Wonderful Hospitality

Our team is staying at three different homes, which has been quite nice for all of us. It's giving us an opportunity to get to know each other much better. In addition to talking about work in the evening, we're also sharing parts of our personal lives with each other as well as customs of our own countries. I have even shared the 'ins and outs' of American football with Jacqui and her husband Hilton! Although we missed the Superbowl, I was able to show them some of the Superbowl commercials on You Tube.

Friday night the four of us had a sleep over at the home of Barbara and James Campbell-Ker. Barbara, you may remember, is the former ceo of Hospice Wits. She and James showed us such wonderful hospitality. We had a wonderful meal on Friday night, concluding with Don Pedros (an ice cream drink with Amarula- an African liquor). On Saturday Barbara took us to the African Market so the team could pick up some gifts for those back home. Saturday night we went to a wonderful African restaurant that had a buffet of traditional African foods. Quite yummy! (The 2009 trip also went to this restaurant). Then, as in 2009, we went next store and saw a play. It was quite interesting and was the story of a Black African man during the time of Apartheid whose passbook was out of date, creating a place of limbo for him- couldn't work anywhere, would have been jailed if stopped by the police and couldn't travel back to his home city where his wife and 4 children were. It was very thought provoking. We returned to our hosts after the play.

Today, Sunday, we're going to Dr. Patrick Mashele's home for lunch, where we'll have a chance to visit with Patrick, Felicity, and their family, along with many staff from the Soweto site. We're all looking forward to this opportunity for fellowship and socialization.

All four of us have been taking diligently notes about all the things we've learned here. We're eager to share some of our sister hospice's best practices. So far we've had such wonderful reciprocal opportunities to learn from each other.

We really enjoy reading your comments. Keep them coming!

Stacy