My grandmother has the most impressive memory EVER! She has spent the last two days telling stories non-stop. I have custody of my dad's video camera in the back seat and occasionally I record some but mostly I just listen.It's kinda scary just how little I actually knew of my own family history!
Anyway, today we hung out in Windhoek, visited my granny's primary school (for the record, I loved it and if I ever have kids they're getting shipped straight over the border to a place that has hiking on the curriculum), did some museum-ing and found soup for lunch between going to see my great-grandmother's grave (she died very suddenly in 1945) and then settling down for tea and cake at a castle.
Things I have learned:
- Well an entire family history in great detail. I knew vague details but coming back here has kicked my grandmother into memory lane and she hasn't even begin to run out of steam. For an 88-year-old she remembers details, names, stories, relationships between random people, the colours of the flowers on the mantelpiece.... EVERYTHING.
- That my grandmother who has always been incredibly neat and tidy and gentle and conservative etc etc can giggle like a little kid when telling stories of childhood mischief.
- There was childhood mischief. Who knew/
- Windhoek is really pretty. There are flowers everywhere, it is clean and well maintained, the people have AWESOME accents and call everything 'beautiful'
- There is free wifi all over the place.
- It is really expensive, I think the big European tourist industry has pushed the pricing up. For a simple pub-style meal (something that would be R40-R50 in Joburg) you can expect to pay at least N$70-80
- Namibian currency is... well to be honest I don't have any. 1R=1N$ and they accept south african money. Just make sure you get change in your own currency or you'll be stuck with something you can't spend.
- The girls wear the most awesome skirts. I want one. Everything is light and airy because it's so flippin' hot.
- they have WEIRD shops
- pretending you can speak German to get into the Lutheran gingerbread church because you think its pretty might just lead to you being stuck in the back row during a history-of-namibia lesson. which would be cool if you actually spoke German.
- There are German tourists everywhere. You can also eat German food everywhere
- The lizards are totally adorable!
Anyway off to the dunes tomorrow! i can't wait to see real real REAL desert! Namib here we come!
