In addition to the many tour guides we hired while in South Africa, we also had many people who were open and willing to help us get where we needed to go. Watching people opening their lives to us was quite the cultural experience.
Being a point navigator for the trip, which happened by accident, I got the chance to ask people for help and watch them volunteer more help than was ever asked or extend themselves to help a group of strangers (us). Many of our helpers pointed us in the right direction or gave us a point for me to use to locate us on the scarce maps that we had, but we had a guardian watching out for us somewhere... A collective of South African people.
On our last day, the group split up. One car took the GPS and the other group took some directions and a map and headed for the Cradle of Humankind and the caves. Kate, Eli, Leslie, Kevin, and I were in the latter group. After having an inspirational day, we had an hour to get to the airport after emerging from a 60m deep cave. We had no directions, and a map that didn't extend to the airport. With Kate driving, and i navigating we managed to get to the outskirts of Johannesburg but were unsure of how to get to the airport. And then our phone died. Late and I ran into the gas station to ask a worker for directions, but a patron who lived just around the block volunteered the information. As we were pulling out, he stopped us and said that he didn't want us to get lost. He would guide us to the freeway.
Well, this man went 30 mins, an hour round trip, to make sure we got to the airport. It was so kind of him, and absolutely needed. If we hadn't have had his guidance we would have been anxious and may have missed our flight.
So as the journey ends, I want to extend the anonymous guardians we had in South Africa, especially those who opened up without even an exchange of names.
In solidarity,
Crys
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