Stellenbosch!

Currently in Stellenbosch for two days with Jill. Quaint little wine town with dutch architecture stumbling around, and quiet cobblestone streets interrupted by some new bars that I wish were old bars to fit in with the decor.

Much quieter than Cape Town, and I like walking around so freely here.

Ran into a bunch of Zambian PCVs last night who were really nice, and a couple from Belgium. It's fun to be touring one culture already, and then meet some others along the way.

Ok, going to go get ready for wine touring! Cheers.

The Hills are alive....

Jill comes to CapeTown! This is a picture of my friend, Jill, at The Botanical Gardens in Kirstenbosch. The small mountain on the right is called Lion's Head, and is a popular parachuting/paragliding place.

Onrus +CapeTown

Three months ago, I was sitting at Bethanie Coffee Shop when I met Philip and Kato, a fiesty, middle aged couple from Hermanus, South Africa. After talking to them for about 2 hours, trading beers way too early on a Saturday morning (heh), and general smal talk, they asked what I was doing after Peace Corps.

"Well, I finish the 10th, but then I have two weeks before my friend Jill comes, "I said.

"Well, that's not going to work, " Kato remarked, eyebrows raised. "Come stay with us in Hermanus!"

As a Peace Corps volunteer, I'm quite interested in free rides, free food, and more than anything, free place to stay with truly awesome people, one of them (Philip)being a cellar master and winemaker of a local winery, Tuitskloof. So my answer was what any self respecting PCV would've said.

"Are you serious? Because I'll come."

Philip's response was, "Great, bring a friend!"

So I did. Heh. And that's how Claire and I ended up being picked up 3 months later at the Paarl bus station where we were driven into wine country, and treated to about a week's worth of sheer fanciness.

We stayed on the winery for a couple of days and were fussed over in the best possible ways, before we went to Onrus where our friends had a summer home. Wha? Claire and I kept staring at each other, like really? Is this really going on? However, both of us tried to be cool, and pretend that we, too, were fancy. I even showered on a daily basis. Big step for a dirty hippie.

Onrus is right on the beach, and Philip's friend George frequently goes diving for crayfish in the morning. Below are the photos of the crayfish his friend caught. After these photos were taken, those little guys had to walk the plank though into the bubbly boiling water of doom. Alas, alas.

George was also a winemaker, and kept giving us white wine samples of everything.

Sampling=good. Too many samples=out of control. I think white wine is just kind of delicious and tastes too sweet to actually make you drunk until bum bum bum it is TOO LATE.

After our seafood midday drunk party day, Kato and Philip took us to stay at Philip's mother's old apartment which is in a retirement village in Gordon's Bay, which was hilarious, mainly because I felt like young people invasion of the retirement home. So it was nice to have our own flat for a week, but mainly hilarious to have infiltrated the retirement community.

We stayed there a week, just did CapeTown for four days, picked up my America-pal, Jill, and am now in Stellenbosch getting ready for wine tour time. Holla! All for now, hope all's well.

Photos from Onrus

wineland!

Fast update. 

Claire and I have made it to Paarl, where we are staying with my friends Kato and Philip who are AWESOME. Jogged through the vineyard this morning which is draped by mountains on every side. Lovely lovely. Heading to Hermanus Bay today with Kato and Philip who are lovely and so welcoming. More on all this later. Must go pack 40 bottles of wine onto the back of a truck . :)

The day that little Europe came to Windhoek

Claire and I thought we were about to have an easygoing, low-key kind of night. We had sat down at our hostel in Windhoek with some cider, and things seemed to be going ok. It was around 6pm. Little did we know what was going to go down. Bwa. ha. ha.

First, this random French dude we met sidled up to our table. He was nice, but earlier that day he'd started breakfast with the statement,"Namibians are just building their houses wrong. They're using tin, and they should be using thatch."

Claire and I tried to explain that due to the fact we live in the DESERT there isn't exactly a cache of magical wood around to build said rooves.

"But, the tin is so hot! Why are they doing it? We need to get in there and build thatch rooves. They're doing it wrong." He shrugged his 20 year old shoulders dramatically, as if accepting this new weight of the world with great ease.

I felt like buying him a copy of The Poisonwood Bible and then beating him over the head with it. He could read it later.

So now it was me, Claire, and pretentious problem-solving Merlin. Oh yes, his name is Merlin. Jealous? I thought so.

"It's kind of an odd name, you know, but I like odd things, who wants to fit in?" Merlin the magical french magician had stated earlier.

Just then, Cecil, a South African who works on oil rigs in Angola, rolled up, bought everyone at our table drinks for no apparent reason (awesome) and then gave us all watermelon?
Yes. Night definitely was getting better.

After Cecil's appearance, a Russian sailor sat down with us, a Greek Student, an Italian Student, and Eric, another Peace Corps volunteer also came to sit.

Who says you can't visit Europe in Africa?

Apparently, Cecil works a month on and then a month off on the oil rigs in Angola, and this was his month off, and he wanted to party it up, and was totally fine sharing this goal with fellow travellers. We had a kind of informal barbeque, the Greek guy made some taziki (spelling?) too, and Claire and I realized too later in our once-low key night that things were about to get not low key.

We ended up going to El Cubano with little Europe and the Southie, if you will. It's kind of an African-Spanish dance club. Cecil, the Southie, walks up to the bar tender, gives him his card, and then proceeds to order shots of who knows what for all 7 of us. What. the. crap. This continues for around three hours. Needless to say, our low key ended up high-key and kind of awesome. We head down to Hermanus Bay tonight, and we'll arrive in the morning.

Here's a brief lay-out of the next 3 weeks if you're following our travels:

Hermanus Bay
Gordon's Bay
Capetown
Stellenbosch
Jeffreys Bay (surfing!)
Lesotho (pony trekking:))
Swaziland
Jo'burg
Maputo, Mozambique....... and then up UP UP to Malawi and onwards.

Cheers

dvd donations!

On another note, two weeks before I left site I receieved over FIFTY dvds some friends in the states, as well as some of my family members and was just blown away by the generosity of my fam and friends. The learners appreciate the movies so much. There's hardly anything going on during weekend times, and it is such a treat for the learners, as well as community members, to come and watch a movie at our theatre. The theatre had made over 500 Nam dollars so far, and I think it'll continue to do well.

The last movie we watched this school term was "Jumanji," and later I was asked by at least 3 learners if it was true.

How much did I want to say yes? A LOT. Did I? No. I think it's time to leave site though because I really really wanted to say yes and make up an elaborate story to back it up. :)

grade 7 class party

We had the grade 7 class party in a dry river bed a couple k from school. It was a green icing cupcake and barbeque laden occasion. Shannon (my replacement) was also there, and we totally played that "Soldier Boy" song a bunch, and all the students learned the Soldier Boy dance, which was pretty hilarious. Heh. These are almost all my grade seven students, and I can't think of any people in Namibia I love more.

We also did funny beach-y stuff like buried learners in the sand. :)

5 December 09

Three days ago, I just left Bethanie for what I feel like may be forever. It's a very strange feeling, and one I'm not really dealing with right now. Before I can officially wrap up Peace Corps, all the volunteers must meet in Windhoek and complete a bunch of paperwork, medical stuff, resume blah to complete their service. I'm currently staying at an apartment while all this goes on, reading books and making travel plans.

While I feel I should be excited, I can just feel this bubbly nervous panicky feeling constantly moving under my skin. I mean, I have left Bethanie. I do not live there anymore. I do not teach there anymore. I just can't believe I won't be going back, and I know I'm going to have some sort of freak out, but right now it's more of a numb, what's going on? kinda thing.

And in 5 more days, I will be a former Peace Corps Volunteer. It's a very strange feeling, to say the least.

This blog, however, is not really going to be about all my Peace Corps-ing. For a while, I thought I'd travel for a couple weeks and then head home, but I mean, we're in AFRICA, don't we need to check some thingity-things out?

So this blog will (I hope) document travels around this here big place. For the next 2 1/2 months some friends and I plan to go to South Africa,Lesotho, Tanzania, Malawi, Moz, hop up to Egypt, over to Morrrrrrrrocco, and maybe skip across to Spain and France. It would be smart to save more money and come straight home, but I mean, there are pyramids that need to be seen. There are lakes that need to swam in, silly straw hats that need to be bought, and ponies that need to be ridden. Because ponies will be ridden. Even though I'm allergic.

So I hope I keep up with this blog, and I'll try to post what's going on, and how travelling is going down going down. I should have some kinda decent internet access, so I'll keep up with it, and try to get my camera to do the same.