28 Hours in Jo'Burg

On our last night in Zambia we were checking our emails and trying to check into our flights for the following day (Livingstone to Jo'Burg and then Jo'Burg to Dar), and Arnold noticed he had received an email from the airline. They were informing us that they had cancelled our flight from Jo'Burg to Dar and graciously put us on the next flight, the following day!!! Needless to say, we were not happy. We had pre-booked (and paid for everything) for our first 24 hours in Tanzania. So our hotel rooms (one night in Dar, one night in Stone Town), our flight from Dar to Stone Town, our airport pick ups and transfter, etc etc.

After trying to do everything in our power to get us back into Tanzania for the following night, we realized that it wasn't going to happen and that we needed to start emailing the hotels and airlines and seeing if they could bump our reservations by a day and hope that we didn't lose out on the money that we already spent. After doing all that, the next task at hand was to book a hotel in Jo'Burg for the 28 hours that we were going to be there. Scary? Yes, but I have come to realize that I LOVE LOVE LOVE South Africa. It is honestly, my home away from home. After the initial dissapointment passed, I was excited to spend more time in SA even if it was in Jo'Burg. While we were in SA I got hooked on the Chai Teas from Mugg & Bean so I couldn't wait to get back and have as many as I could in the next 28 hours (which was sadly only two).

So what did we do for our 28 hours in the big ol' scary city of Jo'Burg? Well went to the movies of course - not once, but TWICE. hahah. I was too scared to venture far from the hotel and it turned out that there was a mall (that was somewhat ghetto) with a theatre in it right near us, so it all worked out perfectly. So now when people ask what I thought of Jo'Burg, I will tell them that I thought it was lovely ;)

As for the movies we saw - hahah lets just say they weren't very good. One was an Alien one - Battle of LA or something, and the other one was a local SA film "Game Drive" haha ... They were both equally bad, but it was really nice to go watch a movie - sort of felt like we were back home.

One last thing worthy of being mentioned, is at the mall they had an ice rink, yep an ice rink, right in the middle. Arnold nearly died. There were a bunch of (old) guys playing hockey when we were there - exactly like Arnold does back at home with all the boys. He wanted to put on skates, right then and there and jump on the ice with them. While we were waiting for our shuttle after the movie, one of the guys came out with his hockey bag with a big "Hockey Canada" patch on it - Arnold's face was priceless.

So that was how we spent our last 28 hours in SA and in Jo'Burg. Turned out not so bad after all.

Love Melissa and Arnold