“There’s no need to hurry, when we have curry!”

Version of the Durban slogan, city with the highest population of Indian people outside of India.

With Easter break being our first opportunity for vacation, we decided to go to Durban: relatively close to Lesotho, can be reached using public transportation, and has a beach with warm weather (similar climate to Southern California). I’m glad we made that choice for this 5-day trip and my first time exploring South Africa.

Right after training, I spent a day in Lesotho to rest, repack, and just get my bearings together before traveling again. The next day, we woke up early (6am) to cross the border into South Africa and take a taxi from Ficksburg to Durban. Crossing the border took about 10 minutes. Once we were in South Africa, however, it took over 5 hours to wait for the taxi to fill up before leaving for Durban. The ride was about 6 hours and we finally made it to Durban at around 7pm. I’m so glad we had that one day to relax because I was able to bear the travel without getting too stressed out.

We stayed at a hostel, the Happy Hippo, just a block away from the beach and close to shops and restaurants. About 15 of the PCV’s who went to Durban stayed there – we didn’t all do everything together, but it was nice to run into each other and be able do different activities with different groups. This was my first time in a hostel, and I’m pretty sure that community bathrooms have never felt so luxurious. Just having electricity, running water, and a flushing toilet was a vacation on its own. But fortunately, we also got a chance to explore the city.

I went to the beach every day that I could. I can now say that I‘ve been in the Indian Ocean.  I don’t know if there is a huge difference but the water was warmer than in California. The weather was warm and sunny, the sand was soft, and the water was nice.  I would have been happy staying there all day every day, but we had to eat.

In Lesotho, we make almost everything from scratch, so when we get a chance to go out and have almost anything we want, we have to take it. Because of the huge Indian influence, we had to have Indian food – it was amazing. Durban’s well known twist on Indian food is called “bunny chow”, which is a bread bowl with curry inside of it. Such a good idea. We also went to a waffle house and I ordered a twist on chicken and waffles as curry chicken and waffles. The other things that we had to get that people missed from America included brunch, sushi, and Thai food – all pretty good. The Mexican and other Asian foods were something to be desired, but we definitely got our fill of things that are not accessible in Lesotho.

 At the end of our vacation, I was relaxed and ready to go back to school!