South Africa!

Yay! I'm finally on internet... I have been dreaming about this moment and having computer-withdrawal systems! South Africa is awesome. We've been in a place called Pretoria (near JHB) for the past 2 weeks and will be leaving for Bethlehem tomorrow. The work we've been doing here is with an organisation called Pop-Up (People Upliftment Development project), which has a number of ministries with all sorts of people from children to drug addicts, but their aim is to give hope to people who have no hope. We have been helping them out at their HQ, getting stuck into cleaning, painting, sanding walls, organising extremely dusty storerooms, packing food boxes for distribution etc.

Surprisingly enough it's been raining and storming here most of the week and is set to continue till Sunday, though this is a good thing as there has been a severe lack of rain for the past 4 months (ie. none, I think.)

Our accommodation and food are brilliant. An Arts Ministry base have let us stay with them for free and we get 3 massive meals a day each for the equivalent of about 3 pounds. Considering that we arrived preparing to really slum it, we have been pleasantly surprised!! I feel like I'm part of Fame Academy too while we're at the base, because we are surrounded by 80 all-singing, all-dancing students. I'm desperate to join in one of their dance classes but know I couldn't quite keep up with them.

The black people we've met here are amazing as they all speak about 6 languages. South Africa itself has 11 official languages, so I'm just trying to decide which one to invest my energy in learning!

As a team we have become like a little family and haven't yet killed each other yet despite spending all day, every day together! There's still 6 weeks to go...

So, the next update will be from Behtlehem... hasta luego!