All the Little Children



Tuesday we had invited all the people in our group over to the orpanage in Roodepoort to meet the kids and have breakfast with us. They had had a late night before so only half of them made it, but the kids loved them so much for coming. They may have loved the breakfast tacos that we had for breakfast more, but they love meeting new people and they really love giving them tours and singing for new people. They are used to me a little bit now since I've been staying there for about a week. But in the mornings when I come in from my run, they still wonder who I am and why I'm out of breath. "Auntie Karla... what were you doing? Were you racing?? did you WIN??" So Tuesday morning and into the afternoon we all just played and spent time with the kids. Then they went down for a nap and we headed up to Pretoria.

Two of us dropped the other four off to the Paraguay v Japan game. Then I headed out to the Pretoria zoo which is supposed to be one of the top 10 in the world. While the actual grounds of the zoo are not that impressive, it did have a cable car ride to the top of a large ridge and as you walk down, you see most of the animals. They also have a ton of different species. Lemurs, lots of birds, lions, tigers, about 6 different kids of deer and bok, lots of different kinds of monkeys, and hyenas, which were so close to me I was really uncomfortable (they are much bigger than I remembered them to be in The Lion King, the source of most of my knowledge of Africa). I really like zoos in general and this was a great one. Lots of the animals were active, there was nobody there, and I got to see way beyond what I would normally see in a zoo in the States. After the zoo we got to experience rush hour in Pretoria which was not awesome, but I am glad I got to see the captial city and all it's hustle and bustle. Those are the two words I could use to describe Jo'burg as a city as well. It's very go go go. Today we are heading out to the bush and Kruger National Park to go on safari for a few days. Hopefully there will be more good wildlife photos coming your way soon. But there's no internet in the bush so I'll see you all in a few days.

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