Capetown

At the request of many of you I will try to continue to update you on the remainder of my trip.

Yesterday was one of those days that just completely tests your ability to be very very far from home in a city that can be very dangerous at times.

Corey, Regina and I went to Table Mountain at 4:30 and waited to watch the sunset and catch the last cable car down the mountain. It was amazing. We got in a cab and the driver tried to take us out of the way to get more money on the meter so we got out about 8 blocks away from where we were staying. While on our walk my Mom called my cell phone and I told her to call me back because talking on a cell phone on the street is dangerous because it draws attention to you. Two minutes later Corey was walking a few steps ahead of Regina and I and two boys in their early teens came up to Corey and cornered him on a wall. Regina and I thought they were just really aggressive beggars (because there are a lot of those in Durban and Capetown), so we started yelling and pulling them away from Corey. The one who was closest to Corey got scared because of our yelling and stepped away and then we ran. When we stopped Corey said, "He had a knife. Did you see his knife?" Because the young boy had his back to us we didn't see the knife or hear him tell Corey to "empty his pockets" and so we were persistent in getting him away from Corey. What an experience.

When we returned to our accommodations my Mom called and it turns out that my bank card was present when the purchases on it in Durban were made, which means that the most likely (as in almost 100% likely) culprit is someone who lived at my home stay or someone who found my credit card in my bag that I left at my home stay. It is really hard to think that the wonderful family I stayed with is capable of this, but I suppose (much like the attempted robbery of Corey) it is just very telling about how many people in South Africa are barely getting by and have to resort to stealing to stay alive. Yesterday we didn't want to leave our accommodation at all and when we went to get some food and the waitress tried to call to us to give me an earring that had fallen out we started running from her until we saw the earring in her hand.

Incidents like what happened to Corey and to me are tests to see how much we can handle living in a different society. The truth of the matter is, either of these things could happen to anyone of us in New York or San Francisco, it's just that much harder to take when you already feel like a foreigner, much less a target to be robbed.

Nevertheless, does this change my previous want to come back to South Africa? Not really actually. If anything it proves that I can survive here and do so much more good as a result.

**I really didn't want to post a blog about these incidents because I don't want to worry anyone, however I think that it is important everyone gets the full picture of what it is like here, much like the preacher said: The good and the bad.**