I just spent the past week in South Africa! It is an incredible place, and possibly one of my favourite places so far! I got to do and see so many things, but I feel like I barely scratched the surface. I think I want to go back one day.
When I woke up the first morning in South Africa, I saw this outside my window! I had a perfect view of Table Mountain. Table Mountain surrounds Cape Town, the city that we were docked in. Can you guess why it is called Table Mountain?
Here's another view of it.
Later in the week, I would hike up this mountain! It took about 3 hours and I was exhausted at the end. However, there was a cable car that took us back down the mountain in 3 minutes.
From the top of Table Mountain we could see all of Cape Town and we could even see the ship!
One day I took a train to visit a small town called Simon's Town. It is famous for a national park called Boulder's Beach that is home to an African Penguin colony! These are an endangered species of penguin that only live along the coast of Africa.
They were very cute and a lot smaller than I thought they would be, only as tall as my shin. However, you are not supposed to touch them because they will bite you!
There were a lot of cool things to see, but there were also a lot of important things to learn in Cape Town.
For many years in South Africa, people were told by the government where they had to live based on the colour of their skin. This was called apartheid. People fought to end this system but the government threw them in jail for many years. This includes a famous man named Nelson Mandela. He was imprisoned for 27 years before he was released! He then became the President of South Africa and worked to reverse all the bad things that were done during apartheid. It is important to remember that this wasn't very long ago! Mandela was elected in 1994, a year after I was born. Your parents probably remember this being on the news.
I traveled to Robben Island, the prison where political prisoners were kept for many years. I got to see Nelson Mandela's cell, where he lived for 18 years.
Something fascinating about South Africa is that there are eleven official languages! It is a very diverse place with many different people. One of the languages is Xchosa - but you don't pronounce the "X", because it is a clicking sound you make with your tongue! It is a tricky language for people to learn because of the clicks. An easy word is "molo", it means "hello"!
Is there still snow in Bancroft? It was colder in South Africa, I often had to wear a sweater, but we are now sailing closer to the equator again, where it will be much warmer again. I wish I could send the warm weather to you!
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