03.11.2010
Wow, crazy. In a month from tomorrow I will be back in the United States.
It has been awhile since my last entry, which is disappointing because I was doing so good keeping up with my almost every 2 weeks rule; basically I just skipped a blog so this might be longer…
The Thursday after my last entry I went to “Cocktails and Pizza” with people from my Social Work class. The house the gathering was held at was in Constantia, one of the nicest places I have been in the city. The house was huge, and even nicer than my house at home. The levels of the housing gap here is incredible, someone can be living in a shack while others in these homes. The garden was huge, there was a pool in the backyard and across the street there was a vineyard. I ended up being the only American at the party which was fun because I got to make actual South African friends!
The next day, I left for my weekend of Rocking the Daisies, one of South Africa’s biggest music festivals. Two people in my program celebrated their birthday’s there and I’m sure it would have been a wonderful way to have celebrated. We got to see one of our new favorite Dub-Step DJ’s, HAEZER (an Earthdance find), as well as find two female DJ’s, Blush & Bass, who definitely rocked the daisies. During the day on Saturday, we sat around a swimming hole (I think it was actually a dam), which was not the cleanest of water, but because it was one of the hottest days we had experienced in Cape Town, it felt really nice. Pretty much everyone got sunburned, but I think it was worth finally having warm weather. We slept in really tiny tents, the first night I shared with two other people and the second we had four. Technically they claimed them to be 4 person tents, but in reality, it probably would have been a two person. I also had the best Samosa I have ever had here, Spinach and Feta flavored. Yum! By Sunday, everyone was tired and wanted to go home, besides the weather had taken a complete 180 and was cold and ridiculously windy, windy enough to blow over tents. It was so much fun, but I actually liked Earthdance better, even though this one was more talked about by South Africans.
The next Thursday, I went to one of my American friend from Spring Break, Charlie’s comedy show. He was funny but everyone else was not. I think everyone in the audience was American, even though I think all the rest of the comedians were South African.
Friday, I think was one of the best nights I have had here. We went to Stardust for dinner. It was a dinner theatre of sorts, where all of the waiters got on stage and sang. Joining in was highly encouraged. There was a competition to see who could be the most enthusiastic the whole night and the winner would get a free bottle of champagne. This resulted in a lot of singing and dancing on chairs. We really got into Sweet Caroline, like any good person would. However, apparently in South Africa no one shouts out “So Good, So Good, So Good” and so when we Americans shouted this at the top of our lungs, we were met with an entire restaurant staring at us wonder what on earth we were doing. Our waiter was the one singing this as well, so he came over at the end and told us it was a nice touch haha. Our waiter was also the most talented one in the bar, he sang well, he played guitar and he was pretty cute. During one song he came over and put his arm around me as he sang for a little while. The rest of the group was jealous. My favorite song was the Grease Medley. I got pretty into it. In the end, we ended up losing the competition to an obnoxious drunken bachelorette party. We brought pretty good game seeing as we had all only had one drink with our dinners, and they had had enough where they didn’t need the bottle of champagne. The manager told us he thought the crowd picked the wrong winner. The whole night was a lot of fun.
The next night was our program Farewell dinner (yes, it seems kind of early on the 16th of October when our program doesn’t end until the 19th of November, but this way it didn’t interfere with our finals). It was held at like a country club thing and decorated with rose petals (I thought that was a little too romantic for a big group of people, kinda awkward, but it did look nice). We drank, and ate, and got awards. The awards were really funny and included such awards as “most likely to fall on a piece of glass” and “most likely to punch a girl in the face.” One of our program coordinators got the aptly named “Interstudy Interstud” Award. I personally was awarded “most likely to have a story after every night.” After all the food and glory, there was time to kill so we started a dance party to music videos on a TV. Once everything was all cleaned up, we loaded back on the bus that took us there and headed out on the town. Pulling up to the club in a Coach bus was pretty epic. We went to the Assembly for the Rocking the Daisies after party. I got to skip the line and get in free because I had my wristband from the weekend still on. They had a few bands there to play; one had a trumpet and everything. We also got to see Blush & Bass again. It was a good time.
That Monday, I had an assignment due (which I actually turned in early) that had ridiculous expectations of any International student. We were expected to get a tour of someone who was not a UCT student’s house and have them tell me about things that are important to them. Since I don’t really know anyone who is not a UCT student, this proved very difficult. In the end I just used the house in Constantia I had been to and made up the identity of the person’s grandma (she did actually live with her grandma, I just didn’t meet her). So thank you Eunice! (Wouldn’t it be cool if that was actually her name??) That Thursday I had a test, which was no fun. And then I got to spend Thursday and Friday nights in working on a project for that same class that was due on Monday. Chelsea and I stayed up till 5 am working on that project but we finished so that’s all that matters.
That weekend was not really a weekend for me. It was required of me to be in a music video for African Dance class. The music video was for the up and coming South African band The Plastics new single “Caves.” We spent 6 hours on Saturday learning the dance moves and 11 hours Saturday filming it. They were not going to edit the video at all so we had to continuously run through the song until we got the perfect take. When we were actually dancing, it was a lot of fun, but unfortunately most of our time was spent waiting which got really annoying. I had my one and only experience eating fish in South Africa on Saturday. They fed us delivered fish and chips both were all soggy and really really disgusting, I tried to eat some of it because I knew that would be the only food I would get. I got about 3 bites in. People who actually love fish didn’t get much further. It was gross. As a thank you, we all ended up getting free CDs and got the band to sign them all. So, I’m pretty much famous now.
The next Monday and Tuesday were the last two days of classes, but a lot of classes ended up cancelling their lectures. All of mine got cancelled expect one. After that one class I went to the Cape Town Aquarium. It is supposed to be the best and very nice, formals are held there and everything. It was really cool, but it was also really small. So either South Africa doesn’t have very high quality aquariums or I am just an aquariumist. Don’t get me wrong, it was really nice and cool. The best part was they had an orb of Nemo’s that you could crawl under and then go into the middle of. The eels were really disgusting the jellyfish were super cool and I saw Rock lobsters and got the B52s song stuck in my head for the rest of the day. After, we walked around a craft fair thing pretty aimlessly and then went looking for a place to eat. That failed so we ended up going home and then me and half of the original group walked down to Rondebosch and ate at Cocoa Wah Wah. After our meals, we split a fudge filled chocolate cookie. It was huge and delicious. It was my first time trying one of them (since I do not frequent there as many Americans) and when they said it was fudge filled, I imagined a chocolate chip cookie with the little circle of fudgy stuff in the middle, but no. This was a 3D cookie and the inside was gooey fudge goodness. It is really hard to describe but it was amazing.
Wednesday, I went Halloween Costume shopping, which we thought kind of ended up failing. And then saw Eat Pray Love. I really enjoyed the movie but it made me really want Italian food. Luckily I was not the only one with this mindset, and we went to Col’ Cacchio. I got a wonderful pizza with Spinach, Feta and Sun-dried Tomatoes. Once we got back, I went with 2 of the girls who went with to the movie, Leah and Macy, to our local pub SA Champs for their giant beer specials and then made our way to Dubliner’s. This is a really Irish kind of bar (go figure with that name right) with rowdy people and music and it is always packed. But this night we discovered the upstairs. Here the lighting is dim, there are numerous couches and even a piano. It was a complete scene change.
The next night I went to the beach it was gorgeous. The water was crystal clear, and very cold. But the sun was hot. I am loving the weather change that is happening, I only wish it would consistently be so beautiful.
On Friday I had to head up to campus to receive some prizes. I had entered a photo contest for international students that pretty much no one entered. There were a total of about 20 photos submitted for three categories, and I submitted one of each. In the end, all three of my photos won a prize. I won first place for my photo of “The UCT Learning Environment,” second place for “Orientation Week” and an Honorable Mention for “South Africa through Your Eyes.” I won a key chain, a UCT winter hat, and a really awesome Vuvuzela that is made out of Kelp and is painted really cool.
Saturday was my day to celebrate Halloween. (Well, for part of it I was writing a paper, but once I gave up on that, it was a celebration). I baked really delicious Sugar Cookies with Orange frosting and Brownish Black sprinkles. They were cute and yummy. Then I transformed from Aria to Ke$ha. (She is a popular singer if you do not know her). Although we weren’t sure if my costume was going to turn out because the shopping on Wednesday was a failure, it turned out perfectly. I got to wear gold leggings. It was wonderful. Unfortunately, I borrowed them so I don’t get to keep them. Most of my program who were in town and not traveling got dressed up and went to a house party a few blocks away. The house had rented a DJ for the party and it was a house full of a bunch of Americans in costumes. It was a little taste of home. To top of the Americaness of it all, the cops showed up 3 times before 12:30. It was funny because I got to witness massive amounts of Americans running from the house when the cops were there because they are so used to being underage in America. There was really no need to run, no one was in trouble it was just loud for a residential area, and well, probably a fire hazard. It was fun though and it was fun to see other costumes made from what little we had to work with in a different country. I actually met a man wearing the same kind of gold leggings as I was.
Sunday was Halloween but I got to spend the day writing the rest of my paper for African Dance. I went and had an orange colored smoothie, so I guess that was kind of festive.
November 1st marked the first day of exams. I did not have one on the first day but I did have one on the 2nd at 8am. My exam took place in the Sports Centre so that meant that there were hundreds of desks set up across multiple basketball courts. It looked insane. I wish I had been able to take a photo. The night before I had not slept well at all and kept waking up from nightmares about my exam. That was not the best way to prepare for a test. In the end, it didn’t end up going that badly (luckily). After getting home from the exam, I was so happy that it was over, that I ended up channeling my inner housewife. I fried potatoes (something I have never done before and just randomly decided to try), I washed all the dishes multiple times during the day, I cleaned my room (it was really really messy, like at home in the US messy), and even baked banana bread. Later that night I went out with my previously met South African friends to a bar in Camps Bay (a nice place on the beach which would be an expensive cab drive, good thing South Africans have cars!) to sing Karaoke. I finally mustered up my courage and committed myself to singing my first Karaoke song on stage (other than the time at Purple Turtle with a group of about 10 people which doesn’t count). I sang a duet of “Girlfriend” by Avril Lavigne. I am very glad I did it and am very proud of my stage-frightened self.
And that leads me to today. In which I have done nothing, but there is still more day to come so we will see what happens!
One more month to live it up big in Cape Town, South Africa!
