Day 3: Sightseeing and a South African Brownie meeting

After a long sleep we were all feeling refreshed and ready for our first day of sightseeing in South Africa. We set off at 9 am on our first adventure, with Pretoria, the political capital as our first destination. Petra and Claudia (our guides) gave us an introduction to South Africa on the way. We arrived in the beautiful city and saw the Palace of Justice and the Union buildings. Every member of the group found Pretoria incredibly interesting as it was full of history and interesting places. We were then  treated to a whistle stop tour of Jo'burg where we could to see the city from a far and were all shocked by the amount of development.  From the bus we could see the two different skylines that were formed during the apartheid. After a short lunch, we were then taken to Soweto, the township to the South West of Jo'burg. It was not what we expected, as there was a mall, taxi rank and properly built houses. Petra explained that once the black people had earnt enough money they built "proper" houses. After a quick drive we arrived in Kliptown, the poorest area of Soweto. We visited a youth project called SKY( Soweto Kliptown Youth). This was where we had the honour of meeting Brother Bob, who set up the project. He was an inspiration to us all. He took us on a tour of the township. This was very emotional for most of us as we were surrounded by the worst conditions. However we were all delighted by the happiness of the children as they were happy to be with us and sang us their national anthem. On arriving home from our day out we were greated by some South African Teddies (Rainbows) and Brownies. They taught us some songs and games and we then recipricated. Every member of the group was given a little buddie and they did not leave our side. We all found this experience really useful as practice for the next part of the adventure. Our wonderful tour guides stayed for dinner and we were lucky enough to ask some more questions. They really understood us and told us exactly what we wanted to know. After the group session, MG and EOK stayed behind and had a long chat with Petra and Claudia which gave them an incredible insight into all things South African. We were all asleep by 11pm, ready for our late start in the morning. 

KC and EOK