A Really Long Flight Well Worth It

These past two and a half weeks or so have been some of the most exciting of my life. Let’s start with the flight, the flight was exciting for the first and last hour I was on the plane. The other fourteen hours were pretty brutal. When I arrived to Port Elizabeth and stepped on the tarmac I immediately fell in love with this continent. There’s something about it that’s really hard to explain, this place from the second you get here tugs on something inside you and the more you experience the harder it tugs. The Taxi which picked me up from the airport drove me directly to the monastery with other college age students heading to Rhodes University. The hour drive from PE was incredible, we past many game reserves where we drove by giraffes, zebras, monkeys, buffalo and many other animals. It was really too bad that I had just finished a total of 18 hours in the air or otherwise I would have stayed awake for it.

When I was woken up by the other passengers we were pulling in to the Monastery which is on the outskirts of Grahamstown imbedded in the hills. It is by far the most tranquil place I have ever been. This picture below is taken of the monastery from across the valley, and is the view you have driving to it from Grahamstown.

I was met by one of the brothers, I asked to see the school and we headed on up to the after school program were I met some of the other teachers including Matt Kellen a Former Yascer from Spokane, Washington, and Liz Haney a volunteer from Rhodes University. Liz is from the Greater Boston area and goes to BC. She is currently on exchange here with many other International students. I also got to meet the kids! I will be working with the older group of students who mostly fall between the ages of 15-17. There hysterical, they can be a bit of “smart allecs” but there very bright kids and I really look forward to working with them. This is a picture of three of my students in the older class, there doing what they do best …ignoring me!

The next day I got to move into my ,which is awesome! I love the place. My roomates are great. Three of them are from the Eastern Cape and have taken it on themselves to teach me the language isiXhosa which is the native language here and something i need to become familiar with as soon as possible. The house is located practically on the Rhodes University campus, which is both beautiful and filled with different activites for someone my age. I have made a bunch of new friends from all over the world who are either students at Rhodes or exchange students. There is just so much to do here and I am having the time of my life. I promise the next entry wont take nearly as long as this one took to post. thanks again to everyone whos made this trip possible and supported me this whole time.

Still Walking,

Robby Hooper

Happy Birthday Joey and Haley!!!!!!!!!!