Rainbow Homestead! And a few pics from Chatsworth!

Just a brief section about my Chatsworth Homestay about a month ago. Casey and I stayed with an amazing family for a nice weekend in the Indian community of Chatsworth. Here are some photos!

This next section of my blog is made up of 3 sections. Section 1. For those of you who don’t care that much. has a brief overview with some fun pics.

Section 2: for those of you who are slightly more interested in my life

And Section 3: for those of you who are obsessed with me

Enjoy.

Section 1:

            For the past 3 weeks, I decided to live on an organic farm outside the rural village of Impendle. I lived with Casey and Alie in a house owned by Jill and her son Dael who lived next to another family who we worked with. Dael showed us around our INCREDIBLE new home and we soon realized that with this home come 4 adorable dogs who follow us around and demand our love.  Sam Rose and her partner Shine (in the other family) allowed us to tag along their daily routines, helping with the farm and learning about their life. I composted, planted trees, helped insulate a yurt, helped in the tree nursery, and much much more.

Throughout this wonderful experience I was SURROUNDED by nature. Every morning I would naturally wake up at 5:30 and Casey and I would go on a morning adventure. Every day was different. We hiked around the mountains, went down to rivers and found abandoned huts and other homes where we found lost treasures. It was actually amazing. Atleast one of the four dogs would accompany us every single morning. We would eat breakfast, which was always eggs or oatmeal (all of our food has to be easily preserved because we did not have a refrigerator. Then from 9-12 I would usually go down to the farm and work for Sam and Shine so that I could pick from their garden for my lunch salad! It always had about 5 different types of lettuce in it, flowers, fresh beat root, and other yummy organic vegetables. After lunch was basically free time where I would either play music, work on my ISP, listen to music, do yoga, go on a walk, or just hang out. My days consisted of everything and anything that I wanted to do for myself. It was the most amazing way to live. It was the most beautiful place to wake up to every morning and be in the middle of mountains and trees and animals, and live off the earth eating fresh leafy salads everyday that we picked from the ground.  I’ve never been in such a space where I can literally do whatever I want with no schedule, having no appointments or time frames to think of.  I woke up when my body wanted to wake up, I ate when I felt hungry, I slept when I felt tired.  My days were filled with activities that I chose to do and I was not forced or committed to anything.  The people there were so kind and generous and it was such a peaceful environment. 

It was probably one of the most amazing places I’ve ever been in my life and it has inspired me to travel to more places and volunteer like most of the workers on the land. The work in exchange for food and accommodations and it’s a cheap and great way to travel and see places you want to go. You will meet the most incredible people this way.

Section 2

We had a shower that requires us to make a fire for the donkey (burner).  We ended up failing the first few times and took about a minute walk to the outdoor solar heated shower near us.  Our electricity is all solar panels so throughout our day we take turns charging our various technological devices that we never really use and make sure the battery doesn’t drop below a certain number.  At night, if we’ve saved up enough energy, we have enough for some lights in the house, but if we don’t it’s al candlelight!

            The very first night was unbelievable.  Sam, the woman who has allowed us to live here and study her lifestyle, asked for a contribution for the communal potjie (pronounced poy-kie). This was a large stew-like pot filled with various ingredients that everyone contributed.  So for the price of 2 sweet potatoes from the three of us, we were given a DELICIOUS meal as well as a fresh picked salad from the garden! The best part of it all was that as we were chopping and preparing the potjie, it started HAILING ginormous chunks of ice and the weather was so bad we couldn’t make a fire to cook it! This sounds bad, but it turned out hilarious.  They had already made a fire for the outdoor bath that Sasha, a German man volunteering on the land in exchange for food and housing, was currently bathing in. So as poor Sasha was desperately trying to get some privacy, Sam was cooking our giant potjie right underneath him while he was in the bathtub.  It was hilarious. 

            After a wonderful evening full of laughter, arts & crafts with Oriah, the daughter, and love, we headed home on our 2-minute walk to our gorgeous house.  In Casey’s room, which is SO big and great for activities, we set up a table with incense, candles, and other small things where we sit around and share things about our day and make sure we’ve done the things on our task list.  Everyday we consciously listened to one song and made sure we did at least one yoga pose and Casey and I had to play at least one song on the guitar and ukulele. 

            The next day was our first day at work, in exchange for vegetables and their time spent teaching us things and sharing their stories for our research.  Today was a FINE day for collecting cow dung.  I must say, as gross as it sounds, it was weirdly therapeutic and oddly satisfying.  It became quite the competition to see who could find the biggest and easily grasped cow shit. After we FILLED the back of the trunk with poop, we headed back for lunch and to get ready for the party we were going to that night!

            We rode to said party in the back of the truck that had previously been FILLED with cow shit, because there were so many of us and no room in the car.   It was freezing, but well worth it.  The party had a Red Hot Chilli Peppers Tribute Concert performed by pretty good musicians.  We ended up meeting a ton of South African High School kids who were actually incredibly mature and really fun.  The whole dynamic of the party was so weird though, in a good way.  There were people of ALL ages, and all types.  Hippie dippie awesome folks, who were mostly the people we arrived with, teenage kids who were wasted and going crazy, some normal adults who were just mingling, and an insanely wasted Indian woman who was really sexual towards all the band members, and accidentally hit Alie in the face like 4 times. It was a really awesome party filled with great people, music, fire dancing, and a ton of potheads around a huge bonfire.

            We finally made it home by 3 am, which is outrageous for us, like I still can’t even believe it, I’ve been going to bed at like 830 every night.  After freezing our asses of in the back of the truck for an hour, we climbed into our cozy beds and passed out.

            The next day we took an amazing hike down to the peaceful Umgeni River where everyone jumped in and swam and we let the horses and dogs free to roam.  We made clay paste out of rocks and water and made cool designs on each other.  It was such an amazing, long day spent outside and in nature.  

           

Nov. 4

            Today Alie got a little injured so she was out for the day, and Casey went to Jo’s house, another woman who lives on the Homestead who is teaching them about herbs and different remedies.  So I was off to Sam’s house for a day on my own with the fam and volunteers.  It was compost day, so we made a huge compost that took about the whole day if you add up gathering the resources, making the manure to pour on everything.  It was hard work but Oriah, Sam’s daughter, brought us all cold beverages at one point, and it was a great opportunity to learn about the different people living here.  Dylan is awesome, he’s originally from Cape Town and has given us a million suggestions of things to do while we’re there.  He worked for a Green company and then one day realized he knew nothing about living “green” so he moved out here and works half days for the company but hopes to one day take over this land for the family and be able to maintain it himself so they can go traveling.  He just cooked his first meal EVER 2 days ago.  We are all so proud.  Hannah is here with her boyfriend from Germany, she’s really awesome.  The couple has been traveling around Africa for months and they’re returning to Germany this Thursday and are both very nervous but have no money left and it is the end of their travels.  The kids are really interesting, living each day with no real schedule, just goals that they hope to complete by the end of each day or maybe the week. Sam “unschools” them which is a type of home schooling where you try to teach what the children want to learn and not just throw basic material at them. Although there is some structure, Sam is doing an incredible job with them.

            It was nice to have a day on my own without Casey and Alie to really explore the family and their way of living.  I really got to see the family dynamic and how each day goes with garden work and projects around the house.

            I also got to have a one-on-one interview with Sam and she gave some really powerful answers.  I asked her questions about beauty and more about permaculture and the values they hold here.  It was awesome.

            At night we had a “bring and share” which in America we call a potluck.  And it had been decided not by us that we would host this at our house.  So we cooked up all the rice we had because we had to feed 10 people, made a salad entirely from their garden, made some tea, and set up some candles and headlamps attached to water bottles for better light.  It was amazing! Sam’s family brought dessert and a giant pot of beans and veggies in a great sauce. Everyone came over to our place and we had such a lovely time.  We shared stories and laughed and each said something we were grateful for.  After dinner everyone helped clean up and then we went under the stars and played music for a while before heading off to bed.

Nov. 5

Today we planted 20 yellow wood trees along a river that runs through the homestead. This was to replace the invasive species that they wanted to phase out. It was a lot of work with digging holes, mixing manure and soil with worms, and then planting the 3-year-old trees that had been growing in their “tree nursery”.  IT WAS SO HOT OUT. Casey and I had to head over to a pond by the homestead and submerge our heads in a lame attempt to cool off.  Oriah and Kei brought us out some amazing fresh juice to cool off at one point; it was so nice of them.  The rest of the day I spent reading and water coloring.  Casey decided to be blind for an hour, so I helped her around the homestead and played some music with her.  Today was a relaxing, peaceful day.  I can only imagine the rest of my days here being something like this :)

I stopped writing daily notes at some point. That point being November 6^th,  6 days into my trip. So section 3 is going to try to sum things up for you. If you’re interested that is.

Section 3

Some other cool thing we did.

Nov. 8^th

We had a camp fire, we went around the circle and told one long story that everyone had to contribute a line to.

Nov 9^th

We planted Aspen trees and another tree that starts with the letter B

Nov 10^th

Partner yoga with the fam

-tasted marmite for ther first time (gross)

-cruised around the ganja garden

Nov 11^th

Bread making! We made bread for the whole family in exchange for keeping two of the loaves for ourselves. It was kind of a disaster. The bread exploded everywhere but it was delicious and we put rosemary in it so even though it was ugly it was still tasty.

Nov 12^th

This day marked the final day of our food supply, so it was time to take the hour long drive to town and face the real world in order to get some groceries. So we headed into town. First we stopped at a bunch of cool little shops with awesome clothing and trinkets and other cool things. Then after spending most of our cash, my credit card got DECLINED at the restaurant. Meaning that the ONLY money we had for food was the cash we hadn’t spent on random stuff at the stores! It was crazy. So we pulled all our cash together and discussed what it was we actually needed and had to stay below our budget.

So I have to prelude the rest of this story by telling you a little bit about my homestay experience in Chatsworth. As the largest Indian community in the world (minus India), Chatsworth houses some SIT students every semester as an optional homestay experience. It was wonderful. They were so nice and generous AND we didn’t have an assignment to think about while we were there which is usually what burdens most of our experiences so I actually learned a lot about their culture and lifestyle. While in Chatsworth I shared a room with the lovely Casey Coviello and our family took us around to show us how they do grocery shopping. Because they are pretty short on cash most of the time, they’re grocery shopping process consists of three grocery stores and a lot of bargaining. First you must go to all the grocery stores in the area and compare prices. Then you have to go back to each grocery store that has the cheaper items of each individual thing you’re buying. While doing so you also have to rule out most of the things you want because luxury items are not an option. Mama Rachel made this a very fun exciting experience and it was damn exciting to buy a bag of flour for just 80 rand and then find the same bag at another store for 96 rand.

So with our money crunch in Howick, we ended up being able to buy EVERYTHING that we needed and some extra goodies! We used these wonderful lessons learned in such an amazing space and directly applied them to our lives.

We then got to see the beautiful Umgeni waterfall which is actually connected to the river that we get to explore at Rainbow whenever we want!

Nov 13^th

Made hot cocoa

Egg shampoo (ew)

Made a picnic

Nov 14^th

Ginger candy in dark chocolate (delicious)

Nov 15^th

First donkey shower! We were so proud and got to take hot showers without having to talk a nice walk outside first!

Nov 16^th

Casey and I climbed a fake mountain. Our usual morning adventure turned into more of an excursion when we thought we were climbing the mountain everyone had been talking about. Although we went pretty high, we couldn’t tell that we weren’t at the top because that morning was way too foggy and we couldn’t see anything around us!

Nov 17^th

Made herb biscuits with Jo!

Decorated my guitar

Nov 18^th

Climbed the mount again with Casey even though we knew it wasn’t the real mountain.. We ended up finding a dead snake in the road that day so Casey was incredibly determined to skin it. So obviously I followed along because I wasn’t about to let her skin this snake by herself. So taking the advice of Glen, a reclusive man who lived in a yurt on the land that we had actually spoken to for the first time that morning, he taught us how to skin the snake! It was disgusting. Casey carved the snake all the way down from the neck and then literally just pulled the body right out of its skin!!! After drying it with tons of salt, Simon is now taped to a sugar cane stick safely tucked away in Casey’s bag.

Throughout all this snake carving, a new couple joined the farm. Jodi (20 years old) and David (51 years old). Jodi was four weeks pregnant and the poor girl was suffering from horrible morning sickness so they arrived early because they had no where else to go and she couldn’t be on the road anymore. So I put a mattress in Casey’s room and gave up my room so they could have a place to stay. They were so grateful for us giving them a place to stay, they were so generous with all their belongings and food and even cooked for us the next two nights! It was so sweet. And David gave us all hair wraps! They look so awesome but I’m so sad mine is already kind of starting to unravel :( It’s awesome though, I have a tiny spoon dangling from it to remind me of South Africa. Did I mention that everyone eats with spoons? Yea things you would never eat with a spoon are eaten with spoons here. Hardly ever see a fork these days.

Nov 19^th

Nothing too exciting happened

Nov 20^th

This is when I got my hairwrap!

And Jodi gave us almonds!! They were amazing! It had been ages since we were given the luxury of an almond.

Nov 21^st

Climbed the mountain THE REAL MOUNTAIN. With everybody. It was amazing. Casey and my morning adventures had been building up to this final hike. It was basically just an extended version of our usual shenanigans but on the way down, it was too muddy for our sandals so we had to take them off and do the whole mountain hike down BAREFOOT. 3 weeks prior to this, our feet would not have been able to handle that. But 3 weeks in nature, barefoot and doing work had prepared us for this hike.

That night we had Dinner with Jill and Dael and Jo, and the boys.

And we found out that Glen sold his skin as a lamp shade

Nov 22nd
Off to Durban to finish our ISP write-ups. Already had 36 pages down so it was mostly editing and a few last minute additions! It was the most amazing experience at Rainbow and I am so happy to have spent my ISP time there and I can't believe it's already over. One more week in Durban and then it's off to Cape Town for presentations and 2 weeks of traveling after my program ends!

Sala Kahle

Pee Bucket and Rainbow Homestead

SO MANY AMAZING THINGS HAVE HAPPENED IN SUCH A SHORT AMOUNT OF TIME.

This past week, we packed our bags and headed to the rural villages of Umtwalume and Impendle (pronounced oom-twah-loo-may and Im-pen-dlay), just don’t want you to butcher my homies’ mainland.

We were each partnered with another student and put into homestays within these villages. My roomie for the week was the beautiful Victoria Ayres and we started in Umtwalume.

We arrived at our incredibly rustic looking home with a loving and warm Gogo (grandma) offering to carry all of our bags. We soon learned that Gogo is a Sangoma and a traditional healer, meaning she speaks to the ancestors and can tell people what their sicknesses and ailments are and then prescribe the proper Muthi to cure them.  She was absolutely amazing. 

There are SO MANY kids in the home, Amahle who is 15 and her cousin Samke who is also 15, Asanda who was our nine year old personal translator for the entire experience, Mandisa who was a 6 year old little girl, Olwethu was an amazing little 6 year old boy, Sandiso who was a 3 year old grumpy pants who didn’t start loving us until the last day and it was heartbreaking having to leave him!, and then a baby who seemed to disappear from time to time.

Amahle the 15 year old cooked EVERYTHING for us and basically ran the house with her mother Nomhlahla.  They were so nice and adorable.  The first thing they did when we walked in was hug us and plop down 2 HUGE plates of food for us.  It was intense to say the least.  We began strategizing ways in which we could take down our dinner.  I ended up not being able to even come close to finishing my rice mountain, and Victoria did rather well. 

We played games outside with the children. Regular jump roping games and game called Teddy Bear that just consists of a lot of hugging. 

That night they gave Victoria and me Zulu names!  They named me Mbali which means flower and Victoria was given Thando the word for love.  We laughed cause we’ve met about a thousand Thandos, one being the creepy serial dater in our area, but she still felt special.

We soon realized that we have yet to see a bathroom so we decided to ask where to go before it was an emergency.  They showed us the way to nearest bathroom which is in another house’s garage, about a minute walk away from the house.  It had no toilet paper and was pretty broken to say the least.  But when in Africa.  We soon realized that they were actually giving us special bathroom privileges and none of our family actually used this bathroom, they used a long drop somewhere in the back of the house that we didn’t find until the last day.

And of course, in the middle of the night they didn’t want to have to walk to the bathroom, so in the room we shared with 4 people, Victoria and I got to snuggle in a bed, they placed a PEE BUCKET by the door.  It was horrifying waking up in the middle of the night to our homestay aunt peeing in a bucket.  We ended up avoiding needing to use this bucket our whole stay.  It was just too much.

The next day Gogo showed us everything there was to know about being a Sangoma and taught us Zulu dancing and told us of her life.  Gogo is such an amazing woman.  She just wants the world to be healthy and happy and is so sweet.  We went to a spiritual healer who prays over water and sells it to people.  A spiritual healer also speaks to the ancestors but they really just give people “blessed” water.

When we got home, Gogo had made us this colorful ropes we are supposed to wear around our waists to protect us from sickness and other dangers.  It was so sweet. The kids wanted to teach us a game “donkey fish” which we learned was just uno.  We realized how many games kids can entertain themselves with a half deck of Uno cards.  It was wild.

On heritage day, we walked into the house while Gogo was fitting a woman into all her Zulu beads and Gogo would not let us leave the hut dressed so normally so she dressed us in traditional Zulu clothes and walked around getting a ridiculous amount of stares. I wonder why. Were they not used to a foreign Jewish girl in traditional Zulu attire?

That night, all the kids in our area including the kids next door, put on a big show for us in their Zulu clothes and did some Zulu dancing. It was so cute!

 Hiking up the road in my Zulu attire

Our guide, Xoli!

The last night, Gogo and the kids and everyone in the house was so loving and kind.  They told us they were going to miss us so much and I ended up giving away my gifts I had prepared for Impendle because I just loved them so much.  Gogo made us bracelets and the kids were just all around us being so adorable and nice and we felt SO LOVED :) and please remember I have still not showered at this point.

So, after attempting to steal some of the children, we were hoarded into a van on Wednesday and driven to Impendle.  Although I was so sad to leave our wonderful family, I was really excited about Impendle.  We arrived pretty late for dinner but our new mama had made us FRESH VEGETABLES!  I haven’t seen those in quite some time.  It was such an amazing fresh dinner.  We enjoyed a wonderful episode of Generations, which is a very popular soap opera here that is some weird dialect that is half English half Zulu, with our homestay brother S’bu.  Then it was off to bed in our hut but not before learning where the outhouse was.

Here is the view from my hut at like 6 in the morning!

The next day we spent wandering around impendle going to town, speaking with Social workers, going to a clinic, and visiting the library.  The young locals, our Host Guide Interpreters, showed us around and fed us an amazing chicken curry lunch with steamed bread that we picnicked under a tree.

That afternoon, a woman came with our professor, Clive, to have a group discussion. Her name was Samantha.  She had dreadlocks, piercings, and an awesome kid with her named Kai. Whatever her story was, I knew it was interesting, so after our generic conversation with Clive, we begged her to tell us about her life.  She was the coordinator for our Rural homestays. She was previously an SIT student in Ghana and knew she was not meant to live in the US. She moved to South Africa where her and her partner now live on a piece of land they’ve named “Rainbow Homestead” with their daughter, Oriah, and adopted son, Kei. So we decided to ditch all the plans we had for the following day and get a tour of her house instead.

IT WAS INCREDIBLE. She lives a sustainable lifestyle on acres of land that was just grass when she first arrived.  They built their own house that is all solar powered, planted trees and several other plants, and use herbs and the plants they grow for all of their injuries and ailments.  There was a contraption meant for drying fruits if they have an abundance, and an outdoor solar generated shower, and a worm garden, and a real garden, and a tree nursery, and SO MUCH MORE.   They built yurts where they “unschool” their children and accommodate house guests.  Their was basically a tree house and was incredibly homey and wonderful and you had to climb ladders to get to the bedrooms!

She made us an amazing tea all from plants from her garden and they all helped with women’s health.  I immediately knew that I needed to learn more and live her life.  So I dropped my original idea for my final research project I’m doing at the end of my program, and asked if I could live with her.  So for the entire month of November I will be living on Rainbow Homestead studying the way they live and how their lived environment creates a holistically healthy body and positive perceptions of self purpose.

Here is their treehouse home! There is a legitimate tree running through the house

This is their outhouse! Even that is beautiful

 Here is the  beautiful Sam showing us her garden!

Here are her children in their yurt where they learn! Sam "unschools" them

Here is part of the tree nursery

Picture of part of their home.  Does not do it justice it is so beautiful inside!

Afterwards we went to a group of Zulu women who hand-make beaded items and sell them! They were so beautiful and they were so sweet I obviously spent so much money there. After we bought beads they showed us some traditional Zulu dancing it was so cool!

I felt so happy at that home and I couldn’t stop smiling.  That night I thought of every possible topic to do on their land and went to bed early in preparation for my 4 am wake up for my mountain climb! It was amazing to finally get some good exercise in fresh air. 

This week has been so many adjectives.  Wonderful, loving, spiritual, fun, eye opening, I could keep going forever.  I have learned so much and have truly realized that everything really is relative.  When I first arrived in Cato, I thought it was pretty rough living, but boy was I wrong.  I was so excited to come home to a gigantic loaf of steamed bread my mama made me, and sleep in my comfy bed, and be able to wake up in the middle of the night and pee without having to trek through the wilderness infested with frogs and other wildlife.  Although it is nice to be home, I cannot wait to go live like a hippie with an amazing family and learn everything about them.

Sala Kahle BoSunshine :)