Week 1 Update

Since it has taken me too long to add all of the people I want to include on my email updates, I think that a blog might be an easier feat for lazy me. It also may allow for more frequent shorter posts. So here it is (without a creative name) in all its glory.

The past week has been a crazy one. I feel like I have been here for months, but in reality when I checked the calendar it seems that I only left home a week ago. We spent the first four days living in a dorm on the UCT campus, and then Saturday morning we made the treck to our off campus houses. I am living in a "compound" called Highstead (that's the name of the street...they do it this way so when we are drunkenly lost we can tell whatever nice stranger that we live on Highstead and they will hopefully direct us home...or come and steal all our belongings). There are 28 people living on the compound, 10 of whom live in my apartment/flat. This 10 includes and RA who is a student at the University of Cape Town (UCT). His name is Buhhle. He hasn't been around much so far but we have only heard good things about him. The other nine of us hail from across the United States...Atlanta, Nashville, San Francisco, California, Philadelphia, Connecticut. All of us go to different schools, except that there are two girls from UPenn (one of them is SDT at Penn...holler sisters of the torch!). There seems to be a good "buzz" (South African word for vibe) between all of us and it is interesting learning about all their different backgrounds. The main time we spend together is during meals when we all cook together in the kitchen. Of course I bought way too many groceries so everyone has been hitting up my food. Last night I even cooked pasta with pesto, mozzarella, avocado, and tomato and everyone wanted to eat it because it was so good (yes, family and friends, I cooked). The compound also has a huge courtyard and a security guard (Peter) who comes every night from 6 pm to 6 am.

Besides my adventures around the Highstead compound, I have traveled a decent amount around Cape Town since moving in. On Sunday, we went on a tour of the Cape Peninsula - the most South Western point in all of Africa. It was spectacularly beautiful and awesome. Really awe-some. We also got to see penguins and other creatures like baboons! For lunch we stopped at a township known as Ocean View. The people of Ocean View made us authentic African food and a lot of their youth arts groups performed for us. It seems that South Africans are a little obsessed with Michael Jackson and Ocean View has their own baby Michael impersonator (pictures of him to come).

One of the most beautiful places I have found here is the water front, which is a complete tourist trap but I am not even going to pretend that I am not a tourist and don't love me some good Thai food. So the other night we located Wang Thai and I stuffed myself with Pad Thai and spring rolls...we then proceeded to go to Haagen Dazs and KFC and THEN to the German pub a few doors down. We were sufficiently full by the end of our time at the waterfront. From there, we went to a club about a 10 minute drive away called Mercury. It was filled with Americans, South Africans with piercings, and lots of second hand smoke. Not totally my scene but it was a lot of fun.

So it does seem like I have spent most of my time with Americans at American tourist establishments, but I have had two uniquely South African experiences this past week. Firstly, on Sunday night the whole program went to dinner at a place called Moyo. It is on a wine estate in Stellenbosch (wine country) called Spier. It was 45 minutes away and when we got there they filled us up with lots of meat and more wine than you could ever want. There were African drumming and dancing performances, and they painted our faces with lots of white dots (a lucky few friends got BBMed the picture of my face with the paint). The food was DELICIOUS and there was meat from all different types of animals. I clearly located the dessert table early on and took my fair share of apple crisp. The restaurant was beautiful, as well.

Yesterday, two friends and I went up to campus for lunch. I had a shwarma (delicious) and my friend Kara got a bowl of African food from the "Afri-quizeen" counter. Our friend Jenna was feeling a little less adventurous and located the Greek salad. Kara is definitely the adventurous eater among us. Anyways, we spotted one of our RAs (his name is Remy) and we went over and spoke to him. An hour later we found ourselves sitting with his friend Nas, a South African woman from Cape Town majoring in history. She is writing her thesis on witch craft in Cape Town. As the conversation began to wind down, Nas offerred to take us on a tour of Cape Town and we took her up on it. She brought us down to the "garden" area. We walked around near parliament and then through Greenmarket Square which has lots of South African art and gifts for sale. We didn't buy anything, but rather kept walking and went to Long Street. At night, Long Street has a lot of clubs and bars, but during the day is has a SoHo/Old San Juan vibe. We went into some antique stores and then stopped for drinks at a Mexican restaurant off of Long Street. Nas taught us all the dirty South African words and told us all the cool bars and clubs to go to. Jenna and Kara took her advice on the bars and clubs last night, while lame-o me went to sleep around 10 pm because I just couldn't keep my eyes open.

So that's where I'm at right now. The people here couldn't be friendlier and I am definitely having an experience I could not get anywhere else. The hardest thing for me is not giving the beggars money (Jess, you would be proud that I am not handing out five-dollar-bills like I do in New York) and seeing people live in such extreme poverty, but I think it will be something I will get more used to as time progresses. I am learning lots of South African slang, and  I even updated my city on Facebook from New York to Cape Town so I guess that means I am OFFICIALLY here! Registering for classes and such today. Weird that school starts again on Monday... Check back for more updates soon! TK