PheZulu

As part of our study abroad experience, the University arranged a few excursions for us. One was to the Tala game reserve, which I already wrote about, and the other was to PheZulu, which took place today.

I'm not going to lie and say that this excursion was the best thing in the world, because it wasn't but it was fun, nonetheless. PheZulu is a private reserve, cultural village, and crocadile/reptile zoo. We visited the cultural vilalge and the zoo.

We watched a performance of Zulu culture, in which they re-enacted part of a marriage ceremony. It was entertaining to watch, however, I am ethically against this type of tourism. It felt very exploitative and rude, as if we were saying "you're culture is so exotic that we must watch you dance around". Some of the spectators were quite rude too and interupted the performance so that they could take pictures of the dancers.

I think culture and heritage are very important things. I don't think that they should become toursit attractions in which we exploit people to understand how they live. It doesn't feel right to me. It's a very complicated issue, however. Tourism provides much needed revenue and income to local people, but then the question becomes: do you lose your identity by commodifying it? Think about it... respond if you like...

However, after the show, we got to watch crocadiles eat chickens and look at all of the poisonous African snakes, which was pretty fun.

And food was provided including a complementary Happy Valentine's Day shooter of armaretto. You can't go wrong with that.

I'm making this short (sorry because it's not too sweet) because I have a lot of reading to do in preparation for tomorrow's lectures.

Happy Valentine's Day! Love you all and miss you!!