The Market and Other Things

Monday and Tuesday were spent on Long Street near the market and other shops. The market is quite an experience, and I think we were pegged right away as suckers. There are no price tags at the market so you have to negotiate with the seller a price for their merchandise. Some things that were always on my mind during this process were, "Their asking price really isn't that bad, but I know I can get a better deal if I negotiate" and "this may be the only source of income for these people so I better not go too low." Those things were always pulling me one way or another, but I don't feel that educated on the market environment like I want to be. For instance, all of the sellers claim that their things are hand made, or that they made them themselves, but then twenty feet away another person will have the EXACT same thing for sale. It makes you wonder if the market is just one big scam or if these people are actually putting a lot of hard labor into their merchandise. One of the advantages we had, as buyers, was that if we saw the same thing at two different places we could say, "well that guy over there is willing to charge me only 40 Rand" when the price of the other person's is a lot higher - that was a nice trick to know.

Also on Monday we checked out a store called "Monkey Biz." This store contains all handmade beaded artwork that the women in the townships make and sell. Everything in the store has a price tag with the artist's name on it so that the profits go directly to that women. This is a great job opportunity for the women in the townships who can really use the income. The store was amazing too. When you walk in and look around, EVERYTHING is made out of beads - the talent to do something like that is way beyond me. I can't imagine how long it would take to make a lot of the things that are sold there. 

Today (Wednesday) we were supposed to check out Table Mountain, but it rained. That was disappointing because the last week we have had gorgeous weather and today it was rainy off and on. This was also disappointing for those in our group that had planned on going sky diving (I wasn't one of them...I figured shark diving was my adventure). The sky diving trip was canceled and there isn't any time for them to reschedule. So today we had the afternoon to do whatever we wanted in place of the Table Mountain trip. Six of us (including me) decided to check out the Holocaust Museum. I am really glad we did because it was really neat to check out. I have always been interested in learning about the Holocaust so seeing this exhibit was pretty cool. After that we went to the V & A Waterfront mall to get some last minute shopping done before we have to leave (yes, we actually have to get back on a plane on Friday - time has really flown!). Now I am relaxing and finishing up some things around here so I can relax for a while. 

Class Discussion Today:

Today we had a morning class where we discussed leadership and referred to our textbook for some things. It was sort of a strange transition to go from learning everything hands on, discussing, and self-reflecting all of the experiences here, and to switch gears to using the text book was sort of tough. We did end up in a pretty intense discussion about what the difference between self interests, values, and passions are. Everyone seems to have a different opinion about the matter and others would debate each other. For me, I had a lot of thoughts about the subject, but everyone was so heated in the conversation at hand that I didn't express my opinions. 

This is what was going though my head though. Values are the root of everything you do and every decision you make. For me, family, friends, education, entertainment, and laughter are my values (just to name a few). Self interests are what are stemmed from those values. In my case, learning about health care/nursing goes with my value of education, spending time with my family and friends which almost always includes entertainment and laughter. Passions on the other hand are similar to your values in that everything can be tied together and is the core of what we do what we do, say what we say, and feel what we feel. My passion is always love. I love my family, friends, and the environments in which I surround myself. Love ties everything together for me. All of my values together equal love, and that is the motivation behind all that is me. Without love, I am lost. If I didn't have the people I love in my life, I would have a hard time having the self interests that I have. I don't know if any of that makes sense, but it does in my head - and sometimes it all comes out in some random stream of consciousness, but I tried! haha.