Die Winkler

After crossing the southern border into Swaziland we drove for a while before stopping at a market place that sold candles, weavings, textiles and carvings all made in Swaziland. It was a chance to stretch our legs, have a snack or drink and do some shopping. We then carried on to our hotel in the Ezulwini Valley. We are in more remote areas now so dinner was eaten at the hotel and we visited with some of the other travellers on our tour before turning on for the night.

This morning was not quite so early thankfully, but we were still up at 6:00 am. We boarded the coach armed with our purchases for the children at the local preschool we were to visit this morning.

As soon as I stepped off the bus I was abducted by a three year old who grabbed my hand and led me into the classroom. The class has cement floors and three or four benches aligned along a couple of walls. There is no blackboard nor desks and no decorations or pictures on the walls other and a few handwritten signs on construction paper labelling a reading area (except there were no books) and a fantasy area. Gate 1, our tour provider has a foundation and they support non government run schools in many countries they travel to. While we were safariing yesterday Jason went grocery shopping for the village the school is in and they loaded all of the supplies into the bus for today's visit. We brought clothing, school supplies and toys for the kids from home so we packed these up as did many others.

The older 4-5 year old kids helped unload the provisions from under the bus, each carrying a gallon jug of water or a 10 pound sack of rice or oats into the building. Once the provisions were unloaded and we settled into the classroom we were greeted by a couple of dozen 3-5 year olds singing for us in English and Siswati, the language of the Swazi people. Meanwhile my captor had taken up residence on my lap and settled in for the long haul.

We spent about an hour at the school and my time was taken up by now two children on my lap, playing with my rings and my phone's camera. Even with no words spoken we shared some mischief and some laughter. We left the school with a stack of food, clothing, school supplies and toiletries and reboarded the bus for the next stop at a glass making factory.

The glass factory was started a few decades ago by some Swedes who taught some locals how to blow glass. It started with only a few people and now employs 70 including three of the original locals. It was actually pretty fascinating to watch them creating beautiful glasses and figurines all made from recycled glass bottles brought in and sold to the factory from all over Swaziland.

We left the glass factory and made our way north to a border crossing back into South Africa. Upon crossing we had driven across the entire country from south to north in about five hours total driving time!

Right at the border crossing we stopped for lunch and a show at a Swazi cultural centre. We ate and then were herded into a Swazi house where we learned that Swazi men always go first "to ensure there's no danger", Swazi men have multiple wives and the first wife gets "promoted" and gets to pick the second wife and so on, that Swazi men expect to be completely taken care of so the women do all the cooking and cleaning and looking after the children and finally Swazi men do not spend the night with their wives, they decide which wife gets the "privilege" of him visiting and they knock on a pole in the wive's hut indicating they are there so the wife should pretty up and crawl on her hands and knees to service the husband! If he is satisfied he will leave for his own hut, if not he heads to another wife's hut for more. I can say this did not go over too well with any of the women in our group!!

After the lifestyle lesson we watched a choir and dance group perform Swazi songs and dances and they were absolutely amazing! The harmonies and the dynamics of the voices was incredible and I've never heard 30 voices achieve the level of volume these people did. It was very impressive!

We left the cultural centre back on the coach for the 90 minute drive back into South Africa where we are staying in Nelspruit near Kruger National Park as that is our next safari bright (or should I say dark) and early tomorrow morning.Read more