South Africa: Travelling Outside My Southern Comfort Zone: Tick, Tick,...Bloem!: Welcome to the Home of Fun!

Upon arrival to Johannesburg, Sarah discovered that her flight had changed to an earlier time and was rushed to the front of security so she could make it in time. I had about 2.5 hours before my flight left so I wandered the airport, exchanged some dollars to Rand, and ate a waffle almost identical to those served at Waffle House, but at a sit-down steakhouse restaurant. My meal was about 28 Rand and I tipped 6 Rand, but I had no idea what I was doing. Still don’t. I met Sami on the bus that took us from the Johannesburg airport to our plane to Bloemfontein.

In one of our two group meetings this past spring, Dr. Jones said that Bloemfontein is comparable to Nebraska, and of course I replied “How exciting!” with a thick layer of sarcasm. I can’t justify my opinion because I haven’t actually seen Nebraska from land or an airplane, but I’m not sure I’d give Bloemfontein that much credit. ;) Johannesburg was a lot like Arizona from what I remember of it – brown and flat with random large mountains scattered around and perfectly aligned houses and neighborhoods – but not as square, and Bloemfontein would be a lot like Arizona if nobody lived there. The city of Bloemfontein looks as though a bomb of civilization went off in one particular spot, and a circular city was formed around it. After a short wait in the Bloem airport, Sarah, Sami, and I were picked up by someone (we have no idea who he was, but he knew we were from App State so that was good enough for me) and taken to our dorm at UFS. On our ride from the airport to the UFS campus I saw a billboard featuring a cross between a mardi gras, 20’s flapper, or can-can girl party theme that read: “Tick, Tick, Bloem. Welcome to the Home of Fun.” Unfortunately I didn’t get a picture, but I thought it was hysterical after seeing the city from the airplane.

Sami and I share a room while Sarah has a room to herself on a hallway across an outside corridor. We were given temporary UFS student cards but unfortunately none of them worked. You needed a card to get in/out from the lobby to outside, in/out of the lobby to the stairs, and in/out of the stairwell to the hallways containing the rooms. Needless to say, we were trapped in different parts of the building several times trying to find a solution or anyone that could help. Speaking of which, we all expected there to be other people in our dorm and were thoroughly upset when we realized we were practically the only people in the entire building, as all the rooms were empty. As Drake would say: “No new friends.” Our RA Layton propped some doors open for us and we began a trek to the mall. After leaving the campus we ended up on some back roads, but finally found the mall with help from some locals. We stopped a couple who mistook my “rich accent” (his words, not mine) for an Australian accent (he’s clearly never been to southern American, but hey, Australian? I’ll take it any day. ‘Ello mate!). We finally arrived at the mall (which we now know is the small mall), bought some bath towels for about R100, and sat down to eat. Once again, we had no idea how much to tip or whether we were supposed to ask for our check or not, but our meal was a combined R220 and we tipped a little over R20. Stingy? Maybe? We returned to our dorm in the dark and went to bed at around 8pm. Honestly, I’m surprised I made it that long because starting at 7am on Wednesday, I probably got a combined 6 hours of sleep until that Friday at 8pm (or 2pm EST, but still). I had already hit my brick wall and started functioning off delusion, but sleep is for when you’re dead, right Emily?

Johannesburg from my window on our AirFrance Air Bus (meaning it was two stories and HUGE)

My Waffle House-like waffle in the Joburg airport

To show how tiny our plane from Joburg to Bloem was, here's my view of the pilot. Also, I was instructed how to open the door of the plane in case of emergency. (Umm, okay lady.)