…and man, has it been FUN!

I feel I must start with an explanation for my absence from the blog. It has certainly not been intentional, but simply been a matter of time. I definitely set myself up for failure with the first two posts as I:

1) had TONS of free time to put into those posts,

2) was unfamiliar with the city and thus, unable to really “do” anything those first couple of days, and

3) did not have any homework to deal with (yes, studying has very much gone along with all the fun “mischief afoot” here in Cape Town).

Understanding many of you back home are very interested in all the things I have been doing here, the fact that I have only now been able to sit down and type up this post is, in some ways, quite satisfying. I say this because I have truly been enjoying and engaging everything that the life here has to offer. Admittedly, there have been some down times I could have spent posting, but considering I’ve been averaging about 6 hours of sleep per night and would like to continue maximizing those opportunities while I am here, I took those moments to regain my mental and physical sanity.

And this is the where the rub is.

I have felt for the past month (yes and yikes! It has been over a month now!) quite the pull between cutting out time to share with all of you my experience, but also to actually experience all of the amazing opportunities that have come my way (the only reason I am able to post now is that I finally don’t have that much reading to do for tomorrow). So in short: yes, I am sorry I have not updated you recently, but at the same time I am not sorry in that it has been due to my complete immersion into life here.

But I digress. You haven’t waited all month just for an apology, so let’s get to some of those adventures and opportunities I have been able to take part in! In trying to structure this post in my head for quite some time (I have at least been thinking about you all everyday!), I couldn’t quite come up with the best way to put everything in because, well, there’s simply too much to put in all at once. The method I could come up with is just a list. To kick things off, I will give a bullet point list of all the “activities” I have done (if only to demonstrate that I really have been busy!) and will then follow it up with another post tomorrow (Lord willing ) with a list of a more narrative sort about the more exhilarating experiences as well as the some cultural observations I have made through this first month.

The majority of these following activities have been shared with either my host parents, Godfrey and Lynne, or the other 5 students in homestays: Haley, Sarah, Taylor, Lauren, and Megan. The six of us have “clicked” pretty well and ventured out to do these things, but I’ll elaborate on that more in the next post.

So without further ado, here goes the list (in pseudo chronological order):

• A trip to a local and completely organic farmer’s market. And complete with, of course, a local brewed beer well before noon (Godfrey jokes that it’s the South African way, but I’m not so convinced yet.
• A rugby game at Newlands Stadium, one of the few rugby-only stadiums left where you are literally right on top of the action, even closer than most NFL stadiums. The DHL Stormers (the Cape Town Team) won the game I was at, finished the season on top of the standings (league included teams from South Africa, Australia, and New Zeland), but lost their semifinal game in apparently notorious fashion (collective reaction of those people interested in rugby reminded me a lot of those pitiful Chicagoans on the North Side)
• Peninsula Tour, that included sites such as: penguins (too cute! pics/video on Facebook), baboons, a stop with music/dance/singing performances by local youth, the Cape of Good Hope/Cape Point
• Mandela Day service project at the wetlands preserve literally right next to/behind Godfrey and Lynne’s house where some local schools helped do some planting and landscaping for the new outdoor classroom
• Registration for classes, but in a sort of “old school” way in that we had to go around, stand in long lines, and get signatures on paper from everyone who’s anyone to approve our class schedule (more on classes a little later)
• A trip to the new 2010 World Cup Stadium to watch a Manchester United Practice (yes, the one from the English Premier League, though the big stars weren’t there as they were still recovering from the Euro)
• A concert, “Soul Classics” at the Baxter Theatre (on UCT’s campus) with Godfrey and Lynne where some AMAZING local singers sang, well, some soul classics. (Though I did recognize some of the melodies from what Mom and Dad played occasionally, it was certainly a concert for the previous generation, but nonetheless, a great night out)
• A visit to the District Six Museum, an extremely insightful look at the wide ranging effects of apartheid both generally as well as specifically District Six, arguably one of the worst hit areas
• A Sunday morning spent in the small fishing town of Hout Bay on the western side of the Peninsula, complete with fish market, indoor market, more local beer, and a drive up Chapman’s Peak, which gave an awesome view of Hout Bay, the ocean, and the mountains
• A Friday night spent in town of Kalk Bay, taking beautiful picture of False Bay, and enjoying a meal and drinks in a restaurant founded and run by a Cuban family in true Cuban fashion (with some crazy, literally flaming Cuban coffee)
• A weekend trip to Stellenbosch, a city about an hour northwest of Cape Town known for its countless wineries, where we, of course, went winetasting (alright…it was more like wine drinking by the time we made it to the 4^th farm).
• A somewhat anticlimactic 21^st birthday in that I was pretty sick that whole week and could barely manage some rice and a piece of my birthday cake (but the previous weekend of winetasting and partying sort of made up for it, more on this later)
• A Saturday morning excursion to the Old Biscuit Mill, another local market that was closer to downtown Cape Town and notorious for its hipster status, if there ever was such a thing. Though I typically abhor hipster culture, the bacon infused Belgium waffle followed by some oh-so-whoa froyo covered in berry fruity topping made the trip worth it.
• A visit to perhaps the oldest historical landmark in Cape Town, the Castle of Good Hope; an awe-inspiring experience certainly given the history of the place, but also eerie considering some of the terrible human tragedies committed by the VOC in relation to the native peoples here.
• An early Sunday morning “walk” (read “hike”) up a mountain at Constantia Nek. Overall it wasn’t too strenuous, but I did break a sweat and it was nothing compared to…
• My Women’s Day hike, starting at UCT and taking the contour path all the way around to Platteklip Gorge (You can find it on Google) to the top of Table Mountain. Oh. My. Goodness! To give you an idea of this hike, we started at 1pm, started up Platteklip Gorge around 4pm, got to the top somewhere between 6 and 6:30pm, caught the sunset on the top of the mountain overlooking the ocean and the city (surreal experience!) and me and two other crazy people decided to race the twilight down the mountain and make it back to the bottom of Platteklip Gorge just at dusk around 7:30, by far the longest hike my sorry, flat plains Hoosier self had ever done. Needless to say, my quads were on fire for the following 4-5 days.
• Many nights spent watching the Olympics with Godfrey over or after dinner. This was part of the down time (but who wasn’t watching Olympics anyways?)
• And a Switchfoot concert. Yes, that Switchfoot. Live. In Cape Town. And by far the most amazing musical performance I have ever witnessed! (a performance that you can also experience in part when the Switchfoot documentary Fading West comes out as they were filming the concert to be part of it)
• Oh, and not to mention the fact I am now into the fourth week of a full schedule of classes at UCT which, although technically not as demanding as my load at IUPUI, still requires a lot of work and studying.

Now a moment to catch our breath…

Hopefully, your presumed disappointment (or worse, perhaps) in my blogging absence has some what subsided now that you know what I’ve been up to. And mind you, this is just month 1. There are still museums to be seen (Apartheid Museum, Diamond Museum, South African Museum) mountains to climb (Devil’s Peak, Lion’s Head), trips to take (like the one with my CIEE seminar this weekend to Joburg, Pretoria, and Soweto; not to mention the Garden Route), volunteering to be done (which finally starts up at the Ark tomorrow), whales to be watched in Hermanus, surfing to try at the beaches (when the temps get above the unseasonably cold norms of 50°F), and of course, homework to be done…just to name a few.

I will leave you at that for now as my books and pillow now compete for my attention. Once again, I will work on the narrative post tomorrow and try to post some pictures of the aforementioned adventures as well, but the Internet issue is still annoying regarding both speed and usage so no guarantees. A final disclaimer though: I have an Ethics test on Thursday that I have to study for, a ton of reading to do, and a jam packed weekend trip in Joburg to prepare for, so no promises this time (but I certainly will try!).

So until next time,

Cheers!