This week was fantastic. We had monday off. Tuesday I went on an adventure which appears in the post below. Weds night I went to Ponchos with Leah, Elena, Taylor and Laura. Friday I went back downtown with Leah, Taylor, and Laura ( who all go to AU). We tried to go to the Jewish Museum, but it was CLOSED again for a Jewish Holiday. Rosh Hashana made sense...but what holiday did i miss? Now i just feel guilty! Instead we went to the National Gallery store. (Dad, your baskets are the on their way...the lady recognized me and talked to me). I bought a bracelet made out of ostirch egg shells and handcrafted by the San bushmen. I love her little gallery store because everything is pretty much the same stuff you could find all over markets like Greenpoint or Greenmarket square every day, but it all the stuff in her store goes to actual people and commmunity art projects all over Southern Africa. We then had lunch on the upper part of Kloof at a Mozambiquan Portugese restaurant and has some pretty spicy curries. I stopped to get the biggest latte they sold at Seattle Coffee Company (my caffine addiction is at full force now that instant coffee has been introduced into my diet.) Then we caught the Jammie back to Upper Campus and I went to class and watched an incredibly borring movie.



On Friday night the ladies and I went to The Nose, which is a wine bar in Greenpoint, conveniently located next to one of my favorite bars... Beulah. We wanted to go to the lipstick lounge but apparently it has been closed down (Tig I wish you'd been there). Basically it was the best night because they played all the great jams, and it was packed! No creepers. I wish every night were as spectacular.

Saturday I decided it would be a good idea to go to an outdoor concert in the middle of nowhere called Rock the Dasies b/c I wanted to do something different. I'm surprised we made it home. The music was bad. I froze because of the million mph winds. The Volkswagon van we were in could have been less creaky, especially when we were in the middle of nowhere driving on unlit roads. Whatever.

Today I went to NIA and was totally out of it because i woke up this morning to having my eyes crusted shut. Allergies. Gross.

I have 7 weeks left here. I can hardly believe it. I love it here because every day has the potential to be new and exciting, however, I still find myself fantacising about driving in Seattle or hanging out in the dining hall for those hour long dinners we like to have.

Remember I have Skype: loebsmobile.

Love,

Katy

the trees look like broccoli

The trees really do look like broccoli. Long stems with branches only at the very top. They're great.

Today I got my ear pierced at a place called Wild Fire off Long Street with my friend Leah. It was the best outing. We drank Margaritas afterwards. We went to different shops. We found the best place on Kloof St called the Wellness Warehouse. I could live there. There is all sorts of healthy food, plus books, vitamins, Tempurpedic stuff. It was fabulous.

The great thing about good to the neighborhood around Kloof and Long St is not only that it's the best neighborhood for food and shopping, but the Jammie Shuttle goes there! Never a dull moment with the Jammie. We only had to wait for about 10 minutes, but as we were merging on the N2 a barrel of some sort got stuck on the Jammie. We stood for about 10 mintues (miraculous) with all the cool artsy and theater kids from Hiddingh Campus. It was pandemonium. I love the cool kids. They created a ficticious news cast about the Jammie Incident on the spot. It was an entertaining wait. I love free transportation, and UCT.

Today I rocked a presentation about how gender shapes and constructs histories. Thanks to my liberal education and numerous hours spent at the WU and with Advocates I blew them and patriarchy out of the water! Thanks, Pomona!

Love, Katy

p.s. I finally have forged the instant coffee frontier after 2 months of battling against it. I found that mixing in sweetened hot chocolate makes it all the better.

Friday Night was Kol Nidre, the evening service for Yom Kippur. I went with this girl Ellen, who sold me my cell phone and keeps coming into my life AND runs this really fabulous program out in Nyanga and Khayelitcha (spelling?--they're both townships). She lives in Seapoint and is 24 or 25. We went to the Claremont Wynberg Congregation, so all i could think about is the minibus taxi guys yelling Claremont Claremon Wyeeeennberggg! Man was I misinformed. I was told this was the temple all the UCT kids go to. Not only did I see any girls that looked my age, but man was this place Orthodox. According to Ellen, everyone is Orthodox here. There is a reform temple, but I was so busy this week I didn't really do my research. Let me put it this way, I was the only girl wearing pants (though there were some Questionable outfits being worn by some of the younger girls--i cannot believe i just wrote "younger girls"--does that make me old?). OH and the sexes were seperated. AND the women barely participated. They didn't sing along. Nothing. The one good thing about the service was the choir. They had this really intense cantor who got really into it and a harmonizing mens choir. Again, no women. Oy vey. I didn't even make it to Avinu Malkeinu (my favorite song of all time) or Kol Nidre. We lasted for 2 hours. There was very little direction given by the rabbi. I didn't know where we were 1/2 the time and was just waiting for the next song. At any rate, I got home and downloaded Avinu Malkeinu from iTunes and listened to it and sang along.


This weekend was good. Tomorrow is actually National Heritage Day and therefore a day off. It's also National Braai Day (basically National BBQ Day). I will be doing homework the whole time though and replying to all your emails. On Saturday morning we left for our "Wildflower Weekend" overnight. We drove North up into the Western Cape, past a town called Darling to a reserve called Buffelsfontein (Buffalo's Fountain i think?). It's a wild animal and nature reserve. We stayed in these adorable and classy little "cottages". 4 people per cottage. 2 bedrooms 2 bathrooms. We went on a game drive. 8 of us had hot cocoa with Quinton. We had leather couches in our rooms. I miss couches. We had a nice girl talk session on the couches. We had a bonfire. We watched some bad 90s thriller with Tim Robbins called Arlington Road. SA TV plays the strangest obcure movies because that's probably the only ones they can afford to pay the rights to! We had a good breakfast.

I fasted for Yom Kippur. It was hard, but I was really proud of myself. I also really didn't want to eat crappy food the next day. A couple of girls and I are going to do a cleanse soon! Woo hoo. Also, I am planning on getting my ear pierced on Tuesday afternoon. This afternoon I had tea at the Mt.Nelson again. Bomb. Tonight I saw Hairspray at the Waterfront. It was really interesting to watch a movie whose original story is all about Civil Rights struggles in a place like South Africa. I wonder what it's like for South Africans to watch a movie with undertones of race struggles in the U.S. The waterfront always makes me forget I am here instead of at Home. I expected to walk out of that movie and be in Baltimore or somewhere else in the States. There aren't a lot of freestanding clothing shops in this town either. I think a lot of it is a safety issue. People prefer to go shopping in a mall because it's enclosed, etc. I must say that whenever there is live music at the Waterfront it always turns out well. Tonight there was a guy singing Mrs. Jones as we were leaving. Couldn't be better!

I'm exhausted. Back to my matress with the dip in it. Do you think it's better to have a dip or have a really HARD mattress? By better I mean which is going to hurt my back less?! I'm 80 years old.

Love, Katy

Zim Refugees

My dad sent me an article this evening from the LA Times (sorry I don't have the link) entitled "Zimbabwe migrants flood South Africa". Every day this is becoming a bigger and bigger "problem" for South Africa. I have been lucky enough to have met a lot of people from Zim, and while I haven't asked them specifically when or why they left, it's kind of understood that Zimbabwe is not the safest or healthiest place to be at the moment. I feel like a third of the people I meet are from Zim at UCT. This makes sense considering it's not that far away and UCT is the best school on the continent. However, some have insinuated to me that going to varsity (college) came at an opportune time. A lot of people in Zim are scavenging for food. It seems like there is very little hope for those who cannot afford to buy food, clothing, and shelter.

This article really reminded me of where I am in the world. I am SO physically close to Zimbabwe (compared to Seattle and LA at least). This story would be so easy for me or anyone else to sort of brush off, but it's RIGHT HERE. Woah. I am in Africa, ya'll!


On another note, I went to voluteering tonight despite my severe case of the mondays. Sometimes I am amazed I learned to read and to add, subtract, multiply, and divide. It's so hard to try to explain to these kids. But they're still cute. Josie showed me everyone's picture in the rec room. Half the kids in the house are sisters. There's one group of four sisters, and a couple groups of three. Josie has a sister at St. Georges too. I am curious to know what happened/ why these girls are here, but I feel uncomfortable asking them. I think it's not fair to them somehow.

Jammie was perfect today. I didn't have to wait more that 5 minutes all three times I took it. Success!

Love,

Katy

Gun Shots?

Nicole, a friend of mine who lives in Liesbeek and goes to Bates, and I were peacefully listening to Sufjan and working on our various essays, when suddenly we hear what I thought were gunshots. We went to my window to investigate only to find a "bakkie" (pick-up truck) that was really struggling to get by. I want to call Car Talk to figure out what this noise was, but it was essentially the cliche blasts that come out of the exhaust that one might see in the movies when the protagonists' car dies in the middle of the desert and you know it's just not his day.

At any rate, it drove toward the Mowbray bus station so we didn't think anything of it and went about our merry ways of writing essays. Approximately 10 minutes later we hear the same cliche blasts. As I am digging for ideas in the back of my brain, the blasts barely registered. Honestly I wouldn't have been surprised if another person with a dying car drove by (it happens rather frequently around here--in fact I believe I've seen at least 4 cars being repaired or having their tires fixed outside of Liesbeek). However, Nicole discovered that it was the same truck. It had finally stalled right in the median of Liesbeek Parkway (which is a major road that runs next to my dorm). After it rocked back and forth for a few minutes , a girl got out and pushed it. I had given the truck up for dead, and it was, BUT two minutes later it was attached to another truck and was being pulled away! Where did that other truck come from?

Love,

Katy

p.s. Boys who live in this dorm mumble a LOT here. A guy just knocked on my door asking for Ackim (my flatmate who left his base on while he went to the grocery store so loud that my door was rattling), and he had to ask me three times "How are you doing" until he had to say it really slowly and looked at me like I was an idiot with a dunce cap on. Oh man.

Bye Dad!

Welcome to my blog.
This past week my dad visited me for spring break. I was fortuante enough to take him around Cape Town and share a bit of my life here with him. This will be great when I have to come home and suffer reverse culture shock (but at least there will be recycling!)

This blog is basically for me to remember and share my random thoughts because, lets face it, sometimes I'm just too tired to write in my journal.

Go to facebook to look at my pictures! Alternatively, if you're a family member/too old to have facebook just get Becky to send them to you. I'm sure she'll really enjoy doing that. Ha.

Right now I am making a promise to myself to get out of Rondebosch and Mowbray more often/ all the time. It needs to be done otherwise I may go insane.

Bedtime!

Love, Katy