Earth Babies Blog

On Saturday past Sally and I thought it would be fun to take part in the 5km Walk against Breast Cancer held at the Johannesburg Zoo.

We pre-registered, I thought this would make things easier in terms of just being able to show your registration papers and going in vs standing in lines to pay on the day. And I have to admit the promise of a goodie bag for pre-registrations also appealed. (Ironically it would have been much less stress and faster to have simply paid on the day)

We took our kids (brave Sally took 4 – her own and 2 friends) with because it was at the zoo, would be a fun family day out (I had done the same distance with the kids before at the Pretoria zoo so knew it was doable as the animals kept the kids entertained and motivated) and we would be supporting a worthwhile and close to home cause. I kindly invited husband dear along as it was going to be nice to do as a family …. bliss.

Sadly the reality fell a bit short of our ideas and intentions. There were 1000’s on 1000’s of people that attended. We got stuck in very slow traffic around the zoo, ended up after lots of driving around having to park 3 blocks away on a pavement and walk to the registration area.

Sally was already in the lines to get their entry tickets and bags (thanks to her beautiful pink hair, we found them in the masses quite easily). The sign in process had been divided into groups according to your surnames and Sally was right at the back of an incredibly long 3 person deep line for A-D’s.

We pushed, maneuvered and probably pissed people off with our 2 kids and a pram through the aimless milling crowds to first go to the toilet (desperation called) before searching for the end of the line of our own long line of 3 people deep j-l group. Thankfully our line was not as long as Sally’s and we were well ahead of her.

More than an hour+ later – about a half hour past the walks starting time; after some crying and moaning (mostly by the children) and a placating sucker each for breakfast we got to the front of the line to pick up our little pink tickets, have our names checked off their list and get our goodie bags which basically were Avon & Justine Marketing material, an old edition of Shape magazine and a T-shirt each (not even in the size requested in the preregistration) we were done – amazingly at the same time as Sally.

Once inside we realised that the walk did not even take place within the relative safety of the zoo but was actually out on the road, we decided that we had done our part (the hardest part) for charity and were going to simply take the kids around the zoo than torture them further – they were already tired and miserable a 5km walk would not go down well.
The kids had fun in the end, was a nice enough morning BUT next year I will pay my fee and NOT go to the walk. Maybe when my children are all grown up and out of the house I will brave that experience again.

Breast Cancer Walk at the Zoo Fail
Female to Female