School Holiday Highs and Lows

I’m no stranger to school breaks – I’ve been on plenty. But the school “holiday” I just finished felt rather different from all the others. For starters, it is weird to travel “away from home”, when you are already very much away from home. It’s like a dream within a dream: a vacation within a vacation. Perhaps that’s the reason for the second big difference: it was REALLY hard to come back from it all….

After an extremely relaxing and low-key Easter, I and two other PCVs spent Easter Monday at Black Rock beach not far from Kosi Bay at the northern end of KwaZulu-Natal. Seriously amazing. Weather was perfect. We had nearly the entire beach to ourselves. There were some incredible black, rock formations (hence the name) just nearby that we climbed and photographed.  Swam a bit in the Indian Ocean. Got a great tan. Ate macaroni salad and freshly picked guavas. Could not have imagined a better way to spend my last day in the area.

At Black Rock Beach on the Indian Ocean.

The "black rocks" at Black Rock Beach on the North Coast of South Africa.

We went to bed early that night (which wasn’t much of a challenge since we were exhausted from all the fun in the sand and sun), ready to travel to St. Lucia on Tuesday morning. For the first time that I can remember, traveling on public transport went without a hitch. We were just in time to catch the 6am taxi from Manguzi to Mtubatuba and we only waited 15 minutes or so to be on our way from Mtubatuba to St. Lucia. Since we planned on spending the whole day traveling, it was a welcome surprise to arrive at our backpackers by 10am with the whole day ahead of us. We had a great time exploring the little town and taking way too long for lunch at the Thyme Square coffee shop. When we stopped by Shakabarker Tours to enquire about a hippo and croc tour for the next day, but we felt so good we just decided to take the sunset tour that evening! The forecast indicated that clouds and rain were on their way, so we figured we might as well enjoy the good weather while it was available. The tour was outstanding and got us within arms reach of the mechanical hippos – just kidding, they were all very real – it was just crazy that we were able to get so close.

On the hippo tour in St. Lucia.

Turns out it was a very good thing that we got the tour in that evening because, in fact, in rained nearly the entire remaining 48 hours that we were there. And I didn’t even care. It was so great to be hanging out with other Americans and talking about all the crazy, unbelievable shit that happened at school during the first term. We also watched a few movies, took short walks on the nearby nature trails when the rain let up for an hour or so, and ate a TON of food, including sushi. Sushi! We even got to talking about our plans for school during term 2 and some of the new things we were going to try. I actually felt excited to go back to school and that my vacation did exactly what it was supposed to do – re-energize me. It was difficult to say goodbye on Friday morning, but I was headed home feeling amazing.

Sunset in St. Lucia.

And I still had one more short holiday reunion to go! One of the PCVs in my area had family visiting from the states, and they invited us to spend Friday night with them at a local lodge to end our holiday break on a high note. We watched a beautiful sunset, prepared and ate a terrific braai, took a night drive through the bush and spotted a few animals, and generally had a great time sharing stories of our different vacations. It seemed the perfect way to end the holiday.

So when I got back to my site on Saturday afternoon, I was overwhelmed by how down I felt almost immediately. I figured when I got back, I would unpack, toss all my dirty clothes in the basin to soak, organize my vacation pictures, and catch-up with my family. In reality, I really didn’t feel like doing anything. I stared at my backpack for a while, wishing it would just unpack itself. I dreaded the fact that I had absolutely no food in the house. It meant I was going to have to go to town on Sunday or eat nothing but eggs, beans, and bread for the week. Not my first choice after the gourmet dining experience I just had. And I really didn’t feel like socializing with anyone. I felt like I was moving in slow motion and there was no point to anything I was doing. It was a bizarre feeling. The rest of Saturday sort of passed by; the only thing I did was walk to the nearby shop to get some bread and some Sprite. I more or less got my clothes in a pile of things to wash, and I went to bed early. I think the only thing I said to my host family was ‘hello’. Not my best day.

When I woke up on Sunday, I tried to snap myself out of the funk by finishing my laundry and getting ready to go to town. Luckily, the sun was out, so my laundry would dry. Unfortunately, transport to town on Sundays is always a little unpredictable, and it took nearly two and a half hours of waiting and riding to arrive at my desired destination. Not fun. But in an effort to keep up a good attitude, I got my groceries, and then headed to one of the local shops to buy some shelves to help me organize all my papers. Organizing always makes me happy, so I thought I would give that technique a try. Thankfully, getting home was not quite as bad as getting there, and I when I arrived, I still had enough energy left to put together my new plastic basket shelves and arrange all my school stuff. By the time I went to bed, I was feeling a little better about waking up in the morning and heading to school.

Being back at school today was culture shock. I forgot how little English they speak at my school (not just how bad the English is, but how, in general, no one even tries to speak English throughout the course of the day.) After being nearly Zulu-free for the past week, my head was spinning from having to work so hard to communicate. And once again, I felt like I was moving in slow motion. The kids were almost comatose. The teachers said over and over how little they felt like teaching. I taught my class in the morning and spent the rest of the day looking through old papers and deciding what to save and what to throw away. I have a plan for tomorrow, but really, I’m more worried about how long this feeling is going to last. This weekend I’m going to a workshop on gardening, so it’s only a four-day week. Going to take things one day at a time… I’m sure everything will be fine in a few days. But now I know how it feels to come back from a vacation within a vacation. Next time, I’ll be prepared.