Garden Court South Beach Durban

... to split our journey and boarded a minibus for Swaziland, about 1/3 of the way to Durban. It was a miserable day (I think I cursed ourselves bragging about summer last time) and we had our bags getting wet in a trailer on the back - just as we were about to leave a lady near us started to shout and point to her bag. We're not exactly sure what happened but think she was accusing someone of ateling her purse ...

Here I am again with some pictures for you. I will be going to Umlazi on Wednesday to stay and will meet my Zulu friends. I cant wait to see my friend Precious who I met when she was 13 and now she is 18. Having a very good time, although the weather is very weird, really hot for days, then it goes cold.<br>

Considering that I have spent the greater part of my life in South Africa, I thought it only appropriate to start off with a homeage to it first before going off to my travels...not quite a good-bye...but more a "I will be ...

... place. Also the guide book we had was saying that it was all tower blocks and promenades and didn't have much positive to say about it. We had the opposite impression. We loved Durban. It just seemed a more 'lived in' city than Cape Town did. The people were as friendly but in more of a genuine way. The promenade was there and so were the tower blocks but the whole place was set off by the great beach that's just on the doorstep to the city. Also, the ...

... and 4 year old girl only spoke Zulu. They were such a great family, and they even gave us Zulu names! Mine is Nontokozo, which means gladness (all Zulu names have literal meanings, so it would be like someone's name was literally Gladness, or Flower for example). Monday we shadowed some home-based care givers on their rounds to various sick people in the community. This organization is really inspiring, it is a group of dedicated women who ...

... had indicated their acceptance and approval, the young man set up a white flag outside his hut, indicating his plan to marry soon. In the interests of diplomacy, close relatives of the two families undertook the negotiations for the bride price (lobola). Polygamous marriages were common, and a man could take as many wives as he could afford. The lobola was paid in the form of cattle - with the minimum being 11 ...

... while we were in Durban. Afterwards a few people came back to my mothers flat for tea and to chat. Then we, along with our cousins, John and Tessa and Katie (Kim was missing), and Susan's business partner Grant and Tracey, went for lunch somewhere my Dad would have really enjoyed, Buds on the Bay, a restaurant on the quiet side of the harbour and Durban Yacht Club in a really beautiful setting.

... she laughed, "It's true, though," she said, straightening her face, as if to emphasise that this wasn't merely a joke, "they can climb over anything, like these fences, and they can even climb a tree if they are running away from you." Feeling very uncomfortable with this conversation, especially as a black man was seated not three metres away, I quickly changed the subject, asking her where in India she was from. She replied that she was from Bombay, and moved here with her ...

... work on HIV related health. It was an impressive building that buzzed with activity. The level of research taking place within those walls was inspiring, and really showed the complexity of dealing with disease. But what about TB? How does that factor in, and is anyone interested? It's a difficult question to answer. Of course TB is important, it kills millions of people each year and is spread so easily, passing from person to person through the ...