Following a grueling 16 hour flight from Atlanta to Johannesburg, we arrived to our host families a bit tired but certainly excited to meet our hosts and see much of the city. The Upfold family and our other host, Pierre Van Der Westhuyzen, greeted us at the airport and took us to their home in the suburbs of Johannesburg. When we arrived, the Michaelhouse students were on a break from school, so they were able to show us around the city. We took a bus tour through Soweto, an urban area of the city which showcases much of the history of apartheid, still very much evident in the culture of South Africa. We also had the opportunity to stay with the Upfolds for one night at the Zebula Game Reserve, where we got to know Richard and Pierre, our hosts, and one of their friends, Gus. It was the night at Zebula where we first got to experience a South African ‘Braai,’ which is similar to a barbecue or a cookout. 
After three days in the Johannesburg area, we took a flight to Cape Town, where we met up with our other host family, the Van Der Westhuyzens. The family welcomed us in, and we quickly got to know Pierre’s brother Luc as well as his parents. On the next day, we drove around the coast of Cape Town, enjoying the beautiful scenery and working on our South African slang, saying “Yoh” and “lekker” throughout the drive. Over our last few days in Franschhoek outside Cape Town, we went to a Bastille street festival and played Richard, Pierre, and Luc in basketball.
We traveled to Michaelhouse in the midlands of KwaZulu-Natal on a Monday at the start of their second term, and immediately went to chapel. Everyone else was dressed in their "Number One's" which is their dress pants, coat, Michaelhouse tie, and Michaelhouse sweater, while we were just wearing our casual clothes or "civvies". The next morning, we got our school uniforms, athletic clothes, and other Michaelhouse gear. In terms of school uniform, Michaelhouse is different from MBA because everyone has to wear a uniform. We got our room in the Baines boarding house, where we got to know other students at the school, playing ping pong tournaments and watching soccer games. For the first few days, we followed Nathan Bau, who went on exchange to MBA last year, around to his classes, though we quickly chose our own set of classes to go to. We attended English, IT (a computer class), Art, Economics, and Afrikaans, which was especially interesting to us even though we could hardly understand anything of the language. Overall, the classes were very similar to MBA, with much of the same humor between students and teachers.
A normal day would start at 6:30 with roll call and breakfast from 6:45 to 7:15, followed by classes until 9:40. Then, similar to MBA, we had a break, where students would often walk down to the Tuck Shop, where we got snacks, candy, drinks, and slushies. After break, we had more classes and lunch until 2:05. After school, Brown went to soccer and Matt went to golf with the school teams. We were both able to play in sports matches while we were there, with Brown’s holding an undefeated record with 4th team soccer and Matt’s having one loss with 1st team golf.
For our last weekend in South Africa, we went to a game reserve called Nambiti about two hours away from Michaelhouse. We went with the other exchange students from Michaelhouse including two from Australia and one from Scotland. We got there at about 12, ate lunch, and then went on our afternoon game drive. We were on a mission to see the “Big Five” which were lions, leopards, Cape Buffalo, Elephants, and Rhinos. We went on three more game drives after that afternoon game drive. Sadly, we only saw four of the Big Five because the leopard is so elusive. While we did not see a leopard, we got to see cheetahs, hippopotamuses, zebras, giraffes, and wildebeest up close.
The day after the safari at the Nambiti game reserve, we went with the exchange students at three local schools to the coast in Durban for shark diving. Once we had learned about safety and had our wetsuits on, we went out on a boat five miles off shore and attracted sharks before we jumped in with our snorkel gear. Though it was a bit frightening, we certainly enjoyed getting up close with the Oceanic Blacktip sharks, and it was nice to get to know some of the other exchange students from around the world. After this trip, we enjoyed our last few days at the school, and we reluctantly left our exchange hosts and returned home.
We would like to thank the Warner family, Mrs. Scholer, Mr. Gioia, our host families, and everyone else who made this exchange possible. The Upfolds and Van Der Westhuyzens were wonderful hosts and took us in as their own. It was a wonderful experience, and we are extremely grateful for such an opportunity.
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