BUSHFIYAAA

A really cool man and his cousin from Joburg who me and a couple friends started chatting with outside of the bathroom on our first night. “oh I HATE America, but just from talking to you, I wouldn't think you're from there” he pronounced as soon as he heard about our origins. Everyone I've met from Joburg is a)fly as fuck and b) super honest and upfront. I love it.

A pair of recent friends, at least twenty years apart but well matched, who met at Afriburn (like burning man, but Africa, apparently) and decided to keep traveling together. The older one is a vegan from san francisco, with permanently tan skin and pleasant laugh lines etched into her skin. The younger is a voyager from Seattle who's been traveling for more than a year, draped in fabric and incredibly down to earth, she has a voice like a whale.

An exuberant twenty seven year old from Texas who hasn't lived in the U.S. for eight years, with stories that practically pore forth from his skin.

A white dreadlocked south african who I chatted about the merits of motorcycle riding in Lesotho with briefly while waiting in line for a morning cappuccino.

An out of control PCV in Botswana who spent the last five years in Philly and may love it almost as much as I do. He told me I look like the girl from 'My Girl' and spent a large part of the after-party on the final night taking me around the dance floor and screaming over the pounding house music to anyone who would listen that, “this is Vega, my actual blood sister!”

But the best interaction by far was with the very same RPCV from Botswana whom I sat next to on a bus from DC to Philly in the summer of 2012. Our brief conversation about his experiences was really what solidified my idea to apply to the Peace Corps in the first place, and here he is four years later, waiting in the line for the shower in front of me my first morning there. Amazing. 

~~A taste of the moments and experiences that I soaked up at Bushfire, a dope AF music festival in Swaziland that I went to the weekend before last. Everything I didn't even realize I was missing was there-all the craft beer, amazing food, good music, and BEAUTIFUL people. A weekend in dreamland. 

THIS!

more than 4 choices of beer?!!!!

The Nomadic Orchestra. Super fun reggae/ska from Cape Town

i have strong friends

open mic 

:) 

and then we stopped at McDonalds on the way home. First time I've gone since I don't know when was in S.A. Sostrange.

And then it was back to reality. It's winter again ya'll. Send me warmth.

Love and khotso.