Day 2

Hi all

I managed to keep my promise about adding in a second entry today! Hooray! Now to see if I can keep this amazing performance up. As you may have noticed, in comparison to yesterday, I am in a much better mood. I was somewhat depressed after reading my cousins blog. He is manic and his lows get really low. I have tried to convince him that he should see a shrink but he doesn't think it 'll help.

Anyway, today I went to Pretoria, north of Jo'burg, to go and hear a talk by Dr. Jane Goodall. It was really amazing! She is such a good speaker! I suffer from mild ADD and as a result I often find that even if a talk or lecture is about something that I find totally fascinating, my mind tends to wander within the first ten minutes. With this talk however, I was captivated for the whole hour and a half that she was up there! What an amazing person! She has recieved countless awards for her work with the chimps as well as various humanitarian awards too. And in my opinion, she deserves every one of them!

Her talk was simply about the state of chimp conservation and the importance of conservation in a global context with reference to global change. It was very interesting to hear from her that there are other kids in the world that feel the same way that I do about the state of the planet and the necessity to change our lifestyles to something more sustainable. Her talk was very saddening at the same time because it made me think about how much there is wrong with the world we live in and it made me feel somewhat helpless about the whole situation. But by the end of the talk I felt so fired up and I am going to go do some online research to see if I can go and help at the chimp sanctuary that they have set up here in SA.

Apart from that I had to take my sisters off to school this morning as my grandfather, who usually takes them, had to go off to the doctor to do some tests. He seems to have some sort of neural problem that is affecting his vision. He can see perfectly with each individual eye, but once he uses both at the same time, he can't see very well. I forgot whether I mentioned this yesterday but my sisters are identical twins.

After the talk I went with some of my friends from varsity to go have lunch (at 3:30 pm) at a resurant called 'Fruits and Roots'. It is an organic resturant and they have all kinds of health foods and vegan-friendly menu items. I had a pizza with, wait for it...NO CHEESE!

I know what you are thinking. How on earth do you get away with making a pizza without cheese!? They used a substitute that had a name, but I can't remember it right now. It was really great though! Alternatively, you can have a pizza with tofu instead. But I didn't have all that much money on me so I figured it was safer to just go with what was on the menu. Very nice though!

Now I'm currently at the university. We just got back and I'm going to go home as soon as I'm finished this. I stuck around because I'm waiting for the traffic to ease up a bit.

I'm going now. Bye! Remember to always treat one another with respect!

Adios...