DAY 12

‘Which one was the Hitler side?’
Asked a girl on my first day and I had to explain that there was no Hitler side but first of all I had to laugh.

No Mick today so getting up and to the university was quite relaxed compared to the last days.
In the university I met with Thoko and we got the markers and tape that I needed for the session.
Now that I had all the materials I prepared the flipcharts and the homemade moderation cards.
Ahh, I forgot to mention that they have a mall in this university including two banks, 3 different kinds of ATMs, several shops and restaurants and what not.
I’ve never seen such variety of shops on a campus before but here it ain’t something special. It’s good that we don’t have it at our university ‘cause I’d spend too much money, I guess.
This morning I also sent a short message to the potential trainers that we figured out yesterday and I hope for loads of replies ‘cause we need ‘em so much.
Johanna’s brother prepared me already for low attendance rates at meetings so I was not surprised when 2 guys didn’t show up at all and 2 had to leave early due classes.
The session itself was quite cool and the 4 people who joined till the end participated actively.
After the exercise was over the VPER showed us a logo that he’s been working on for AIESEC UJ and it looks pretty cool, maybe I’ll get a pic later.
The last thing for today was to get me a student card so I could enter the university alone and this turned out to be a funny experience.
First we paid a visit to the lady being responsible for all student organisations and
we had a funny talk about AIESEC, Germany and Afrikaans. She told us the criteria to become the best student’s organisation and they’re definitely not impossible to fulfil.
After we got a letter from her explaining what I’m doing at UJ we headed of for the registration office to get me a card but there a woman told us to get a certified copy of my passport.
So we headed back to the mall, into a bank and asked for it.
The woman at the desk just asked me whether I have an account at this bank or not and when I denied she said she can’t certify it and I should ask the bank where I have an account. I explained her that this bank is in Germany and that I pay a fee to use the ATMs in Africa. Now she asked her boss if it is possible to certify it even if I don’t have an account and the boss said no. But then the boss asked me which team I’m going to support during the world cup and I replied South Africa for sure.
‘Okay you can certify his copy.’
Really I would be so happy if that’d be happening in Germany but here people are so friggin obsessed with rules that they won’t do you favour even if it’d mean no extra trouble or work at all.
I mean this was just great because otherwise I had to go a police station and get my copy certified there and now I could just go back to the registration office and within a blink of an eye I had my card. Great!
10 minutes later Johanna’s brother picked up and I was almost falling asleep on our way home.
Once we arrived I could hold back and went straight to bed (6pm!!!), I dunno why I was so bloody tired but I couldn’t help it.