Research, baboons, ubuntu, and other Cape Town randomness, Oct 2

On Friday I woke up and went running. I am very proud of the fact that I have been waking up before 8 am every day for over two weeks. My favorite part is running through the small park on the way home. There are always lots of squirrels and awkward pheasants running around, and the way the sun shines through the green leaves makes me happy :) I normally just run around the track in the morning, because I am lazy. If I am feeling adventurous I will either run to Rondebosch commons, which is a huge open field with trails and flowers, or I will run along the highway. I have yet to run on any trails, but since my routes are starting to seem a bit stale, I expect that I will soon be branching out.

After I went running I quickly got ready and rushed off to class. I practically had to run up the hill, because I wasn’t as quick as I thought I was. I entered class a few minutes late, sweaty due to the summer weather that we have been having. As much as I enjoy the heat, it is making this walk up the hill a lot harder. In class I watched a documentary screening about women subjected to violence during the Apartheid era, or at least that’s what I figured it was about... I was late, parts of the film were in Afrikaans, and it was filmed in the 1980’s on a low budget. All of these components made if very hard for me to actually decipher what the film as about.

After class I decided to get started on my research for my first paper due this month. For this I had to go to the National Library of South Africa. It is in downtown Cape Town. Unfortunately, I have to write a 3500 word paper on the South African National Tuberculosis Association, so I had to go all the way to the national library to do some intense research. I took the Jammie down to the Hiddingh campus. From there I walked along the government avenue to the National Library. The Government Avenue was gorgeous and was lined with huge green trees. I walked past the Company Gardens and art galleries. I will have to come back here after my research is over and have a summer picnic with tea.

Unfortunately, the National Library was very disappointing. It barely had any of the journals/news articles that I needed. The librarians were not very nice either. I will have to go back on Monday to finish looking through the material there, so hopefully the Friday librarians don’t work on Mondays...

But now it is the weekend, and because the libraries are closed, I don’t have to worry about research! On Friday night we celebrated Jen’s 24^th birthday. Jen is from Norway, and is one of the girls that I connected with on my Botswana trip. Liz, Jen, Ann, two other friends, and I went to a dinner restaurant venue called “Stardust.” I use the word venue because it was a two for one dinner and performance deal. We were served Mediterranean food by waiters that were also performing arts students. In between taking orders and bringing our food they would sing and performs for us. They performed music ranging from the musical Chicago to Buffalo Springfield. It was a lot of fun, and lasted until 1 am. Unfortunately I had to wake up at 5:30 am the next morning…I didn’t know that Stardust would be such a long dinner experience, but nonetheless I am very glad that I went.

On Saturday morning I woke up at 5:30 am. I was invited by my friend Kate to help out with a volunteer project with the Mountain and Ski Club (a club which I am singed up for, but had yet to get involved with). We got up at this ridiculous hour on Saturday to set up a treasure hunt for a group of high school students from neighboring townships. We drove to a forest near Constantia and set up a course for the treasure hunt, using a map of the forest that the students would later follow to gather the clues. While we were setting up the clues we came across a massive troop of baboons. There were at least 30 of them. Baboons travel in large familial groups called “troops.” Baboons are really very strange looking, but I must admit that the baby baboons were pretty cute as they rode along on their parent’s backs. Although the massive amount of monkeys was a bit intimidating, especially since they have been known to attack people for food, we were not too scared because the “baboon watchers” were nearby. The “baboon watchers” are a group of local guys that are paid by the national park to follow the baboons around everyday and make sure that they don’t cause too much trouble or damage. The baboons were fighting which was fun to watch. One baboon also climbed to the top of a huge rock wall and proceeded to climb down the artificial rock wall using the handholds. It was really funny to watch. The same baboon then tried to steal my friend’s jacket, which he had carelessly left on the ground next to the wall. The “baboon watchers” had to intervene at this point, as the baboon started to run off carrying his jacket. Baboon do not senselessly conduct their muggings. They will take anything. After the baboon experience we headed back to our basecamp where we met the high school students.

After a brief introduction we sent the high school students off on the treasure hunt. While they were busy hunting, we walked to the nearby farmer’s market. It was the most magical farmer’s market I have ever been to. The food was AMAZING, as always, and there were so many samples…Imagine Costco, but with gourmet home-cooked foods. I bought a homemade quiche and a brownie…very healthy. I loved it! I will definitely miss the amazing farmer’s markets of South Africa. After the students finished the hunt we had a brai, where we cooked some boerwors and bread on a stick. (you cook the bread just like you would a hotdog over the fire….but instead it is bread dough. delicious.) The baboons returned at this point and tried to steal our boerwors. We threw rocks at them, and they retreated. After eating we lounged around the picnic area in the woods. I was extremely tired at this point, since I only had slept for 4 hours on Friday night. The large amount of food consumed also didn’t help my tired state. We left the forest at 4 pm and travelled through the scenic route of Constantia back to Rondebosch.

Once back home I immediately fell asleep for 2 hours. I woke up to what I thought was Liz knocking on my door. I opened the door only to find a huge dog wanting to come and hang out with me. His name was “Griffin” and he was Hanli’s friends dog. He was huge, and was literally jumping up on my door to try and open it. Because my door is glass, I thought that this probably wasn’t the best idea. Griffin wouldn’t listen to me.

After partially waking up from my two hour nap I went up to the Student Y for the Potjie Indaba, where they were discussing the concept of “ubuntu.” The Potjie Indaba was a traditional style dinner where they made Potjie stew. They were talking about the notion of ubuntu, an African humanistic philosophy about recognizing and celebrating the importance of community and the humanity of those around us. It was an inspiring talk, prompting us to find our identity in Christ, and urging us to share his love with those around us through service and care of our fellow humanity.

And now it is Saturday night and I am planning on going to sleep soon. Tomorrow I will go to Church on Main again. At 4 pm I will be meeting up with Liz, Ann and Jen to have a Jane Austen marathon/dinner cooking party (and no, we are not having Jane Austen themed food). I have been place in charge of making the dessert…brownies? I think yes.

“Mexe-Beans” and SA Post Office Ransom Notes, Sept 27

Today has been an eventful but unproductive study day. I woke up at 8 am and went for a run around the track. I have been running every morning, and it is getting a lot easier to wake up. I am really enjoying it. Today felt like I was sleeping in, 8 am is the latest I have woken up in weeks! When I got home I showered and headed off with my 300 lb suitcase full of laundry to the Laundromat. “Wash ‘n Web,” the two in one Laundromat and Internet Café was ridiculously crowded for a Monday morning, but I was able to get both of my loads washed and dried with little problems.

While my clothes were washing I did my grocery shopping. I always go to Pick ‘n Pay first and then to Woolworths (the expensive and amazing health foods store :) I have been craving Mexican food for over 2 months. Thus I decided to try to find some ingredients to make burritos or quesadillas or something. Unfortunately all of the tortillas were out. I purchased “Roti” which is tortilla like Indian food wraps. Then I went to the canned veggie aisle. The only canned beans they had were baked beans. South Africa does not like black beans or refried beans apparently. Next I turned to the one foot Mexican spices/salsa portion of the shelf. And to my surprise I found two cans of “Mexe-Beans.” I bought some chili powder in place of the beloved chipotle spice I normally like to use. I finished my grocery shopping and went back to put my laundry in the drier. After my clothes dried I headed home to test out my South African Mexican food cooking.

I made a roti-quesadilla for lunch. The Mexe-Beans were more like baked beans without the tomato/sweet sauce, but they worked. My quesadilla was ok, considering I used Roti as a tortilla substitute. Needless to say I CANNOT WAIT to be back in Cali where I can eat and make Mexican food everyday without any trouble!

After lunch I folded my laundry and procrastinated by cleaning my room. Monica (our houselady) came to my door and informed me that I had a package. It turns out that the South African Customs is not as ridiculous as I once thought. My package that my mom sent (consisting of some used/new clothes) was being held for a ransom of 900R (over 120$). After days of trying to reach the customs dept by phone, I finally got through. They told me to send it back with a letter explaining the problem. I sent a letter to customs and my package was sent back to be reassessed. It arrived today and I only had to pay 25R (about 3$). I was so excited. It felt like Christmas! Thanks mom!

And now I am back at home, listening to good music while blogging. The sun has finally come out, and I think it is here to stay :) I have my door open and the chilly wind is blowing in. Anuk, Hanli’s poodle puppy, keeps running in and out of my room and trying to eat my toes. She is a pretty cute puppy, despite the fact that she is a poodle. But alas, I think it is finally time for me to stop procrastinating and to work on my last Tut Assignment. After this paper, I only have one more dance paper, a 2500 word Memory and History research paper, and a 3500 word Medical History research paper. I have four more weeks left of classes. YAY! I can’t wait for finals to start (finals last almost three weeks), and for it to get warm so I can go to the beach everyday :)

Whales and Trails, Sept 24-26

On Thursday night I hiked up Lion’s Head Mountain with Kate, Kevin, and Nora. It was recommended to do the hike on a full moon - where you hike up for sunset and then hike back down in the dark. When we went it had just rained and was a very cloudy day. It was a bit harder than I would have thought, and involved a lot of rock scrambling. Because it was so cloudy, there was no moonlight, so we were rock scrambling down the mountain in the dark, trying our best to avoid the rain puddles. Kate, who was leading the way, stepped in many big puddles. (Kevin’s small headlamp couldn’t illuminate everything…) I slipped once and fell on my butt on a rock, but besides that I made it down the hill without too much difficulty. It was a really pretty hike, and we got a 360-degree view of Cape Town and the Cape Point. I think I would like to do this hike again, but on a night where we can actually hike down by moonlight.

On Friday we woke up early to depart for our two-day Hermanus Whale Festival Trip. It was National Heritage Day, so we didn’t have any class on Friday. Liz, Kevin, Kate and I rented a car for Friday and Saturday in order to drive up to Hermanus. Our car that we rented was a bit sketchy. It was an old Toyota Corolla. When the rental man drove up to our house the hubcap fell off. He then proceeded to put it back on with a zip tie…This is when we knew that we wouldn’t be doing a ton of driving in one day. The car ended up getting us there the whole way without many problems - despite the broken hubcap and a shaky streeing wheel. It unfortunately didn’t have a CD player, so we ended up listening to the radio. The radio in South Africa is pretty bad. We often would only get three stations at a time - composing of old school hip-hop, polka, rap, soft oldies, or reggae…..not my favorites by far, but we managed. The drive there was gorgeous. It felt a lot like driving through Monterey CA combined with Washington. The traffic was a bit heavy due to the popularity of the festival and construction on the road. We ended up reaching Hermanus after 3 hours of driving.

When in Hermanus we drove around the town for a bit, and stopped to get lunch at a local café. The burgers were absolutely amazing. The town was very cute, and felt so much like California, that I almost forgot where I was. Of course, I was reminded quickly I was no longer in America when I heard people speaking in Afrikaans all around me. After eating we went down to the festival shopping tents that were set up. I bought some really cool jewelry and other souvenir type things. I have become pretty good at bargain negotiating, so I got a good deal on everything that I got. After that we went and sat by the ocean side and watched the whales off of the shore. The shore was cliffy and rocky, and the whales came very close to the shoreline. It was really fun to watch. We saw lots of whale backs, fins, and tails - but unfortunately didn’t see any breaching (which is when whales jump fully out of the water).

After watching whales for a bit we went to check in at the Hermanus Backpacker’s Hostel. It was my first hostel dorm experience. The Backpacker’s inn was really artsy and nice. It had a pool with a bar, and a huge kitchen and lounge where people could make food and hang out. There were 60 people staying in the hostel, but we didn’t really get to meet too many of them, because they were all out and about. After checking in, we went back to town and walked around and got dinner. I was wearing shorts, and once the sun set the weather dropped like 10 degrees and it was windy. I was freezing! We went back to our hostel where we played pool and met some students that were studying abroad here from England. After that we went to sleep.

On Saturday we woke up early and checked out of the hostel. We walked along the coastline for an hour and did some whale watching. Then we returned back to the festival and ate really good and greasy festival food. I ate a “cravedog” (bratwurst style) and a fried potato swirl on a stick. It was delicious. After eating we walked back to our car and headed home along the coastal route to Cape Town.

The drive was so gorgeous. It looked like a combination between New Zealand’s rocky cliffs, and the gorgeous blue of Kauai’s ocean. The contrast of the scenery was so gorgeous. It looked like I had entered into a world that had been photoshopped and the contrast enhanced. I get this feeling a lot when traveling around South Africa. The colors are so vibrant here. We stopped at some scenic outlooks and beaches. There were baboons on the beach, which was fun to see. We stopped in Gordon’s Bay around noon to get ice cream and walk around. We got huge soft serve ice cream cones at an old fashioned shop, and then went to a used bookstore and looked around. We took our ice cream to the beach shore and ate it while looking out at the ocean and the whales. It was perfect. I love the ocean, I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to move somewhere that is not close to it….this could be a problem :)

After Gordon’s Bay we drove back to Cape Town. Once at home I took a nap and a much needed shower. For dinner my friends from Boston College were having a “tail-gating” party - which entailed grilling burgers and listening to the BC football game over the stream on the internet. This did not turn out well, as BC lost miserably and the internet wasn’t working very well. My friends were left feeling depressed and homesick. I personally was not very invested in the game, so wasn’t too devastated by the loss.

Today is Sunday. It is an icky rainy day. I just want to sit inside and read a good book or watch a movie, but unfortunately have a lot of reading and work to catch up on. I went to a new church this morning, which was really good. It is called “Church on Main” and is located a 5 minute walk from my house on campus. I already knew some people at the church because some of my Student Y friends go there. The worship and the preaching reminded me a lot of Upper Room. I miss UR and Flood so much, and can’t wait to come back home, and return to these communities and friends. But Church On Main was definitely very similar, and was full of students. I think I will definitely go back there next Sunday.

Springtime is officially here! September 23

In honor of springtime officially arriving in Cape Town I chose to wear shorts today. The morning was sunny and it looked like today’s weather was going to be nice. But by 2 pm it was sprinkling, and I was questioning my decision. Luckily, many other students also decided to commemorate spring by wearing shorts, so I didn’t look totally ridiculous walking around campus while it was nearly raining.

I went running this morning. I have ran everyday for the past week. But unfortunately I think I may have pulled a muscle in my leg again - or strained it at least. Either way, I had trouble walking to school today. I walked like a gimp up the hill, undoubtedly looking pretty ridiculous.

Last night I volunteered with SHAWCO. We went to a township called Joe Slovo. I worked in the paeds mobile, so I got to see a lot of small babies with many minor ailments. None of the children had anything seriously wrong with them, that we saw, which is always a good thing.

Tonight I will hopefully be hiking up Lion’s Head mountain for the full moon. It is the smallest of the mountains in Cape Town. It is a popular hike for people to do on a full moon because it is relatively easy and you get a view of the whole of Cape Town. So hopefully it won’t rain tonight, and we’ll get a good sunset.

Tomorrow is a public holiday, so I don’t have any class! I will be going to Hermanus with Kate, Kevin, and Liz for the Hermanus Whale Watching Festival. I want to go kayaking with the whales! We are renting a car and driving there on Friday and coming back on Saturday. We will be staying at the Hermanus backpackers hostel. I will let you all know how the weekend goes (hopefully I won’t get smushed by a jumping whale as I am kayaking :).

I drink Tea, Sept 20

I love the tea here. Everyone in South Africa drinks tea. Tea is served at church, at restaurants, for dinner, lunch and breakfast. There are three types of tea that I have become accustomed to drinking. There is the original black tea (like Earl Grey/Breakfast - similar to US tea), Chai tea, and my personal favorite Rooibos. Rooibos tea is an African tea blend, that doesn't have caffeine (thus perfect for drinking after dinner), and is sweeter than black tea. South Africa was once a British colony, which partially explains their "tea culture." Needless to say, I have fallen back into my tea drinking habits, and have even started to put milk in my tea.

Along with issues of tea is that of eating healthy. I have decided that I need to start eating healthier (aka, I must give up my Cadbury chocolate eating addictions, regardless of how amazing the chocolate here is). I am trying to eat healthy and go running/exercise everyday. It is hard to eat healthy though when you are cooking for yourself - but I can do it! As for today, I think I will go running. After I go running I plan on writing my dreaded History of African Dance Essay. I am taking this class for pass/no pass, so I'm going to see if I can produce a very mediocre essay in only one day. But seeing as I'm keen to go exercise before it starts raining, I might postpone the essay writing and go for a run. ("Keen" is my favorite South African lingo. I like to use it often in sentences, and it is one of many words that I will be taking home with me :)

Ditching Class on Fridays, September 18

Yesterday I decided to skip my class that was showing a video on perpetrator’s testimonies in order to go surfing. I went surfing with my friend George, who also ditched that class. He came to pick me up at 8 am and we drove to Muizenburg to get my board. Unfortunately when we got there, the shop that holds my board wasn’t open. So we got some coffee and waited until 9 am and chatted it up. Once we got my board we drove back to the other side of town to go surfing. We went surfing at a beach that is on the Atlantic side, and a lot closer to down town Cape Town. It was super fun, and I loved surfing somewhere besides Muizenburg. The waves were 2-4 and pretty steep in sections, but slow. It was really fun, and I don’t know if I will be going back to Muiz anytime soon (partly because my board is no longer at that shop, and I don’t know how I will get it back, haha). We surfed for about two hours. Because it was on the Atlantic side it was freezing, so after two hours I could no longer feel my feet. George had made hot chocolate, so after we surfed we drank some hot chocolate and ate cookies. Although it does not beat the standard burrito after surfing, it was definitely a very good substitute. Then George drove me back home and dropped me around 1 pm. It was a long and fun day of surfing, and now I have a nine foot, red longboard standing up in my room :)

After surfing I showered and took a nap. When I woke up I was hungry and ate a ton of random stuff from my refrigerator. I ate a banana, carrots, pasta, chips and salsa, and orange juice. Not a good idea. Haha, I need to go grocery shopping. My stomach hurt after eating the weird combination of foods. Later that evening I went to HUB. At HUB I played another piano piece, it was fun.

Today I hiked Table Mountain with Liz, Kate, and Julia. Liz and I woke up early and went to eat breakfast at Coco-Wahwahs (spelling?). We took a cab that drove us to the bottom of Table Mountain. From the trailhead we proceeded to climb straight up for two hours to the top of the mountain. It felt like I was on a stair-climber machine for two hours straight. It was strenuous, but really fun. Once we reached the top we could see all of Cape Town and both sides of the Cape Point. It was not flat like one would image the top of a table mountain to be. A cable car goes to the top, so there were a ton of people once we reached the top. You could tell who had hiked up. We had a bet going of how long it would take us, and the person who’s time was furthest away from the mark had to buy a piece of cake for us all to split at the top. There was a restaurant at the top where we ordered burgers, and Liz (who had lost the bet) ordered us a piece of chocolate cake. It is a great idea to have restaurants at the top of mountains, because burgers after hiking are amazing! After stuffing ourselves with delicious burgers and chocolate cake we took the cable car down the mountain instead of hiking. I am so glad we saved our knees by taking the cable car down. At the bottom we had to find a taxi to take us back. We wanted to only pay 80R (instead of the 140R we payed on the way up). A taxi driver approached us who accepted that price, and led us to his car. It was a mini-van, which was a surprise, since it was very off of its normal Cape Town/Whineburg route. We got into it, and were a little sketched out, since normally mini-buses don’t go off their routes. But the guy was really nice and he took us back to Rondebosch with no problems.

I just finished napping and showering, and am now going to see Inception with Liz, Ann, and Jen. It will be the first time I've seen a movie in South Africa! yay! Tomorrow I plan on going to church, and writing a Tut assignment (not looking forward to writing this Tut, but it must be done...)

And the schoolwork resumes, Sept. 16

School resumed this week in full force. I was hopelessly behind in my readings at the beginning of the week, but have miraculously been able to nearly catch up. By the end of this weekend I intend to be fully caught up. This week has been relatively uneventful.

On Monday I went to class and then spent the afternoon doing laundry and grocery shopping. I was excited when I arrived back from my trip to discover that I had two packages awaiting me at the post office. Upon pick-up I was informed that the customs charge on the package my mom sent me was 894R (roughly equivalent to $130). This was a total downer. The man at the post office told me that because my mom had put the values of the items (i.e. t-shirts, tights, etc.) on the package that customs was charging me thinking that I was going to sell the items in South Africa. Totally ridiculous! So after three days of relentlessly calling customs, and using up nearly all of my monthly airtime, I finally managed to receive orders to write a letter explaining the mistake and have the package sent back to customs. Hopefully when it returns I will not be paying an outrageous amount for my used clothes!

Later on Monday I went surfing. Monday was gorgeous and sunny, and the waves at Muizenburg were really fun. I saw more whales while I was surfing, which is always fun. The rest of the week the weather has not been so nice.

Tuesday through Thursday are really blurring together in my head. I think I spent these days going running, doing readings, and playing the piano. Some memorable things to note:

1. I have been going through another one of my banana eating obsession stages. I have eaten 14 small bananas in the last 2 days. Some may say this is not healthy, but I disagree.

2. I am also obsessed with picking pretty flowers off of neighbor’s bushes while I walk home from school. I make sure to only pick flowers that are hanging over the fences, in reach of the sidewalk….thats okay right? I have two vases of flowers in my room :)

3. Tonight I went out to dinner with the girls, Amanda’s mom, and a few other friends. There were eight of us in total. Amanda’s car that she just rented is a small 4/5 person car. (Mom and Dad: you might want to stop reading here) We thought it would be easier and cheaper to cram all eight of us into the car instead of calling a taxi. Not a good idea. Not only did the car sound like it’s breaks were going to give out due to the extreme weight load (equivalent to a small Jetta carrying 5 obese people) but we literally drove by eight Cape Town policemen. I did not know that that many policemen existed in Cape Town (haha, jk). There was an accident on the freeway so we literally had to drive past policemen that were standing 2 meters away. This constituted multiple people being smushed down out of view and cramped necks for a 2-mile period. After seeing the eighth policeman we decided to hire a cab, so as to not risk our luck any longer. So we reached the restaurant alive and without a ticket (thankfully!). The food was great and I ate a whole Margherita pizza by myself. My stomach hurts now.

Tomorrow I will go surfing early in the morning with George, instead of going to my class (they are just watching a documentary, thus I think going to the beach is more beneficial). I will hopefully be branching out and going to Long Beach. It will be a nice break from Muizenburg :)