"Cause all I see is a tower of dreams. Real love burstin' out of every seam."

Work has been pretty slow going this week. With Sifiso out this week because of his grandmother passing away, waiting to get back registrations from the mentors and limited work to be done, not a lot has been happening. Let me go over the highlights from each day, though.

Lwazi's cousin has been staying with us this week. He's in his final year of university in Durban studying engineering. He has taken the car and made it his baby. He has washed it, cleaned the interior and has been the driver all week. I decided to use this to my advantage. On Monday, after my run, I asked him if he would teach me how to drive manual. My past two attempts to learn (thanks Amith, Dennis and Billy) have not left me confident. Plus, this is driving on the other side of the car. He agreed and we went out. It was slow going at first. But after a while...it was still slow going. Like most things in life, practice makes perfect. I do feel more confident driving manual and on the right side of the car! After the lesson, we had to go into town to pick up Thandazo. I came along, still wearing my running shorts and flip flops, thinking it was going to be a 5 minute trip. When we arrived in town, Lwazi was also there to be picked up. Great, two birds with one stone! Lwazi got behind the wheel and started driving in an opposite direction of home. After 5 mins of clearly driving out of town I asked where we were going? Lwazi laughed because he thought I knew. We were heading to Richard's Bay (an hour away) to meet Thandazo's brother to exchange a car battery. I then realized this was going to be a lot longer than a 5 minute trip. 5 hours later we pull in back home! Our trip included going to the wrong place, stopping at a fast food place called Wimpys, going to Thandazo's village to pick up her kids (an hour trip on a dirt road at night with patches of fog), dropping them home and finally getting back. Oh and I got the 995th bug bite on my thigh along the way because I was wearing running shorts. Went straight to bed after that.

There were two highlights from Tuesday. The first was that I bought some clothes! Not just any clothes, I must say. I purchased a traditional Zulu outfit. It comes with pants, a vest and...head gear. That is all I will give away. The outfit is for a coworker's pre-wedding party in a week. There will surely be plenty of pictures taken so you will all just have to wait until then to see what it looks like. The second was making rice, daal and keema (rice, lentils, ground beef). Daal turned out very close to mother's recipe. The keema...way off. The tomato paste, like ketchup and other tomato products, has a sweet taste to it. It didn't taste bad, it was just different. The best part was the abundance of green chilis in this country. I was able to enjoy two hot ones with my meal.

Yesterday was a pretty low key evening. Lwazi has gotten me into the daily soap opera here that comes on at 8 pm called Generations. Last night episode was CRAZY! One guy found out his father isn't his biological father. Oh yeah, he's engaged but sleeping with another main character. A receptionist who is in a relationship with her boss is taking advantage of it. The boss isn't happy with it. Let's not forget the 50 year old woman who is trying to make it into the music business but at the recording studio, everyone tells her that her songs aren't cool enough. Thank God for subtitles because I wouldn't get any of it.

This Saturday we will be attending the funeral for Sifiso's grandmother. Apparently drinking and eating will be involved. I like how things are done around here.

Today marks the four week mark of my trip. I am a third of the way through. I've had many great experiences and hopefully there will be many more to come.