This post goes before "two dramatic days"

For some reason, this didn’t post the other day, even though I checked it. Whatever. This post goes before “Two Dramatic Days,” and not after.
OK, so I’m going to cover what we’ve done over the last couple of days. Two days ago, on Tuesday, we sort of had the day off, but spent it riding from Joburg to Swaziland, which took, overall, about 5 hours. The nice aspect of this ride was the chance to view the landscape of both South Africa and Swaziland. Well, parts, at least. Nothing really eventful on that day. We checked into the Tum’s George Hotel here in Manzini. It is quite nice, and the people here are very friendly.
Yesterday (Wednesday the 15th), was our only “day off,” which was slated to begin with a press conference here at the TGH after breakfast. We quickly learned that here, they operate on “Africa Time,” which means that there’s a lot of hurry-up-and-wait. To make a long-ish story short, the conference was called off. So, we went on a Safari. This was awesome. In S.A. and parts nearby, they have what are known as the “big five,” which are five animals held in high regard. They are: the lion, leopard, elephant, rhinoceros, and water buffalo. We saw lions, elephants, and rhinos. I have some amazing shots, including a four-photograph composite panorama shot that has to be seen to be believed.
Today we drove to the local TV station, and Dr. Campbell and his sister, Cynthia Prime were interviewed as we stood in the background looking fantastic. Afterwards, we broke into two teams: Donna and Gretchen went to a rural church, and Phil, Monique, Chrissyl, Joanna, Anna, and I went to an AIDS/HIV clinic to do a presentation and assessment of their structure/system. What we did not know was that we were also to be interviewed by the newspaper and TV station (the same one that we went to in the morning). The newspaper guy got our press release, which he was happy to have, and the TV reporter really grilled us. However, Phil and I handled the interview with the casual aplomb of ordering ice cream; we are studs. So, tonight, in about two hours, we make our television debut on Swazi TV. The great thing about much of this is that we truly are the experts everywhere we go; mental health counseling, as I mentioned in the last post, is completely new to this part of the world. The zeitgeist has shifted such that we are not shunned (as we may have been just 10 or 15 years ago), but welcomed. We did a presentation to the clinic staff after the press conference on stress management and burnout, and they were writing as though their lives depended on it. Indeed, this was the area they identified as the most needed, which was a giant red flag to us that they were quite burned out. This is simply an occupational hazard that we know is associated with counseling of any sort. All in all, the day was very successful, and/as we are becoming more and more familiar with the local/regional/national cultures.
OK, that’s it for this post. I will have another one up within two days, if not sooner. I am finally over my jet lag. Thank goodness.