5:30 am November 30th

Wide awake and have been for about an hour or so. I decided I may as well get up and see what's around me in the daylight. It was dark on the ride home last night and the scenery looked cool. In the dark. There had been a bit of a miscommunication about our ride sitch but we had a lovely cup of tea (Rooibos) and some croissants while waiting for Issac and Mama Anniki to come. When we got to Refilwe, Papa David and Pete came to let us in the gate. We had thought we were staying in a house further up the road but it turns out we are staying in their day care building which is HUGE!!! Two people to a room, but 3 bathrooms, 2 showers and 2 bathtubs!!! There is a really big kitchen (p.s. all my spices got in :) and two large living spaces. We are surrounded by a tile patio on one side otf the house. There are bars on all of the windows and locks on all of the doors including a gate that locks us in at night.

The weather is not too bad. (at 530am) When we got in last night we encountered some mosquitos, cockroaches and a few kitchen rats but we are getting traps at the grocery store today. They had prepared a meal for us upon our arrival and once we got all our stuff in we sat down to our first meal together. Rice, an orange saucy thing that was great on the rice, chicken wings, potato salad and a mystery meat...we have guessed pork but I'm not convinced. Do to the animal situation (and lack of garbage disposal) we scraped our plates into a tupperware container and placed it in the freezer. We made a shopping list for the store today, went over the plan for today, unpacked and went to bed.

And HERE I AM, a little crusty but none the worse for wear.

"Common sense shows that human life is short lived and that it is best to make of our brief sojourn on this Earth something that is useful to ourselves and others."
Dali Lama