So here are pictures from two of our past driving adventures.

The first are a few from Rocking The Daisies, a music festival outside of Cape Town.

The Tents at sunset…

Myself and two of my good friends, Susannah (Wesleyan) and Jane (Upenn)

Some tents…

People in the day time… (I forgot to add, it was a two night, three day show)

A lake that people sat around

The Venue…

The Tents…

We drove 6 or 7 hours up to Namaqualand to find flowers only to discover that we had missed the actual flower season, but it was still one of the best trips I’ve ever been on.

(View Gallery Below for more photos!)

The Orange River at Sunrise:

Here is just some quick photos from Camps Bay/ Clifton, two beaches in Cape Town… Really pretty water!!

It has been almost a month since I last made an entry here! Things have been really busy with spring break and then getting back to classes and things, so I haven’t had much time to write. However! I have added a really large gallery of photos below, mostly of my 12 day trip in Namibia! My friends and I organized the trip with a company and hoped on a tour, where we drove for 12 days through the desert, from Wintuk all the way down to Cape Town. (we flew to Wintuk)… It was a great experience and although I was hesitant (I’ve never been camping before) it ended up being a really cool time.

Here are a list of some of the things we did on our trip:

1. Camped at various sites including a few places in the middle of no where desert (bushlands)

2. Went to Swakopmund where there were various activity options- I chose to Sky Dive and go on a dolphin cruise!

3. Drove around in a large Truck/Bus for 12 days

(On our tour we were known as “the americans”…. This is me making  my “american college student” face.)

4. Went to Etosha National Park and went on a Safari

5. Went on a ‘Desert Tour’ and walked around some Sand Dunes

6. Woke up at 5 and climbed ‘Dune 45′ to see the sun rise

7.Went to a seal colony where I learned that seals make the most bizarre sounds ever…

8.Went to Fish River Canyon to watch sunset

9. Spent a night at the Orange River

9.Many other things!

So I haven’t written in forever but I took some pictures today at Old Biscut Mill, which is this awesome market type place that is open every saturday. It is such a great place! You go there and there are tons and tons of samples plus all sorts of foods that you can buy. There are all sorts of foods there and all of it is very fresh and local or organic food. You basically just walk around this little area and eat non-stop. It’s wonderful . In addition to the food, there are also shops around the area and a designers market where certain stores can bring some of their clothes and sell them. It’s a really neat environment to check out. I took some pictures… (see gallery)

Other things that have been going on…(a brief summary)

1. Went to Camps Bay two weekends ago with some friends and saw an awesome sunset…Its so nice to be near beaches for once!

2. Our house got broken into two times in 10 days…It was really sad- I was very lucky because my room did not get broken into … Thankfully CIEE, the program I’m with has been incredibly helpful about everything… They’ve definitely made the process easier for everyone. We are getting new bars put on many of the windows so hopefully things will be better now.

I have a lot more to write about but no time right now! I will write back soon…Enjoy the few pictures below!

On Friday our house had a braai (a bbq) outside- It was a really good time! It takes a long time to cook the meat since we are doing it over these little coals and it’s pretty cold outside, but everyone in the house contributed a little bit and we got everything done before 9:30. It was a really fun time- each person from the house had some friends over from other houses so it ended up being a good mix of people. After the braai, my friend Susannah and I went to Cybar, which is a little posh bar 1 min. from my house, to say happy birthday to Ben, a boy who lives in my house who was turning 21. Following that, we went back home and then headed over to Cubana for a bit (another bar, but more of a loungie type place) with Hilary, my Sol-Mate and some of his friends. It was a good time but I was very tired by the end of the night!

Saturday was really nice because we went on a Wine tasting near Stellenbosch… The scenery was really gorgeous and I’m not sure if I did it justice with the pictures, but at least you can have a sense of what it looked like! (See Images in Gallery Below)

As for the Rain…

We have been incredibly lucky with the weather here, as I said before- It has been amazing for almost the whole time we have been here (almost a month now) However, there have been 2 days with lots of rain. On one of these occasions a bought an umbrella from campus beacuse I thought it would help protect me from rain, however 5 minutes later i found myself walking around campus with a  ridiculously bent and distorted large rainbow umbrella. I looked like i was carrying some sort of walking stick with a rainbow tarp on it and pieces of metal sticking out- needless to say I got some weird looks. Plus, I was completely soaked- I laughed at myself though, it was a pretty funny situation…-next time someone tells me not to buy an umbrella b/c of the wind, I will listen!

I am taking this entry from an Email that I wrote to a friend of mine…It is sometimes hard to sound like myself when I am ‘blogging’ because I get stuck and don’t know what to write when I don’t know who I’m actually writing to…Therefore I found that if I make a post out of emails I send to people it might bring my voice out a little bit more .I’m sorry if there are many spelling errors- it’s never been my thing. Also, please excuse the “likes”- it’s something to work on Also, this entry is extremely long, so I’ll break it up into pieces because I know I would never read something with this much text!

Overall- Going Out / Location

Things here are very interesting and I really haven’t been able to like sit down and think about any of it yet. I have been having a really nice time so far and I’m slowly adjusting but of course there are some things that will take a little while to get used to. Surprisingly there are many things here that remind me of America- they play American music everywhere, which is odd and whenever we go to bars/clubs it feels like America…kind of…except you never know when you will be mugged and you have to be in large groups, and they allow smoking in doors so I smell terrible whenever I come home… etc. (but as we say here in the program, “TIA” (who cares…this is Africa!- there is no reason to be bothered by those sorts of things… its just something to get used to- I’m just happy to be here!) As for location – I live in a house off campus with some other American students from Ciee. We are in a great location because we are only a 10-20 min walk from campus (depending on if you walk up the huge hill or take the shuttle, which is a 10 min walk away) and literally a 30 second walk to main road which has grocery stores and food places and the gym (which is amazing because I love grocery stores and the gym!)… It is “safe” for me to walk on main road alone which is great because it means I can eat and do work and go grocery shopping without having to ask someone to come with me- who’d have thought that would be a luxury? I still have to be cautious of course, but it’s better than nothing. I have a really nice room- I get a double bed! The room is a little big for me, so I put up a clothes line with multi-colored clothes hooks and made a random picture to put above my bed. It makes the room feel a little homier which is nice.

Food:

The food here is interesting- the first week we were here we like ate with the program every day and they gave us a lot of red meats like Ox and duck and lamb which I’m not the biggest fan of, but it was ok! My friends from home thought I was going to die when I came here because I am such a picky eater—the first week I was thinking the same thing, but alas- I have found more food now! I have been eating many meals at this (i’m sorry to say) chain place that’s called Kuai which is like a healthy fast food restaurant. I’m obsessed with it and it’s right across the street from my house! They have a lot of organic foods as well as items that are dairy free and gluten free. I get a wrap with chicken, beans, rice and salsa. It’s the best. Of course, I am hoping to branch out soon- i’ve started to make some food for myself but so far that has been mostly cereal or turkey wraps . Yesterday, however, I did contribute to a guacamole making party as well as some mac cheese making for our house dinner! (I can’t actually eat mac cheese, but I enjoyed shredding cheese and bread for the recipe). The House dinner ended up being a good time.

The House and Rondebosch

There are 7 other Americans living in my house with me, 3 other girls and 4 boys as well as our “sol-mate” Hilary, who is from Zimbabwe. Hilary is like our Customs Person here (that is like an RA who is your friend and hangs out with you, for non-Haverford people). He is really great! He took us to a market called “old biscuit mill” the other day (next time I go I will take pictures and write more about it) and a Braai (which I wrote about) on Sunday. It has been nice to have someone here who can help us to get acclimated to the different nuances Cape Town. While it sometimes seems to be European, there are many aspects of it which are completely foreign to me.

The streets here are crazy- of course people drive on the opposite road so for the first few days I was nearly run over many times b/c I looked the wrong way….Also there are these “mini-buses” which can drive like 9 people around the city (kind of like Taxis that make many stops and people just hop on and off for a few rand (dollars)- they are everywhere and always honking at you and yelling “Cape town!” to see if you want to go into the city- We tried to get on one the other day and literally the two different mini-bus drivers started fighting with each other over whose car we would go in- it was insane…but I guess that’s something you get used to. I’ve been told not to go in the buses alone because you could get mugged…we’ll see I guess (there is a lot of stuff you can’t do alone here which kind of sucks, but what can you do?)… Speaking of being mugged and the “crime scene here”… the other day I saw a “security guard” (I put that in parentheses because I’ve recently learned that some people who wear the neon jackets are not security guards, so now I don’t know what to anticipate) literally on top of this one guy across the street from me. I looked out the window of the internet café/ laundry store and saw this guy strangling a rugged looking man on the ground in the middle of the side walk. Once the “security guard” had pinned the other man to the ground he got up and literally kicked him in the head three times! That was within my first 6 days here so it shook me up a little just because it happened on a main road in our town-area and it’s not something you would ever see in America. I haven’t seen anything like that since then, but it’s things like that which kind of shake you out of your comfort zone and make you realize that despite a few similarities, you are definitely not back home.

Weather:

On a lighter note, the weather has been absolutely amazing here- we have been so lucky! Usually I think around this time (winter) it is really rainy and sort of cold…The day we got here it was really gross and I was like oh god…here we go…However, every single day since then has been like 55-70 degrees in the day time and pretty sunny! It gets kind of chilly at night but it’s nothing compared to phili- more like a moderate dallas winter. I think the air here feels thinner because I keep getting out of breath but maybe that’s because I eat too much and until this week haven’t been doing my normal work out routine … The first day we moved into our house we had to walk up a big hill with our luggage and I was like.. “is the air thinner here? are we at a higher altitude or something?!” (because I was so out of breath) and the guys were like “uh..we’re at sea level…” enough said.

Classes and UCT (University of Cape Town)

We started classes on Monday and I really don’t know what to expect from them! I am taking Memory, Identity and History which is like my favorite subject (thanks to Toni Morrison), so hopefully that will be good, as well as Religion, Ethics and Human Rights and Geology. The classes seem a little odd so far- kind of all over the place, but I think after intro week things will start molding together. The campus is crazy and I literally feel like I am at one of those huge California High Schools that you see in the movies! I’ve never been to a school this big in my life (Greenhill =110 kids pergrade, Haverford= 330ish) so my first day I was stunned! There are kids all over the “jammie” (spelling?) steps hanging out…i’ll take a picture one day (later, so I won’t seem as much like a tourist)… It’s really cool. Also, classes are only 45 mins which is crazy! Though some meet every day, and others 3-4 times per week. I typically will have class from 10-1 except on Wednesdays when I only have a 12-12:45 Geo class and Mondays when I have only Geo and Religion. Not bad ☺.

Sometimes I worry because I don’t know many actual South Africans yet and it feels like it will be hard to meet them- Most of my classes are actually filled with American students and not too big (25-40 kids…maybe 50 in one of them)… Hopefully I can gather up the courage here to talk to some locals…its just intimidating because I’m still unclear about how people perceive Americans. Hopefully once clubs start up things will get easier or I’ll at least have more interaction with people. I do enjoy my friends from my program here though! They are really nice and fun people- I’m very glad to know them.

Adapting:

I definitely feel more comfortable here as each day goes by. I feel like I have been here for a month already- This past weekend when I thought back on like how long I had been here i couldn’t believe that it had only been one week. The difference I felt as far as comfort and orientation from last Saturday to the one before it was incredible (if that makes sense?)…it felt like I had been here for so long but it was only a little over a week! ( I got here Wednesday, which would have been like 9 days before Saturday?) It was weird to recall how unfamiliar I felt. Of course I still feel disoriented- I haven’t really been into the city of cape town that much… I live right near campus (UCT) in Rondebosh which is like 15 mins? from town (maybe…i don’t actually know) but its a bit of a drive… Hopefully on Sunday I’ll go in for a bit (Saturday we are doing a wine tasting and going to a festival in Stellenbosch!)
…Anyways, aside from sometimes not being able to sleep because I’m scared a robber is going to bust down my door- all is well . I get paranoid but I don’t think I have a reason to really…there are bars on all of the windows and we have a security guard outside our door. Plus, it would not be the end of the world if my laptop was stolen. I have to keep reminding myself of that. There are much worse things! (Not that I want it to happen of course… I just can’t stay awake all night!)

I’m very glad to be here so far. I have made some really nice friends and it is really cool to be in such a different environment. I miss my friends from home a lot but I’ve tried my best to just stay in the present here and go along with the flow (otherwise I know I’ll get homesick). I try not to think about the fact that I have 4 more months here- I don’t even know what that means at this point. I’m just taking it day by day and seeing how things go!

Anyway, I hope you didn’t read this whole entire entry because it was really long and I wouldn’t even expect my parents to read this much

Alexa

7/25 Tonight was interesting- I went to a café/bar with some friends where we started talking with a few Africans who said they were from the Congo. When my friends and I were finished with our meals we took our phones out in order to calculate who needed to pay what, how much tip we should leave, etc. The one African who I was sitting next to laughed at me and began talking to me about the difference between “whites” (American and South African) and “black Africans” when it comes to our perception of material things and money. She explained that while whites will fret about who pays what “15.95 rand or 16?!”, the black Africans will pay for each other. “If I invite my friend,” she explained, “ I will pay this time.” She says it is more about being with the people than the money. “I have a job- but just because I pay for dinner doesn’t mean I have a lot of money…it just means I know I will make more money later.” The girl explained that she (who she described as “we”, referring to black Africans) does not invest her money in big cars or houses, but rather supports her entire family with the money. I don’t believe this goes for all cases, obviously, but it was interesting to hear about her relationship to money and luxury. She explained that if a family member went off to Europe, they might ‘forget us- and leave us behind’. Where as Americans might consider this to be simply another element of “growing up,” to this woman, it was considered rude- the person would be letting her family down. I’m not sure if this is the mentality in South Africa…I haven’t been able to speak to many locals yet, so we will see. As I said, this woman was from the Congo so maybe her lifestyle is different.

7/26
Today I went to a big “braai” in one of the townships (like a bbq) with some people from my program- it was really crazy- There were lots of people hanging out (some dancing) and listening to really loud music – all from different backgrounds it seemed. It was nice to see South Africans of all different races at the location because it seems to not always be the case here. Though, many of the races were not partying together (people kind of huddled around there own tables)…The race relations here are very complex and I am far from grasping them…However, people seem to talk about them in a much more open way then they do back home. It has been interesting to hear people discuss race in such blatant ways… hopefully by the end of my stay here I will have a better sense of things. As for now, I won’t say much because I really don’t understand a lot of it.
The Braai was really interesting though- lots of drinks and pieces of meat that were served from a bucket…(literally) it was fun! Then, on the way home our “mini-bus” driver started falling asleep at the wheel (they think he had been drinking??)  so one of the program “sol-mates” (like a customs person or RA) had to drive the car home- a crazy day indeed!

July 13th 2009
I’ve never traveled this far away from the US in my life.  I went to Canada once when I was four but I don’t actually remember my time there.  My three and a half hour plane ride to Phili pretty much covers the extent of my travels so as you can imagine, when I learned that I would leave Texas on Monday and not arrive in Cape Town until Wednesday morning, I was quite…shaken? I don’t know if that is the right way to put it, but let’s just say I was less than enthused. While my usual go-to plane activity is Solitaire, I have been advised that playing all the way to Cape Town (that’s like 22 hours?) may be a bad idea. .. So we will see what happens! I’m on my way to Chicago right now and from there I go to London where I will stay for 7 hours and then head to Cape Town. So far the flight has been nice and I’m writing in here to pass the time. I’m going to go to sleep now but I’ll write more later!

July 17th 2009
I have been in Cape Town for 2 days now- We have been staying at hotel and doing orientation things. I have had a nice time so far but I am kind of in a daze right now– I titled this piece ‘expectations’ but I’m not sure why because at this point I can’t really articulate what they might be. I’m really not sure what to expect. I feel like there has been so much build up to this process and now I’m just…going. I’ve felt like I was in limbo for my last week or so at home- just waiting for something to happen…but now that something is about to happen I don’t know how to think about it. I feel a lot better than I felt when I was leaving for college though, and I think that says a lot. Haverford (and going away for college in general) has really challenged me to grow up a lot and feel more confidant when I’m in unknown situations or places on my own.  I’m excited for this trip because I hope to challenge myself in a similar way (although, I don’t know how much I will actually be able to go out ‘on my own’)….but still. I hope to learn a lot form this experience.

July 14th 2009: I decided to make my entries design based so that they are accessible to people in different ways (I’m not very good at story telling!). For my blog I hope to create a few graphics or upload a few photos and describe what they mean to me or why I created the image in the way I did. That  way I can tell stories in multiple ways so people won’t be too bored with my writing… Though, sometimes  I won’t have time to create an image so I may just talk about what I did that day and some thoughts…hopefully that works

The cover-page for this blog (above) is taken from an image I took of a bird of paradise plant and a view of the cape of good hope, which I saw a few days after I began writing for this blog.

Alexa