My Travel Adventures

We left our hotel in Johannesburg at half past six in the morning: Joel had foresightedly booked an Uber in advance, so we did not have to wait at all (indeed, the driver waited for us while we tried to figure out how to deposit our keys after using them to open and close the main gate). We arrived at Lanseria Airport a little after seven only to find out that the car rental agency was still closed. We had seen three different opening times for the agency online and on the board outside their counter, but fortunately, we did not have to wait all that long, as the place opened at half past seven. In the meantime, Tiana and Brent breakfasted on leftover ribs while I searched – and failed to find – a SIM card. I eventually gave up and paid for Safaricom’s exorbitant roaming.

Ezra and I picked up the rest of the gang a little after eight o’clock, having been held up by the purchase of groceries and snacks for the road. Our first stop were the Sterkfontein Caves. Sterkfontein was where as many as five hundred Australopithecus and other hominid fossils were discovered, making it an incredibly valuable location for the study of human ancestors and their relatives. The individuals found by archaeologists mostly fell into the caves through sinkholes and died in the darkness, their personal tragedies fuelling scientific discoveries millions of years later.

I arrived in Johannesburg at half past two in the morning on a flight that was supposed to arrive at midnight. I was fortunate that my friend Ezra, who had agreed to pick me up, is the embodiment of South African generosity. He politely said that he had been unable to sleep, but I later found out that he had slept before I came and woke up specifically to come fetch me. He drove me to his house in the dead of the night, sliding his car back and forth at the stoplights to discourage robbers from coming to smash our windows. I asked Ezra whether anything like that had ever happened to him before, but he said it did not. He did, however, have his car stolen last year.