I don't even know when was the last time I rode a bike other than in DC last summer for like 1/2 hour. It has been at least 20 years and I am terrified of falling down so I had this amazing idea of touring katutura on bike...I have no clue what I was thinking when I thought that it was a good idea! 

The morning started a little hectic, with the taxi driver being 45 mins late after he said it would take him 5 mins... My perfectionist self was angry... I hate to be late!!!! I think I was even rude to the guy, not bubbly happy Andrea for him... I was pissed!!!... on the way there I even felt bad for a second for being moody... It's Namibian time, it's ok to be late!!!

I finally calmed down when I got to katutura to take my bike tour. My mom always says "pay attention to how you start the day  and that's what you will attract" so thinking about that I knew I needed to just calm down, put a smile on my face and let go... 

In katutura I was greeted by Anna, the owner of Katu tour, who explained to me what we were doing and what the tour was all about. Anna is such a passionate women, you can feel that she does her job from her heart and that she enjoys it. She gave me a lot of info about the township, how it came together and on the ride she even drew little maps on the ground to explain how houses were made etc.

So Katutura is the township in Windhoek where low-income to no-income black people live. It is a very poor area and Anna did an amazing job at explaining how they live and showing me around.

At the beginning I was terrified of going on the bike, we rode to the left of the street with cars passing right next to us and a lot of guys saying things or honking! Ahhh super scary. Riding in katutura is the equivalent of riding a bike in El Salvador... Jajaja probably not the best idea! 

I started the tour wanting to throw up, I couldn't breathe (have a stuffy nose, plus performance anxiety) so of course I was in almost panic mode. My mom always says that when you are dizzy it's because "you have lost control of your ship" and that you are scared so I took ownership of being scared and told myself that I was in control "of my ship" and decided to enjoy the tour... A couple of minutes later, no dizziness! Yeay!

The ride had more hills than I expected, I thought I was going to die but after maybe 2 hills Anna said "and the last time u rode a bike was for 30 mins last year?!?! You are doing great! I had a Dutch guy who fainted on this hill, and he rode a bike at home everyday" ... That gave me the motivation that I needed to survive the tour, plus I kept saying "I climbed a freaking huge sand dune, I got this!" Jajajajaja I am loving all the self talk in this trip! It really works :-)

Then we came up to a bigger hill and I couldn't push... It was too hard and I just remember teaching Andrew how to ride his bike and saying to him: "Andrew just keep pushing, push hard, you can do it, I know you can" and I just kept doing that until I reached the top... I'm glad I survived!