Stupid Americans and their Laundry Baskets

So there’s one major drawback to life here: we can’t leave the African Leadership Academy unless we go on a special school trip, and it’s tiny. All of the buildings that concern us surround a single quad that’s about half a frisbee-throw across. I know that because I massively overestimated its size the other day, and almost brought my lifetime “discs to a teacher’s face” tally to two. For those of you who know her, Ms. Zia was number one.

But worse than the small campus are the cars that we see driving past it. They are a tantalizing reminder of the freedom that our friends in college are enjoying. The first time I saw those cars, I began plotting my escape. Maybe I could pole vault over the barbed wire. Maybe I could take a hang glider, or escape in the rubbish truck. (Yes, I do get most of my escape ideas from Toy Story 3). Living at ALA is like living in a goldfish bowl and watching nine year olds tap their pudgy fingers on the glass all day.

I was therefore suitably ecstatic when we visited the mall for the first time. I suspect those who witness the Rapture will experience similar emotions, because I had to stop myself from kissing the floor. Instead, I spoke in that high, almost squeaking voice that guys use when they’re delighted. “Oh my God it’s a mall! It’s a MALL! Look, it’s not a brick building! No quad! I can go wherever I want here!! OHHHHH. It’s so NICE! MAYBE they have ADAPTORS!”


They didn’t have an adaptor. But they did have other things, like laundry baskets! Gaciru, Julia and I all bought one and packed everything else (toothpaste, flip flops, Ferrero Rocher etc.) into it. For the remainder of the trip, we wandered around with our purchases in hand. We were delighted! Until we realized that we looked like fools. South Africans are cool; they wear chic jeans, and elegant canvas shoulder bags. We were three Americans, traipsing around with an L.L.Bean backpack, a fluffy New England vest, and matching laundry baskets. We were dorky tourists, but with a hint of the domestic. The South Africans looked at us with a mixture of repulsion, and judgment.


To make matters worse, the baskets weighed us down, and we had to run back to the bus with them. It was difficult to tell what the other students were thinking, but we were fairly sure it was “these foreigners are morons.”