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This just in: A group of 30 students have been seen together in various parts of the world over the past week. They began to gather at their school, the Canadian Mennonite University, and only grew from there. Many teerful goodbyes were seen, but there were also many joyous reunions. "It was a pleasent experience flying from Winnipeg to Toronto, but our group seemed incoomplete. All I can say is that seeing the group all back together was quite magical," said one Lauren Harms. After some careful research, it has been concluded that the total flight time for those 30 students was approximately 20 hours! That's three flights in two days. The students were then seen traipsing around Mainz, Germany during their 10-hour layover in Frankfurt. A lot of the students enjoyed some German cuisine and others toured the city with some locals that they met. Rachel Parkinson was heard saying, "It was such a great day! We got to tour the city but felt less like tourists when we were with the locals. It was super sweet!" Upon arrival in Johannesburg, South Africa, the temperature was around 30 degrees celcius. After two days of travel, the students all appeared exhausted, yet shouts of glee could be heard over the hum of the bus. Apparently they were excited to be in South Africa. The first stop on their journey was a beautiful retreat centre called Heron Bridge just north of Johannesburg. The students were trying to overcome the symptoms of jet-lagg, so they spent the afternoon playing water polo in the pool. Some students had a harder time than others getting over jet-lagg, including one Carter Whyte who joked, "I loved waking up at 1:30 in the morning on the first night because I couldn't sleep!" The Heron Bridge retreat centre had many facilities for group sports games. There was a lot of volleyball, soccer and water polo played in those three days. On top of all the sports, the students also played many card and dice games and had a great opportunity to reconnect after a month of being apart. The weather was also something to be noted. "It was incredible watching the lightning storms roll in everyday and getting to witness the awesome fork lightning in the distance," remarked Matt Gain. They days were hot and sunny, but a thunderstorm and rain could be counted on in the afternoons. One day, a soccer game broke out in the midst of a storm just because the students enjoyed it so much. It was observed that although copious amounts of sunscreen were used, there were still more sunburns recorded than last semester. A noteable event that took place was that the students were seen meeting their country partners: Johan and Mpho. The students were informed of some things to expect while in South Africa and welcomed to the country. Three more months lie ahead for those 30 students. Stay tuned for more upcoming reports!

Written by: Megan Sherk