Johannesburg - Day 2

Another morning, another jet lagged/confused body and another breakfast buffet. However, today we did it in matching shirt! Here is the first group picture of the Mark Day School South Africa Delegation 2014.

The itinerary today began with a driving tour of Soweto, a township of 3.5 million people. Blacks were displaced here during the apartheid. Since then, many parts of Soweto have been developed and become affluent, whereas other parts have changed little since the apartheid. The people in the more affluent areas choose to stay in Soweto, instead of moving into Johannesburg, because they see it as a source of pride. 

The 2010 World Cup Statium is located in Soweto, along with the freedom square and Nelson Mandela's home. We stopped by the freedom square, which is where the freedom charter was signed. In honor of that, the square has 10 pillars starting the basic rights blacks wished to receive; the people shall govern; all national groups shall have equal rights; the people shall share in the country's wealth; the land shall be shared among those who work it; all shall enjoy equal human rights; all shall be equal before the law; there shall be work and security; the doors of learning and culture shall be open; there shall be houses security and comfort; there shall be peace and friendship. The square also had 9 X's that presented different provinces, along with a tree native to that area. All the rights were described in detail in a free standing cone shaped room. It's so saddening that they were denied the simplest rights.

We were then treated to a traditional lunch at Sakhumuza. It was gorgeous to sit outside and try delicious chicken in curry sauce, rice with a tomato based sauce and beef sausage. We enjoyed sipping an appletizer ( a sparkling apple juice drink) and watching some young men perform some native, most likely Zulu, dances. After lunch, Nelson Mandela's house was a short walk away. His house has been turned into a museum since his passing last year. He lived humblely in a small house, until he was forced to move into Winnie's house due to safety risks and constant freedom songs be sung out front. While freedom songs sounds great, a man who is trying to change a country needs his sleep.

With about a hour to spare before we were expected at KYP, we stopped by the Peterson memorial museum. Hector Peterson was a 13-year-old boy who was shot and killed by police during a non-violent protest. The students were protesting the the implementation of Afrikanns as the main language in schools. There are nine plus native languages spoken in Soweto, but Afrikanns was a language created by the Dutch immigrants that was used in the mines for the Dutch mine owners/ bosses to be able to communicate to the black/ native workers. The language was difficult for the students, and honestly, it was destined to keep them uneducated and unable to rebel. Hector's sister said she did not want Hector to be thought of a martyr, because he was just an innocent boy caught in the cross fire. However, he still became the symbol of an unjust nation.

Our final stop of the day was our most exciting, KYP! Entering Klipptown reminded me a lot of the streets of India, dirt roads, shacks, trash, dirty water running down the roads, barbed wire on fences and lots of dirty faces.

However, every face had a smile and a hello and every door was open. We could hear the singing before we reached the gates of KYP. Hundreds of children were lined up singing our welcome. KYP was located in the center of Kilptown and consists of about four building, including a computer center, a kitchen, an office and classrooms. KYP is an after school program, which you have to apply to and be accepted to. There is currently a very long wait list. This first afternoon was mainly about introductions and having a good time! I cannot explain how friendly and warm everyone was, child and adults alike!

It left us very excited for the days to come!

Johannesburg - Day 1

Back to the blog! I can't believe I totally failed at posting at all this past year. I had so many ideas, but the excitement/ relief of having a light (ish) schedule all last year was distracting. However, I'm glad I took a little extra me time last year because I will be starting grad school in September (and I except I'll have very little time for relaxation during the next three years. Back to the now!

After 35 hours of travel we made it to South Africa!! We are meeting up with a group of about 40 parents, kids and teachers from Mark Day School (formly Saint Mark's School). Maddy and I graduated from Saint Mark's in 2010 and 2005, respectively. The little girls, Callie and Morgan, are going into 3rd grade. If you asked me if I'd every travel to Africa with some of my K-8 school teachers, I would have said no way. They again, I would have been wrong. Along with a couple other members of faculty, Ms. Becker, my first grade teacher, and Mr. Evans, my sixth grade teacher will be part of the group. Saint Mark's has been sending a delegation to South Africa every other year for the past 12 years. It started with a sister school, eSibonisweni, in rural South Africa, and has recently added a partnership with the Kliptown Youth Program (KYP), in Soweto.

Saying we were out of it when we arrived at our hotel would be an understatement. Luckily, our hotel was located directly across from Nelson Mandela square, which was filled with high end retail shops, but more importantly, food. (The placement of these shops made a lot more sense after I found out that we stayed in the wealthiest square mile of Africa, like all of Africa!) The first day was a blurr of food and sleep. (All photos in this blog post where taken by my dad, Steven Zimmerman.)

The first full day started with a delightful breakfast buffet. My only (nitpicky) complaint would be that the bacon was Canadian style. Nothing against Canada, but I like my bacon thin and crispy. Regardless, I thoroughly enjoyed my breakfast and we were all in much higher spirits after spending our first night in a bed in two days.

All of the delegation loaded into our bus with our friendly driver John and our KYP tour guide Thulani. At one point, Thulani trained to be a tour guide, therefore, he gave interesting and insightful information during our drive to the Apartheid museum. We may be all smiles in the picture below, but I promise the museum was no joke. 

I know I learned about the Apartheid in history, but I don't think I realized that it took place during my lifetime. When you are given your ticket, it says white or non-white. Depending on your ticket you have to take a different enterance into the museum. I definitely learned a lot, however, I was left feeling slightly self conscious about being white at times. This was only because of how horribly whites treated the natives and others of color. I can only hope I would have been courageous enough to stand up and fight for equal rights for all. The museum had a big, temporary exhibit on Nelson Madela. Wow. I can't imagine how great a world it would be if we had just 10 more leaders like him. He approached every situation with calm, focus, strength and passion. Many South Africans refer to him as father. Overall, I'd highly recommend visiting this museum, but be prepared for an emotional roller coaster.

After a quick lunch, we wandered around a craft market. I LOVE markets. South African craft markets definitely rank high on my market scale, because it was awesome! I was luckily enough to take home a shirt and a large beaded lion head! I can't wait to find a place for the lion head in the bedroom of my newly leased apartment.

The first day was a great way to ease into our South Africa trip and get me excited for more!

Rome - Day 1

Ello, Ello!

Long time no blog. At the end of my trip I was  getting a little tired of blogging, but I managed to put together drafts that consisted only of photos, but no words. I am now going to make my best attempt to fill in the words (two-three months later...). This first picture cracks me up. My beautiful love Arin sent me a good morning snap chat, but little did she know my ability to screen shot.

We started our day on the Spanish Steps. If I remember correctly, we slept in and had a much deserved lazy morning.

View from the top. I can say I definitely miss this. The adventure of looking out on a foreign city.

We walked to the top of the Spanish Steps then to the top of Rome! There was a beautiful big park at the top.

We wandered around the park for a while before decided to stop by a nice cafe for lunch. 

Mmmm salad. A rarity for a young traveler on a budget in Europe.

We decided to get dessert and we kept seeing these odd looking cookies. We asked the vendor what they tasted like and he said chocolate. Well, they did NOT taste like chocolate. They tasted like cardboard. We were proud of ourselves for trying something new and got a good laugh out of it.

A beautiful horsey fountain. Deserving an obligatory picture.

Arin and I were tempted to stay in Rome and pursue our modeling careers... but our parents taught us better.

Breathtaking view of Rome from the park!

We did a little shopping in the afternoon and I felt like I was right back at home in this LA/CA themed store! Little did I know that a new one was opening in the Village shopping center right as I was getting home!

All serious shoppers need a wine and appetizer break! It was moments sitting outside at a cafe sipping wine and eating cheese that made me appreciate my company the most! If I remember correctly we talked about weddings and other deep emotional girly things.

Yummm. I remember we went to get pizza from a famous restaurant, but when we got there it was closed. Tired and hungry it didn't take us long to find a little Greek restaurant. It was a nice change of pace to sleep in and end the night with some Greek food. It's crazy to look back and remember that our trip was coming to an end and our dinners were numbered at that time.

Travel Day - Siena to Rome

Last train day! We got up, packed up, had our free breakfast, figured out the bus route, got to the train station and got on the train. Exciting morning right? Well I wish I had taken a picture of our train because it was only one car long! I guess not too many people are heading to Chiusi, Italy?

We had an hour and a half layover in this little town that luckily overlapped with lunch.

We grabbed sandwiches at a little family run cafe. One of my biggest pet peeves about Italy is when they heat up sandwiches they heat up with lettuce too! So my lettuce gets all warm and gross... Luckily they made it up by have the cheapest gelato yet.

We got on our second train, but it should have been called an oven. We were all just dripping sweat while sitting still. Paige put it perfectly, "I feel like we're being cooked." Luckily my mind was playing the Lizzy Migure movie over in my head! We managed to find our hostel using poorly translated directions and Paige's map. The hostel was great and we all took advantage of our private bathroom with a raised shower! It was early evening when we ventured out to our first sight, the Trevi Fountain. 

It was pretty exciting to come around the corner and see this famous fountain. It felt a little like it was out of a movie... The Lizzy Migure movie in my case. I made my wish!

(And it wasn't to get a haircut, but I am getting one in 3 days.) Our next destination was Piazza di Popolo. We walked down the big shopping street, Via  del Corso in order to get there. I had one thing I was willing to spend money on, a maxi skirt. I have a maxi dress I love and I've wanted a skirt for a while, not to mention I need to be appropriately dressed for the Vatican! Well we passed and Zara and Paige I sprinted in! I found a great skirt that I'm super excited about! We all all of a sudden became pretty ravenous and went on the hunt of a baked pasta place my book recommended... Unfortunately it turned out it was closed and not closed on Sundays but closed closed. Luckily we walked by a cute place on the same street and popped in their. It had such cute plates. 

We started with the mixed bruschetta: tomato, white bean, liver, and prosciutto.

I ordered the spaghetti carbonaro. It was nice and peppery just the way I like it! And the bacon pieces were huge!! 

I wasn't feeling like dessert, but Magdalena was and decided to order something without hearing the Italian translation. We all thought it sounded like a fruit tart and she asked the waiter "is it good?" And he looked a little confused as he said yes. Well that's because it was actually just a fancy fruit salad.

We all burst out laughing and the waiter looked confused again. Magdalena kept saying "I want cake." But I sure enjoyed helping her finish her huge plate of fruit! After dinner we walked through Piazza di Popolo.

Then on to the Spanish steps, which were packed at night.

I also really like the ship fountain that was right in front of it.

It was a great first night in Roma!

Siena - Day 1

Bells are beautiful unless they are blaring through your window every half hour starting at 7am. We can hear the bells all the way from the Duomo on the hill, but the bells from San Domenico are SO LOUD. More unfortunate than the super loud bells was that I was definitely sick with another cold. This time my throat is fine but my nose is constantly running. I just shrugged it off and got excited for a day of sight seeing and wine tasting. We made our way over to the Duomo and got a lovely view of San Domenico and our hotel along the way.

The yellow building to the right of the church is ours! The duomo here is absolutely gorgeous inside and out.

It had all of my favorite things:

1. Cool floors

They covered up a lot of the floors with rugs I assume to prevent wearing them down, but I found this cool skull and cross bones still visible.

I also love simple, but colorful patterns.

2. Beautiful ceilings

And especially in the library!

This little room just glowed!

3. Stain glass (which I didn't get a great picture of)

It also had some sculptures by Michelangelo. He was commissioned to make a sculpture of St. Peter and he put his own face on it! So they didn't ask him to make the other 8.

I decided I want my next pet to be this thing...

I could keep posting pictures for days, but I will cut myself off there. We walked to Il Campo again, but deicided not to climb the bell tower because you have to leave all your belongings unlocked at the bottom, only 15-20 can go up at a time, no one who is scared of small spaces is allowed, etc. So we got lunch instead.

I paired my pizza with the last of the bell pepper I got at the Florence food market.

It was a really cool tie dye yellow green and super fresh. The next thing on our agenda was a chianti and castles tour! Magdalena decided to take a shower. So like I said there isn't a shower there is just a drain in the center of the bathroom and a flexible shower head/ pull around curtain. I was standing in the kitchen nook and all of a sudden I realized my feet were wet. Well the drain in the bath room must not have been working at all because it was flooding into our room! We stopped the shower and I got the woman who worked at the reception desk. She didn't speak any English and didn't understand what I was telling her. I brought her to show her and she grabbed a mob and we cleaned up all the water. However she never said anything out fixing the problem? So we were all like, well I guess I'm not showering till Rome... We regroup and met our tour group. It was us four, a young Australian couple and a charismatic couple from Texas. We all started our quite, but once we opened up it seemed like we were just one big group together. We first went to a small castle called Castigliano.

Magdalena also kindly pointed out that I have had panorama on my phone the whole time! 

What a beautiful country side! The inside of the castle was so small! Arin even found a sign that said the earliest documentation of the castle was 1126, which means it probably existed before then! The first vineyard we went to was Poggio Amorelli.

It was just as lovely as you'd expect and a very charismatic owner explained the process to us. She explained the importance of swirling the wine in the glass and swishing it in your mouth before drinking it. She also gave a generous pour.

The first wine we tired was a white wine from their other vineyard near the sea (lower elevation is better for white wines, but all vineyards are usually on hills with a rocky ground so that water rolls off instead of over watering the plants). The Vermentino IGT Marrmma, poggio barbone was a 2011 and you could even taste that it was more salty because of its proximaty to the sea. Next we tired their olio extra vergine di olvia. It thought it was pretty strong, but I was happy they brought it on more bread because I already ate the cheese, bread and meat on my plate. Then we tried a red wine called Morellino di scansano DOCG - poggio barbone. DOCG means that it is certified from this area. It was a "lighter bodied red that should not be used as a table wine." It ws made with 90% San giovese grapes and 10% marlot grapes. I thought it was nice and sweet. For the main show we tired the Chanti Classico DOCG. For it to be a chianti Classico it must be 100% San giovese grapes from this region and bare the black rooster symbol. She described it as "dry, but smooth." My favorite part came next... Balalmic vinegar!! We tried a 12 year old one, which I thought was yummy and a 20 year old one, which I wanted to marry. She said she saved the best for last which was a RIserva Poggio Amorelli Chianti Classico DOCG made with of course 100% San giovese grapes! I think it was my favorite... But who knows. The view of the vineyard outside was perfect.

Our guide dropped us off in a small town to do a quick walk through and we picked us up at the other side when we realized we lost Magdalena... I had been walking with the Australian couple and Paige and Arin was with the Texas couple so we hadn't noticed Magdalena had gotten distracted by trying on rings. Luckily she was quickly retrieved her and we were off to a beautiful panoramic view. 

Fattoria Lornano was our last vineyard. It had a gorgeous property and villa with rooms for rent and a pool with a view! 

We were able to go down into the cellars.

To give a size comparison this barrel is a renovated 100+ year old one that is still being used (the smaller ones only last about 5 years).

I won't go into as much detail about these wines, which were also great, but we learned about the same typical Chiantis (and my nose was getting progressively more and more stuffed, so my taste was decreasing).

The only one I want to specifically mention is the small bottle on the furthest right. It is a special type of wine that ages in 100% sealed barrels for many years. We tired a 2003 and it is extremely sweet and thick. It was really fun to try something new. Now I'm ready for more wine tours in Charlottesville and Napa! 

We returned to Siena and decided to make dinner. I was feeling extremely under the weather from my SECOND COLD OF THE TRIP! (I swear I don't even get sick twice a year usually!) I just wanted some comfort food... Luckily I was in the land of comfort food aka pasta. 

Peas, pasta and wafer cookies = pure happiness.

And we don't have to pay a cover charge for the best view in the house (maybe the town)!

I was feeling horrible after dinner because my sinuses were so clogged I couldn't blow in or out of my nose. It was a miracle when I found some nasal decongestant (which I thought I was out of) in my backpack. I took that and some ibepeophen and passed out.