First destination: Africa!

Street market in Johannesburg

Overview of Johannesburg

I already had my last weekend completely planned. My best friend from Brazil was in Portugal and she was coming to visit me in Madrid for the weekend. We were going to go to Rock in Rio, watch one of the last concerts of Swedish House Mafia and have a great time exploring Madrid together.

On Wednesday night, my boss calls me in his office just to let me know that I was being sent to South Africa. My ticket was already bought for 6 am on Friday. I had one night to pack my things and leave Madrid for indefinite time. At least, now I learned that planning is not an option when you have a job like that. Luckily, my friend understood my situation and was not mad at me.

I never planned a trip to Africa and I was not sure what to expect. Although I felt I was prepared to be sent to any place on earth (since I consider myself a quite open-minded person), when things suddenly happened and I got here, the reality was completely different from my expectations.

I am not quite sure what should be the focus of this article. The truth is that when you go through such a strong cultural shock like this, it is quite hard to structure your thoughts and understand your feelings. You think you have an idea of what you are going to face, but what you really experience is a mixture of unexpected situations. You are in a total new cultural context in which you don´t know the social rules.

So basically I was sent to Johannesburg from one day to another. I didn´t even have time to tell my mother. I got here on Friday night and I knew absolutely nothing about the city. At least, everyone here speaks English, so communication was not a problem. Little I knew that many other issues were about to come.

And, as I did not have any time to do any research about the cultural and social reality of the country, I thought I would enjoy this surprise element, just because I guessed it would intensify my experience. But the surprise was way too intense. I have to admit I knew vaguely about the Apartheid, but in all honesty, I thought this was a historical fact. How could I imagine that 18 years after the announcement of its end, I would still face such a divided nation?

Later on the week, I will post some more concrete impressions on this issue. For now, the only thing that I can say is that the next two months are going to change my life completely. I already feel it: for better or for worse, I will never be the same again. My world is literally falling apart. My beliefs, my dreams, my impressions of reality and the objectives I had for my life, nothing makes sense here. I feel like I need to step out of my little bubble in order to get in touch with the new reality I am facing. And I am willing to take this experience as deeper as I possibly can.