Highlights of My Visit With Panther Bior First Day

As our loud plane landed on a deserted, dusty strip of land, I saw a small figure run up to the plane, their arms waving wildly. As the blurry figure started to get closer, I realized it was Panther Bior, coming to greet my family. I sighed; we were finally in Mareng, South Sudan. I couldn't wait to see where Panther would take us on our trip.

When we got off the plane, we all introduced ourselves and took our bags to our temporary residency, which was not as nice as we are used to but much better than we expected. For the first hour or so, we were introduced to the villagers, some of which were very friendly, and some we could hear whispering "American!"

After we were introduced to everyone, Panther tried to teach my family how to do some Sudanese cultural dances. We weren't very good at them, but we tried very hard and had a few good laughs, so overall it was fun anyway. Even some other villagers tried to help us, but we simply could not get the hang of them.

When our dance lessons had finished, it was time for dinner. We had a very traditional Sudanese dinner, and it was delicious.

After our dinner, we stayed up and talked with Panther and his friends for a while. We told them stories about sunny California, and in return they told us stories about their culture in South Sudan. After a while, the sun went down, and just like that it was time for bed. I asked, "Why so early?", but Panther said the people of Mareng get up very early in the morning, so they make up for their loss of sleep in the morning by going to bed early. We all retired to our beds, and went to sleep immediately, fatigued by our jetlag.