Hi All, Well we are now in Africa and love it! When I last left off we went and met Nicole and Craig to swap some tips and stuff which was cool. We went back to our hotel for some sleep before our long crap flight which didn't happen as the fire alarm went off at 3am then we were up at 6am. We got to the airport with the full 3 hours to spare and when we eventually got to the front of the queue we were told the flight was really full and they said they were looking for volunteers to go later that day or tomorrow, so we played up on our not liking to fly and she said she would put us on standby and they would give us hotel, meal and transport vouchers plus $590 each so we decided we would rather have that but in the end when we went over they had 10 people and 10 seats but we still couldn't sit together so we played the hate flying card again and got seats together. I was sat next to an old woman who looked like a tranny and if the child in front dared put up the window she snatched it back down even though it was not her window lol! We never slept and it was really long and boring, we watched 5 films and there was no ice cream, not a happy camper!! However for our inconvenience Qantas had paid for a $30 breakfast in the airport and gave us $100 to spend on duty free so Craig bought whiskey lol! When we got to Johannesburg it was not at all scary and there were no touts or anything which was good, we called the hostel and they came and got us. The trip was a bit scary if you have never been here before, lots of black guys selling newspapers and things at the traffic lights, women walking about with their babies on their back and things balanced on their heads and absolutely no white people at all. The hostel is nice as far as I reckon it goes here, apart from the ant trails everywhere lol! The hostel is out of the city and the guys take you everywhere for a price and run tours and stuff so you don't really have to ever go anywhere on your own which is good. The first couple of days we just chilled around the hostel, as we kept waking up at stupid times and feeling shattered, they had a massive dvd collection and Aaron who works there just took us to the shops for food and we made stuff. Can you believe you can get a Cornish pastie and HP sauce in the supermarket here?! I also made my first vegetable curry which was amazing if I do say so myself, as Chloe pointed out I am becoming quite the Gordon Ramsay lol!On Thursday we decided to head out (don't freak Dad) as there seemed a lot more to do than we first thought. We went to Sandton witch turned out to be pretty much a big shopping centre as we didn't know Nelson Mandela Square was here which was quite annoying. We did our usual thing we always do lol and went for food and then to the cinema to see Pride and The Glory which was pretty good. Then we had a look round the shops and found really cheap backpacks that load from the front and have wheels for dead cheap. We have also started our malaria medicine now and instead of the ones Craig has had before that give you nightmares and constipation we have gone for the ones that can give you thrush - nice! So next we had an embarrassing time at the pharmacy trying to get stuff just in case we got this and were somewhere that we could not get medicine, lots of questions like "So where do you have thrush?" and me saying "well I don't have it but I might get it" I reckon he was thinking that's what they all say. A white guy who worked in the shop was in the meantime telling Craig not to trust anyone. So eventually we were armed with oral drops and cream and off to get our bags when we realised that we didn't have enough to get both bags and the cream so I made Craig take the cream back which he had to embarrassingly fill out about a million forms for! I didn't want to have to pay for another taxi lift back there to get the other bag lol! Its so cheap here, not as cheap as you would think but a lot cheaper than Oz anyway. Our bags were about £18 and you can get a bottle of Appletise for about 10p, Andra would love it! Today we passed a huge slum area which was quite horrible, very wide gap here between the rich and the poor, the rich mainly being white people so far seem really ignorant unlike all the blacks we have met who are really friendly, passionate and have great senses of humour. The next day we decided to go into Johannesburg as supposedly its no where near as bad as people say but luckily the guy up sold us a tour and once I had been I was well glad they had as I would have been petrified there on my own. Supposedly it has such a bad rep as people know this and then use the place to commit fraud against their insurance companies while they are there. Anyway, first we went to Houghton which is a really posh area and is where Nelson Mandela's current house is. It was massive but just as massive as the rest of the houses in the area. Anywhere with any money has huge walls and electric gates and fences, to us it seems a lot like living in a prison. They also have security systems with armed response teams! Then we drove to see his offices as well. Then into the city where we had a drive about and I held onto the car door handle s nobody could try and open the door, it was awful and dirty and very scary looking just lots of poor blacks on the streets. Next we went to Constitution Hill which is an old prison where they kept prisoners up until about 10 years ago. It was really interesting, we had our own guide and he was really good. The prison was built for 900 people in the black cells and 900 in the white cells even though this was at least twice the size. The prison was closed due to overcrowding as in the black cells they were housing in excess of 2000 people. Nelson Mandela and Ghandi all served time here. They had some really interesting things like blanket sculptures prisoners had made and all the meal pots where whites, coloureds and blacks all received different meals and people would change their surnames to get more food. It was a really sad but interesting place. We also visited the Constitutional court which was built using bricks from parts of the old prison, bringing the past into the future, it was really cool. Next we went over Nelson Mandela bridge to the Top of Africa, which is basically a huge tower over the city which was scary as the lift shook and Im sure I saw locks on the windows at the top that you could just open! Then we went for a drive through Hillbrow basically a really rough area where there are loads of Nigerian drug dealers, that time the door actually got locked even thought the guide said you shouldn't as it shows you are scared. At night we had few drinks with some people from our hostel, best of all way Pam though, another new friend from New York who actually works wardrobe in the movies, so that made for a great nights chat as we all love movies! She had actually met Robert De Niro amongst a million others and said he was very nice, so at first I hated her but I got over it lol! Also the hostel bar had cider which is more than bars in the States had and Craig's duty free bottle of whiskey to share with locals was also gone in a oner but a good night was had by all lol! Also I checked Facebook on the off chance that I might be able to find my friend Andre who lives here that I worked in the hotel with and it paid off and I found him so we are going to meet when we are back in Jo'burg after our tour. Next day we had booked a day tour to Apartheid Museum and Soweto Township, we felt a bit fuzzy but got up and out early. This guy didn't know we had seen Nelson's new house so took us here and it was here that I almost died, not literally though lol!! We were waiting at some lights and this wee old black man opened the door to come in the van and the guide had to shout at him that he was not a taxi and it was behind but at the moment when he opened the door I though this is what my Dad is talking about , I'm going to die lol!! First we went to the Apartheid museum which is all about the era when the government segregated people by the colour of their skin and then how the likes of Nelson Mandela fought for a free country, it was quite a sad place because blacks were being treated like lesser people as recently as 15 years ago! It was a lot of reading and we were not really in the mood but we had a good look at most of the stuff. House of Bondage looks like quite a good book to read if you are interested. After this we got back in the bus and were now joined by a white South African family and a Norwegian couple who were all really snobby! After lunch we drove to Soweto which is the oldest ghetto in the world, there are 4.5million people who live here and 4 of those people are white and only stay there as they dated blacks and their families disowned them. Nobody here has fences as everyone knows not to steal here as the residents just blow a whistle and lots of neighbours will come and kill you. People do actually have nice houses here, then there are the hostels and government housing and then the slums. First we went to The Hector Pieterson museum. In 1967(I think) lots of school children started a rally as they did not want Afrikaans language to be necessary in school and when they came across the police they opened fire on all the children and Hector was one of the first killed and there is a famous statue of his friend carrying him and his sister at his side. After this we went by Nelson Mandela's first ever house which is being turned into a museum but was under construction, we saw his ex-wife Winnie's house though and the Arch Bishop Desmond Tutu house aalso. Next we went to Regina Mundi church where there were some people singing in the church choir, this was also where some of the students hid during the raid and you could see the police bullets in the roof. Last we went to visit a traditional shanty town, which to be honest I hated, it was sad and disgusting and it felt so degrading. A guy who lives there took us round for a wee tour and all the little kids were following us and then he took us to a little house where a woman lived with her husband and 4 kids, it was tiny, one room with a wee kitchen off it and one double bed and one single, they don't have any electricity or toilets and the government give them no help, there is no dole and some people have been waiting longer than 10 years for a house. It was really embarrassing and awkward, it felt like we were kind of being like the rich white tourists come to poke fun at their misfortune. The Norwegians on our tour were taking photos of her and her house and the white Afrikaans girl asked her when she built her "shack" it was horrible then we had to give her money and only two of us did, I felt so bad for her, it was so degrading. Then we were shown round some more of the place and it was smelly and horrible, Craig filmed some of it on the camcorder and then showed it to the children and they loved it. They all wanted you to take their photo and then when they had finished talking to you they all wanted you to give them something. Then at the end we had to give the guide some money and there were lots of guys selling stuff and its all really nice but I already bought a canvas painting at the Hector Pieterson museum and I don't really have much room and don't want to have to post stuff quite yet, it's a shame as they have nothing and are really persistent! After that we had to drop off everyone first as we said we didn't mind and it was from or hostel so we dropped of the family first and they lived in a huge estate with walls and security guards to let you in and then all the houses were walled I as well, we didn't like them very much as they seemed to think they were above everyone else so Craig said loudly "Wow its like a prison in here" lol! Next we dropped the couple in Pretoria which was nice to see as we are not going there so our guide took us round some of the sights on the way back, the parliament building is beautiful. When we eventually got back we just wanted to relax but there was a bus full of German girls in and they were so rude, we said hello and they all ignored us and then had the TV on full volume half the night and didn't move ut your way or anything when cooking, so irritating. I remember on The WhitSundays the skipper saying "If there are any Germans you are actually allowed to speak to other nationalities" lol and that's what it was like. I was so shattered I got to sleep instantly anyway. Yesterday we got up and tried to get our bus tickets printed out but all the Germans were demanding Aaron to do things for them and then the printer stopped working so we eventually got to the station without a reservation. Some guy helped us to the desk for a tip which I was quite glad of as its right in the middle of the city and well scary. Some guy asked me for some money in the station and I said no and he left and that's the most I was ever hassled. We decided to get the overnight bus instead of a 7 day pass thing as by the time we got to Cape town we would have had no time there before we had to go back. So we got an 18 hour bus which was amazing, 180 degree reclining seats and a rinks service on board. They had great music it was so funny like what you hear in Poundies, people singing other peoples songs like a karaoke lol. It was really good apart from the white Afrikaans old guys who got on at Bloemfontein and spoke loudly continuously. We thought we were not going to get a proper food stop but we did and had a Wimpey and then went to sleep. Then at 3am the guys were loud so I turned round and told them to keep it down and slept the rest of the way, a surprisingly great sleep. This morning we have arrived in Cape town which seems really nice, the hostel is nice and clean with free wifi for the laptop too. We are covered in bites though, Craig has a hugely swollen forearm from something and I have what we think are ant bites all over my hand, its great lol! We think we are going to visit Robben Island, go cage shark diving (Craig's idea - not mine), up table mountain and maybe for some wine tasting. We really like it here it is a nice breath of fresh air, feels much more like we are travelling again and now with a bag with wheels woop woop!!Hope you are all well. Lots of LoveEva and Craig xxx