Odd Arrival

I saw Africa for the first time out a circular window, 3 hours out of Joburg. After the intense envelopement of the plane by thick, white fog, the land of vast desert, rich forest, curvacious river beds and suprising oasis presented itself. I nearly lost my delicous, freeze-dried airplane lunch I was so excited. The clouds were sparce and cottony and the land a visably untouched for kilometers. It was so comforting, like the warm hand of your mother rubbing the length of your back.
We landed, I sweat alot and immediately began to burn my pasty San Fransician skin. This is were things got tricky: after a lot of hustle and bustle and 3 days of traveling, we landed in Joburg, got delayed, got a little robbed (well, Amanda did) and kept trucking towards our final destination of Port Elizabeth (aka PE). As anyone who has studied abroad will tell you, the issue communication is a garganchuin problem. NMMU (Nelson Mandela Metropolitan Uni) was not notified by the CSU to pick us up, so we waited. And called ever possible number to get a hold of someone in South Africa who knew something about where we were going. And finally a very friendly man named Shareef picked us up in a ghetto white van and drove us barefoot to Annie's Cove where we were supposed to stay. We got there, exhausted at quarter past 10 at night only to be yelled at (in Afrikans) by the man who runs the place. He slammed the door in our face and we sat there stunned by the "greeting". Shareef, our driver, being the wonderful man he is, told us not to worry because he was going to find us a cheap hostel near by to sleep and shower at. He also explained that Maurious, the prick mananger, was quite racist and didn't like the fact that Shareef, an South African of Indian decsent, brought us unanounced into the grounds. I was pissed before, but now I was livid. It might not have been a proper introduction to my future home for the year, but it was an accurate one. And as friendly as most are in this city, it's turbulent history of Apartheid is still quite obvious.