It’s been two days since we left Johannesburg, and man, are they excited about the World Cup! It’s not even until next summer! The bus ride to Lesotho was 8 hours long, but we made the best of it. We even saw two rhinos on the way! Eventually we got our music working and played twenty questions to pass the time, all the while enjoying the incredible scenery. When we stopped for lunch most of us had a new experience, we had to pay to use the restrooms! We found out that this is a pretty common practice. When we were about 2 hours out of Lesotho one of the buses got a flat tire. We thought it was going to set us back for a while. Thanks to the drivers and their expertise, we were back on the road in no time.

After two full days of travel, we pulled into Thorns where we had an absolutely amazing welcoming crew! About 30 children from the village were screaming and waving, and were just ecstatic about our arrival. It’s unreal to see the poverty surrounding us, but at the same time, the utter joy and happiness of these children. We have yet to meet a child that doesn’t have a smile on their face. The kids are so eager to hug, hold hands, tell you their name, and ask you to be their friend. After a first meal of chicken, rice, and vegetables, we walked outside and were completely overwhelmed with how many stars we could see! It’s so clear and the stars are so bright; it’s honestly breathtaking.

This morning some of us went for a run and the excitement still hasn’t died down. The kids swarmed us and overtook our ipods. They knew all the latest songs better than we did! After we got back from our run some of us got our Lesotho names. After breakfast we left for our worksite. The view on the drive there was so beautiful. There are so many kids wandering around, it’s nice to see how the older kids look out for the younger ones.

When we got to Little Angels, our project for the next two days, we met Kennedy who introduced us to Little Angels and explained their mission. We took a tour and saw all the paintings the past groups have done. They really did a great job. We split up into 3 groups for the day: green house building, painting, and working on the irrigation system. While we were working on the green house we met a German man named Sven. He and his wife left Germany on their bicycles one day looking for people to help. Who knows how long later, they ended up here in Lesotho, by bike! There’s also these aloe vera plants everywhere that are about 6 feet tall. They’re huge! Later on in the day, the children performed dances for us. The girls had their own dance where they wore skirts with bottle caps attached to strings of fabric that made fun sounds as they danced around. As the boys sat around and admired the girls’ dance, they got ready for their own where they stomped to the beat of a traditional African drum. The dance was one of the cutest things ever!

After our first day of work we were all exhausted. We came back to Thorns and had a guest speaker lecture us on the politics of Lesotho. Shortly following, we had a brief meeting going over the days’ experiences, and then dinner was served. We are all so excited to return to Little Angels tomorrow where we will finish the garden and the greenhouse. We are a bit worried we will be sore tomorrow from all the hard physical labor. Thankfully, we sleep on what amounts to massive heating pads so we should be all set. We will be in touch soon and keep the comments coming!

P.S. Pictures will be coming soon!