Jen actually IS in Africa!

It was 48 actual hours from my first takeoff to my last landing. I might have my kids calculate distance traveled as an exercise. They can use some trig to figure out how many kms shorter it would have been if I’d flown direct from New York to Johannesburg rather than through Dubai. But, I digress.
All made it safe and sound. The group was 21 people ages 18-30 – pretty good odds if you ask me. There was only one case of lost luggage and that was back in the states. Also, no luggage appeared to be rifled through, except for good ole Homeland Security in a few instances.
I watched 4.5 movies and fitfully slept the rest of the time. For the first time in a very long time I was stuck in a middle seat on both the 12 hour and 8 hour flights. Emirates is pretty plush, though, I have to say. The Dubai airport was interesting, particularly the Irish pub that played country music and charged $12-$15 USD for pints. But 7 hours in one artificially lit place is just too much, especially from 8pm to 4:40am.
At long last we arrived in the proper hemisphere, landing in Johannesburg. We had much less time to explore and essentially went straight through (not without receiving nifty SA stamps in our passports though). We then boarded a much smaller (by Emirates standards) plane and took off for Namibia, and it wasn’t long before we were flying over obvious desert. I knew Namibia was an empty place, but flying over the southern half definitely confirmed that. I felt like crying and hollering “whoo hoo!” when we landed, both in celebration of a long journey finally ending. My luggage came out of the carousel first so I was stamped and breathing African air in no time.
It was a 40 minute bus ride from the airport to our accommodations, a hostel in the capital city, Windhoek (pronounced Vind-hook). I was surprised at how large it is, but I’m told you can easily drive across it in 10 minutes. We were all knackered, to say the least, but had an hour meeting, then dinner, before passing out (in my case, for 12 hours).
Our first full day consisted mostly of training at the hostel, but we were taken for a walking tour through town. Unfortunately the cell phone that I needed to get that is also going to work as a modem for my laptop required a taxi ride to another store, so I had to put it off until later in the week, and there was no time left for internet café-ing.
Today (June 3) I've made it to the Internet, obviously. I'm feeling a little bit more at home in town now that I've gotten to make two trips. Things in the capital feel a lot like any modern-ish city. There are shops, cafes, traffic (left side driving and walking!). It's quite cool in the mornings and rather warm (hot actually) during the afternoon. The sun sets pretty early (5:45).

Some translations/references so far:
1 beer (Windhoek Lager) = $10NAM (80 cents USD)
30 min internet = $10 NAM
Now = "Now Now Now" (if you just say "now" that means probably never. "now now" means soon. "now" actually means now, or very soon.)

I'm hopefully going to have a phone and internet on my computer on Friday. I will post my number when I get it, plus instructions for calling/texting.

Until next time...