On her way to the National Arts Festival in Grahamstown, South Africa, YJI Senior Reporter Mariechen Puchert took these photos from the car window. The top photo is of a Xhosa village in the Peddie district of the rural Eastern Cape.
The photo below is of aloes growing alongside the road. The plant is indigenous to the Eastern Cape, she writes, and is commonly seen in the province. The plant is known for its real, not disputed, medicinal properties, says Mariechen, now a third-year medical student at Stellenbosch University in the Western Cape.
Mariechen Puchert / youthjournalism.org |