Tom, Nicole, Teddy, Kayla, Terri, Julian
It’s strange to think that I have already been in South Africa for over a month. Looking back I can remember feeling that three and a half months in a foreign country seemed like an extremely long time. But now that I’ve been here, I’ve realized how quickly the time actually passes. I feel like I’ve been busy all the time, always doing different things. This in part stems from the fact that there is such a large group of us that are living together. Because we each have different interests we therefore come up with different things that we personally would find interesting to do. From there, other people bandwagon on to the idea, and next thing you know you have over twenty American students taking over restaurants, clubs, and any other venue that we happen to pop into.
This past weekend was especially fun because it was so packed with different things to do. On Saturday I got a chance to go to the Old Biscuit Mill, which was a big outdoor market, with a wide variety of different foods. All I have to say about that experience is that I definitely plan to go again sometime in the near future because the crepes that I had were fantastic! After that we headed over to the stadium that was built for the world cup and participated in the Gay Pride Parade. It was a really cool experience to be around a group of people that are normally a minority, and are so discriminated against from so many people. And yet there were so many people in great spirits being proud of who they truly are. And everyone there was so welcoming and so excited that we were there to experience this day and celebrate with them. I thought it was really cool to listen to the speaker who had come all the way from San Francisco and to listen to her talk about things that affect the “Rainbow People” I thought it was really appropriate that we were in South Africa “ the Rainbow Nation” for the Gay Pride Parade. After we spent some time inside the stadium and listening to the speaker and various music artists, we headed over to District 6 for a Krumping and hip hop show that we had heard about from Vernon. The theatre was actually inside a small chapel that was on street in District 6. When the cab driver dropped us off he told us about how it used to be the area that so many people lived in but during Apartheid were uprooted from their homes and relocated to the Cape Flats.
It was really interesting to see, that once we were inside this small chapel, the talent coming from the people who were performing was unbelievable. The moves that these young people were doing looked like something that I had only seen on TV or in the movies. It was awesome to be so close and to see local young people with so much talent that don’t necessarily come form the best of places. A couple kids did raps and in them you could hear about what it meant to be Coloured and coming from a township in Mitchells Plain. It’s clear that coming from these areas definitely has an effect on the way these kids live, and hopefully through their dancing they are able to stay out of trouble and remain on the right track to a successful future.
Sunday was another day that was filled to the brim with things to do. We started off the morning early with a trip to Mzoli’s. Mzoli’s is a restaurant in Gugulethu that is Braai style cooking. Everyone just kind of hangs around all day to socialize and dance while the food is being prepared. After we finished up at Mzoli’s our group headed to Kirstenbosch Garden’s for a Goldfish Concert. This was something really different and exciting for me because I’ve never really listened to trance, electro or techno music, and this was really similar to those genres. Also the fact that we were able to be outside enjoying the beautiful weather and view of Table Mountain in the background was awesome. All in all it was a very busy but very successful weekend!
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