibian dollars ($5) and he gave it to us for that. Then we started to walk away and he brought the same exact thing (a banana leaf picture of two giraffes) to me and said or you 40. So I bought it and then said that he should give Ashley back $10 since he gave it to me for less than her and he started laughing and said no, no, no and I said what you don’t think she’s pretty? And he laughed and said no! I couldn’t believe it! It was pretty funny and it made me feel pretty good about myself! haha!

Then we went to find some ice cream, but instead I found a charm and a patch! It was a really fun day! That night we went out to celebrate Ashley’s birthday. We took this ridiculously long walk to a resataurant called the Raft or the Lagoon as its known by the locals. The restaurant would literally be a 5 minute walk from the ship if we were allowed to go out the other side of the port gate, but there was only one entrance and it was in the opposite direction. Anyways we finally got there and found a table just in time to order food before the kitchen closed. I was so hungry that I ordered the first thing I saw and that was a Hawaiian pizza, not exactly authentic, but delicious nonetheless. I went to the bar with my friend Andrew to order a beer and we got to talking to a couple of locals at the bar. Well we quickly made friends and the one who claimed he was in an HBO series bought us a couple rounds of Jaeger shots. Since it was Ashley’s birthday she got some special treatment and everyone order her some fancy drink or another. Needless to say we had a lot of fun. Towards the end of the night we got to talking to them about life in Namibia. It was a long and tough conversation but the bottom line is that they hate black people and think that the world should be split for white and blacks. Although I disagree completely, I can see where this frustration comes from. In Namibia, whites are the minority and since they used to have the power, they feels as though they should be treated with respect. They think that black people are dishonest thieves, drunk drivers etc. After we had this intense conversation, they offered to give us a ride home so that we didn’t have to take a taxi driven by a black person. It was a nice gesture if you forget about their reasoning. Anyways we got a ride home with a young guy named Waldo who is training to play in the rugby world cup! He was a really nice guy and got s back to the port safely!

The next day we woke up early because we had half a day to kill before Ashley and I went camping and star gazing. We decided to head to dune 7 (a big dune where there are all sorts of sand sports that you can try out) to go sand boarding. Let me tell you, it was quite an experience! We were driven up a GIANT sand dune (thank goodness because you usually have to walk up them) which was a pretty scary experience in itself! There’s not exactly traction when your driving up a big mountain of sand so we had to back up a couple times to get up enough speed. Once we got up pretty far we had to jump out and walk the rest of the way to the top. It was SO sandy! We practically sank up to our knees with every step we took! Once we got to the top our driver man laid out literally a board like the kind that go in the pack of paintings and told us to lie down. It was quite an experience! We went down SO fast on our bellies! It was a lot of fun but my hands got pretty torn up! Then we saw that they had what Sara Weinberg calls a Zorb, but they called a Hydroball. Basically it’s a giant hamster ball blown up with water inside. You climb into the ball and they roll you down the dune! Well we had to try that out! So we geared up and head out to a smaller dune to roll down. It was insane and bizarre at the same time! We were covered in water and it felt like you were weightless inside the ball! After fulfilling our thrill quota for the day before noon, Ashley and I headed back to meet our trip at the ship.

An hour or two later, we left for the campsite. It was a long drive in a hot van with windows that didn’t roll down. I thought I was going to die. We finally got there and saw that there was a larger main tent where there were tables set up for dinner and a bunch of smaller tents for sleeping. We decided once we put our stuff in our tents to explore the rocks and desert around us. We walked to “the river”but it was pretty much a dry bed. We climbed some rocks and hung out on the top of one for a little while. My friend Lindsay and I sat there while Ashley scaled one of the taller mountains. The rest of the day was fairly uneventful. We pretty much hung out and waited in the hot hot heat for the sun to go down and for dinner. Everyone got sick off of the dinner, but we had a nice Marimba band that came to entertain us! So this trip was supposed to be a camping and star gazing trip right? Well, just our luck, we were there the one night probably all year that Namibia will get rain. Needless to say, there wasn’t much stargazing. No one slept at all because it was so hot and the next morning we were all cranky and ready to go back.

This was the morning that I started to get sick. It started with diarrhea that caused me to stop our convoy on the way back and squat behind a bush. Then we got back to the ship and I felt miserable. I was coughing and sneezing and freezing! I must have caught the flu from someone at some point. It was miserable! I was sick all day until we got to South Africa and even the first day we were there! That however is for my South Africa blog.

More later!