Over memorial weekend I had the pleasure of going to Swaziland for Bushfire Music Festival. This was my first music festival and I was elated to be going with a car full of wonderfully wacky friends. Rati and Gary, two of my host siblings, drove, and Evan, Emmy, Joiwyn and I stuffed ourselves into the back of their van. On Wednesday night Evan and Joiwyn spent the night in my ice box of a house. Now that it's winter, there are only about 8 hours of sunlight in my village because it's shadowed by hills. My house it surrounded by trees and never gets direct sunlight. In the winter it is only truly warm if you're in the sun. That means my house sits around 40 degrees most of the time. My house is made of cinder blocks, which makes it like living in a very cold basement. I sleep most nights in underarmor, ski socks, sweat pants, a sweatshirt, and with two-three thick blankets. Occasionally I'll even heat up my hot water bottle! Needless to say, my friends always complain about my house when they visit in the winter!
On Thursday we drove halfway and spent the night in Pretoria, SA at my host sister place. It was fun to see my host brothers who had been staying there for school and to have a night with family. We left early Friday morning to make the rest of the close to 10+ hour drive and arrived in Swaziland in the late afternoon. Swazi was so beautiful: tons of rolling green hills and gorgeous mountains. Fields of pineapples. Beautiful. We set up camp at the festival and started to explore. The festival had four stages: a small barn, a large concert stage, an indoor house of Blues style stage, and a dance floor stage for the djs. There was also a large fair trade craft market and a large food area. Obviously the food was the most highly anticipated perk, with the taco stand and the vegan/gluten free stand winning the day.
Over the weekend there was non stop music of all styles from all over the world. Most of the artists came from South Africa, but there were a lot from all over Africa, some from Europe, and even one from the US (a group that had been on The Sing Off!). I loved them all. I recommend looking up Kwesta, TKZ, Jeremy Loops, Matthew Mole, and Msaki. Since we didn't really know any of the acts we could float from stage to stage and just enjoy all of it. During the day was more of a chill atmosphere and at night it turned into a party. It was absolutely amazing. The first night we were waiting for an act to start at the main stage and we met tons of other PCVs who were serving in surrounding countries. Suddenly, Toto came on and EVERYONE started singing at the top of their lungs, dancing and laughing. I'm not going to lie, I got a little choked up when they said they miss the rains down in Africa. It was a beautiful moment and a perfect start to an incredible weekend.
The whole weekend was a variation of eating, listening to music, shopping, dancing, and sleeping, in any order. We took a trip outside the festival to a candle factory/art space one day which was fun as well. We met so many people and had a blast. But more than anything I was so glad to be there with such great friends. It was freezing at night in our tents but being there with them made it worth it. I'm lucky to have made lifelong friends during my service. People I can laugh myself silly with and also won't judge me when I eat my 4th taco. I wouldn't have made it through service without them.
We returned late on Monday: exhausted, cold, and smiling. Another country and another incredible adventure on the books.
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