Cape Town, South Africa: Day 3, 4 and 5

Malo! The third morning in South Africa I met up with my friends in the morning with the intention of going up Table Mountain. The sky was extremely overcast and foggy though, and Table Mountain is great mostly because of its incredible views over the city so we spent some time trying to come up with a potential plan B and a plan for the afternoon regardless of what we did in the morning. By the time we finished procrastinating and trying to come up with a plan, the sky opened up and the sun came out so we immediately jumped in a cab and rushed over to the bottom of Table Mountain. We clearly went at a good time because the lines for the cable car were short (we waited 2 and a half hours less than friends who went two days before) and we were up to the top overlooking an absolutely beautiful Cape Town in no time. We walked around the top for a while, saw some friends and wished them luck as they geared up to repel down the side, and took some awesome pictures. We then went and got a delicious lunch at the restaurant on top of the mountain before walking around for a while longer. I believe the top of Table Mountain is something like 2 miles long so there was a lot of space to walk around and different views to see and it was pretty awesome. We spent some time talking to an old English couple who were on vacation for about two months and also came on a boat. They were flying home though after this. As we were waiting on line for the cable car back down, we were trying to decide what to do we saw posters for things to do in Cape Town and decided to go to one of them which was the Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens.

The gardens were absolutely beautiful and had a ton of just grassy areas that families were picnicking on and it was amazing. I am not someone who is very enthralled by flowers and trees and nature in general (which my friends soon found out when the bugs were all over us) but it was really beautiful. We ended up just finding a quiet bench in the middle of one of the small gardens and sitting there relaxing for a while. It was a lovely afternoon. Yes, I said lovely. I could have spent hours there but I was meeting up with some friends to go hike a mountain so we had to leave.

We hiked Lion’s Head that evening, which is right next to Table Mountain and as you walk around it you get a 360 degree view of the whole city because the path circles around the mountain. We made sure to get there for sunset and found a good spot off the path to watch the sun go down with a fantastic view of Table Mountain on the side. It’s funny, we watched the sun go down over the ocean (ATLANTIC OCEAN already) and while it was beautiful, I realized that sunsets over the water is not as much of a novelty now that it’s what we see as we eat dinner every night. But it was still truly beautiful and peaceful and we had a great time just relaxing up there and enjoying the view. As soon as the sun was no longer visible, we started our descent down so that we would still be able to see where we were walking. We sat for a while waiting for a cab looking over the harbor area where our ship was docked and it was pretty to see the city all lit up. Then we went to dinner at a place called Dizzy’s. On the menu they had some rules of life that were absolutely amazing: (here are a few of them…)

1. Men are from earth. Women are from earth. Deal with it.

2. Thou shalt not weight more than thy refrigerator.

3. You should not confuse your career with your life.

4. Nobody cares if you can’t dance well. Just get up and dance.

5. Never lick a steak knife.

6. You should never say anything to a woman that even remotely suggests that you think she’s pregnant unless you can see an actual baby emerging from her at that moment.

7. The one thing that unites all human beings, regardless of age, gender, religion, economic status or ethnic background, is that deep down inside we ALL believe we are good drivers.

8. Your friends love you anyway.

These were just 8 out of the 20 on the menu… absolutely amazing. After a long dinner with my friends and 3 of one of my friends South African friends (well, one American who has lived here for a few years and her South African friends), we headed back to the ship for the night.

The next morning, we had an early start as we were going to Cape Point/Cape of Good Hope. First, we were stopping at Boulder Beach, known for its penguins and so I was ridiculously excited the whole drive there. It took us about an hour and a half to get there, partially due to a large marathon that was taking place that day and so we had to detour a few times. Unfortunately, it was a foggy day so the drive down that is known for its beauty wasn’t as amazing as it could have been, but definitely still nice. When we arrived at Boulder Beach, it was drizzling and cold but SO WORTH IT. There were a ton of penguins all over this one area, some of them nesting, some of them hopping around, some “mating”, some swimming, etc. It was incredible. We were able to get really close to them too and we spent a lot of time taking pictures. The only problem that morning was that the area that the penguins were in were filled with these large boulders (hence Boulder Beach) and we were climbing all over them to see all the penguins. Since it was drizzling the rocks were slippery and I was wearing flip flops that were also slippery and so I slammed into a rock at one point clumsily and sadly my camera which was around my neck did too. I had awful bruises on my leg and elbow and so did my camera. I think I am sadder about my camera’s dent. Needless to say, I changed into sneakers right then and there and was much more careful the rest of the time there. We left the beach to head down to Cape Point National Park. It is this huge area filled with just green and it was amazing. We had the Indian Ocean on one side, the Atlantic Ocean on the other (still so crazy) and we hiked up to the lighthouse on top of Cape Point so that we could see where the oceans meet. It was a beautiful view from up there and really amazing. Around the lighthouse, people had left their names all over the area. We had fun walking around trying to find SAS people because that’s always cool. I do not have nearly as much of a problem as other people on this ship with the strict rules, but someone I know was turned in by a staff member for leaving her name in this area and “defiling private property.” There were THOUSANDS of names up there and it just seems a little bit ridiculous to me. Anyway, we spent some time up there, and then drove a little bit farther to Cape of Good Hope, took a picture at the sign that said that it’s the most southwestern place in Africa and then continued on our way. On our drive down to Cape Point, we saw a ton of signs that said “BABOONS are dangerous WILD animals. DO NOT FEED” and it wasn’t until driving down to Cape of Good Hope that we saw a huge one on top of someone’s car. We also saw a ton of wild ostriches, which are a strange looking but huge animal. So, on our way back we were keeping our eyes peeled for them. We saw a few off the side of the road so stopped to take some pictures. As we were sitting there, I watched as a mother baboon with a baby on her back snuck over to a car, whose passenger door was open and whose passengers weren’t paying any attention, and grab a bag of chips before running away. The people’s faces were amazing. You just saw the driver look over, notice the baboon grabbing the food at the door, and he screamed shut the door! As she shut the door with a terrified look on her face and the baboon left with the chips. They then laughed about it for a few minutes, as did we. Next we went to Simon’s Town, which was a cute little beach town that we had lunch and ice cream in and did a little shopping. It was great.

When we got back to the ship we went to an internet café to waste a little bit of time before going out at night. I got to Skype my ENTIRE family for the first time in a long time so that was really nice. When I say my entire family I mean my mom, Jason, my grandma, grandpa AND aunt all squeezed into my mom’s office. It was hilarious. Then I went to the supermarket right there to buy some matzo since it was Passover and I really wanted it mostly because the majority of the food on the ship that I eat is bread and pasta. That night I went out with a few of my friends and one of my friends friend’s from South Africa again. We didn’t really have a plan as to where we wanted to go so we drove around stopping at different restaurants that one of the girls likes but we kept getting turned away. Apparently part of it was that we were there on a Saturday and it was busy but according to my friend racism is still a very large issue and since the boy that kept going in to see if they had a table for us was black, it played a large part in us continually getting turned down. It was extremely unfortunate and sad. Eventually we went to the casino nearby where they had a ton of restaurants and that was perfect. We had an amazing buffet of Chinese food and the casino was incredible and reminded me a lot of one of the places that I have been in Vegas before. After dinner we went to do some gambling, something that I have never really done by myself or legally. I spent most of my time at a roulette table and found that they played it much different than they do in the US but I really liked the way that they played. Our odds were much better. I don’t really know gambling speak but I ended up with three times the amount that I started with which was extremely exciting. It was definitely a success.

The next morning I got to sleep in since all my friends were in church for Easter. So, I woke up, ate some breakfast and then went off shopping. It was an amazing morning. It has been so long since I have been able to be completely by myself, outside, wandering safely. I was in heaven because the port was safe enough to be able to do so. I went to the mall, bought some world cup stuff because when will I ever be able to do that again? And then went back to the ship to meet my friends for another township tour. We were being toured around by the two people who took us out the night before (one who is from America, volunteered in a township three years ago and decided to stay here since, and then one who is from South Africa). First, we went to Sabrina’s (the girl from America) apartment where we got to see her really nice apartment that overlooks table mountain (amazing), and then headed out to the first township. We got to get out and walk around this township and stopped at a shop of one of the lady’s living there and talked to her and got some cool stuff. Then we continued to walk around throughout the whole township. The first township that I had been to a few days before was heavenly compared to this one. People lived in shacks that were barely standing and that we learned caught on fire often and because they are all on top of each other, hundreds catch on fire at a time—we had actually seen a fire in this township the night before and wanted to help out but no one knew where the fire had been that we spoke to. People were walking around all over the township saying hi or just staring. We were told beforehand that people would be very wary of us at first until they heard us speak because there are still a lot of hard feelings towards white South Africans, but then they would get really friendly because they love Americans. One thing that we noticed was that a lot of people had cell phones and cars and couldn’t understand why that instead of homes. We were told that the government will provide them with homes but with that comes the responsibility of utilities and such and they cannot handle all of that because they don’t know how. On our walk we came across a bar so decided to go check it out. It was AWESOME. The bar was a shack with a small room with a couch on it but there was music and we danced and talked to the guys in there for a little. At some point some women came in and were dancing with us to and it was definitely a unique experience as we picked up quite the crowd. This was after just a little bit of our day and I was already loving seeing the townships more this day than the other because we were getting to interact with people who were really living in awful conditions but were still smiling and happy.

Next, we drove around for a while through a few other townships just seeing what they were like. Some of them were more crowded and dangerous than others; some of them had large bustling markets and lots of shops for hair braiding and food. We got to pass by the restaurant that I had eaten at two days before and it was hopping. The traffic was awful blocks away from it, people were parked all over the street and it was just packed because it was a Sunday. We then got to another township where we got to stop at the organization where Sabrina volunteered her first year. It is called Home from Home and provides “supported and supervised foster care for orphaned, abandoned and vulnerable children in small family homes in the child’s community.” There were about 10 kids and they ran up to the car when we pulled up. We got to spend a good amount of time there playing around with them. My camera had been taken out of my hand the second that we arrived and they were all really enjoying taking pictures of each other and I ended up with some amazing pictures actually. It was a great time and I wish that we had more time there. After we left, we stopped a little further away to get snoek, a type of fish that one of my dad’s friends told me to make sure I get. The portion was HUGE, came with fries and everything, and I only wanted a little bit so after a few bites I was done as was everyone else in the car. Luckily, we had entered another township and were trying to find some African beer and someone who was home so that we could see what the shacks looked like inside. We stopped outside a pretty large bar and there were a few kids playing outside the car so I got to give them the rest of my food. They were so happy and excited and about 5 of them were just crowded around with these huge smiles and it was just so rewarding and amazing. We went inside the bar which was crazy and busy and sat down at a table. This bar was much bigger than the last and we got to talk to a bunch of people. One man came over and was shaking all of our hands and was so excited that we were there. He toldus that he never thought that there would be a point where white people would come into the townships and sit with black people and he was just so happy that is was now possible. After we left that bar, we went to Malobungwe’s brothers home. In terms of space it was very roomy but there were also only two people living there whereas in some of the shacks there could be anywhere from 1 to 10+. So, as I said his home was nice and roomy with electricity and a tv, but the roof was collapsing and there was a ton of water damage. Then we finally went to get African beer in someone’s home. It was interesting. We drank it out of a bucket right after it was brewed and it was like a pink seedy substance. It wasn’t strong but there was definitely the aftertaste of beer. My friend referred to it as a beer smoothie and I concur. My other friend referred to it as milk and gasoline and that’s an opinion I do not share but can understand. Sadly following that visit, we had to head back to the ship so that we weren’t left behind but it was one of my favorite days of the trip so far without a doubt.

Even though we were supposed to leave a few hours after that, we didn’t leave until the next afternoon which was such a tease. It’s not easy waking up to Cape Town out your window and being unable to explore!

Sorry this post took so long, I have been crazy busy with homework and birthday dinners and it’s just getting to that crazy point in the semester where everything piles up at once.