Improvise.

We have finally arrived at the place that will be our home for the next 5 & ½ weeks. We are staying in the flat up top LEAP 3 in Linbro Park right outside Alexandra. Our plane got in around 2:00pm, and a whole fleet of LEAP students and LEAPSAs came to fetch us. They gave us a little tour around the school, and at last, I started to feel like home.

I told Piladi I hadn’t felt that way since arriving a week and a half ago. The school sits on probably an acre of land (I do not know what an acre is… but it’s a big lot) and there’s a soccer field, a barn, and a few stables in the back. The trees and plants are all things I know the names for, like Jacaranda and Eucalyptus and Ivy and Hydrangea.

Tumelo picked us up around 5:30 to get a few essentials, but everything at the mall was closed. We did manage to find some hot water bottles to heat up our beds, because it is very freezing here. We made dinner out of what we had – omelettes with tomatoes, individually wrapped cheese slices, and lunch meat – and then we set up an entertainment system in Kristin’s and my room with pieces of a futon, a comforter, lots of pillows, and Mike’s laptop. We watched two episodes of True Blood before curling up with our hot water bottle babies and getting to sleep.