Some more thoughts about Monday, February 23

After the teachings of Impact Day, we fed the 300 plus people who were there. Jennifer had found a place where they sold what we might call pot pies, but they were wrapped in flat bread instead of in a tin. They were more than what we would call a wrap. We had one, and they weren’t too bad until someone asked what was in them. I won’t tell you what was in them, but they were called Kidney Pie.

After this, we went to take back the dinner baskets for the Kidney pies, and saw one of the main shopping markets for Qwa Qwa. This was a 4 city block area which serves as a main shopping area for 1.8 million people. There were a lot of open air places, and many of the things for sale were old and used. One vendor sold electronics, however, they were mostly radios from the 1960's. There were some in his pile that I remember seeing when I was growing up. The poverty was great there. It would have to be with over 75% unemployed. It looked like many of the people would bring things in to sell on the ground and then they would pack it all up with them when they left.

What are the prices like in South Africa? We were surprised that food costs were very good. Soda pop was 50 cents a can. We got ice cream cones at Kentucky Fried Chicken for 25 cents. And the chicken was good, not quite the same as KFC in America, but it was good. I had a 600 gram T-Bone steak (16 oz) meal for $5.50. However, you order your meal and when it is ready they bring it out to you. How is that different from the USA? Well, sometimes the meal comes out in 5 minutes (rarely), sometimes in 10 or 20 or 30 minutes. There is nothing in South Africa that we could compare to fast food. They seemed to be on their own time.

And there are people walking everywhere. They were alongside every road we traveled. Most of the time, there were a lot of people as this picture shows.

I already mentioned the weather, and this Monday was typical for the time we were there. Becca spent more time outside than the rest of us did on Monday and she got sunburned. It went from 53 degrees, to somewhere near 80. Then on our way back to Thrive, it started to rain and turned cold again. We would wear clothes in layers, starting off wearing them, then carrying them, then putting them back on as the sun started to set.