This was my first year to spend the 4th of July in South Africa and as you would expect it was a little different… everyone’s at work, there aren’t any cook-outs and no place to go watch fireworks at night. Now, since most of us are Americans here we knew we had to do something. Kind of the “Thrive” tradition on the 4th is to head to a restaurant in town called the Spur. Since it’s really the only real restuarant in town we visit the place quite regularly and have great relationships with the managers there. So good in fact, they allowed use to bring in “Born in the USA” on cd, which they played over the speakers for the entire restuarant to hear. I can’t image what all the locals thought when this song started playing and this group of people in the back started singing along waving sparklers all around?

True, there weren’t any fireworks to end the night, but we all had a lot of fun hanging out which really made it just like any other 4th of July for me.