New adventures soon

Tonight I am having dinner with a few friends at a well known restaurant in Cape Town called Mama Africa's. I'll try to post some pictures in a timely manner.

I'll be having some new adventures beginning in a little under two weeks. I am going on vacation (finally!) and will be posting pictures of my adventures when I can. As time gets closer to vacation, I'll post what I am doing daily in an itinerary :-)

In the meantime, enjoy the scorching heat. I wouldn't trade it for California (sunny and breezy) weather.

~Carolyn

Well that was. . .interesting

 For any Americans who decide they want to venture to South Africa (I highly recommend it) you have a 90 day visa upon arrival to the South African borders. Once those 90 days are up, you are an illegal immigrant, and they will give you a hassle at the port of exit. You will also be fined 1000 ZAR and if the officers are feeling up to it (very very small chance though) they can threaten you with prison. I being the check-in/check out sort of person I am, decided that I wanted to avoid all of that nonsense so I decided to spend a few rand and get an extension visa.

That was definitely an episode.

To do this, one must go to the Department of Home Affairs. The Department of Home Affairs is located  Downtown, in a building in desperate need of a paint job. When walking into home affairs, you first approach a counter with a saucy DHA woman who gives you a ticket number and instructs you to go to a particular level of the building to wait for your number to be called. When I went into the building, the whole place was super busy with an outstanding number of asians and Zimbabweans. I got my number and went up to the third floor, designated for visa extensions.

Sitting down, I was happy to see that I only had four people in front of me. So I chilled and read a bit, but not without doing some people watching. If you are ever in need of good people watching in Cape Town, besides the wharf area, the DHA is the best place to do so. You'll find all manner of people in the place and Wednesday was my lucky day. In front of me seated was a pimp. I kid you not. He was wearing a very brightly colored orange silk shirt, and snakeskin shoes. He also had an odd assortment of gold jewelry on, and the guy next to him looked like a bodyguard of some sort. Perhaps he was famous or something. Next to me on my far left was a middle aged woman (clearly cougar) trying the Mary J. Blige look (over 40 and feeling foxy as comedian Jeff Foxworthy would say) who was kind of flirting with the guy next to her who looked around my age. It was disturbing. On my right was a quiet but attractive American guy (California surfer type) who was also around my age. The reason I knew he was American was because of the American passport he held in his hand.

After going to the counter to hand in my documents, I was directed to another counter where an extremely ancient looking woman was doing accounting and signing off on paperwork. As I was standing in line, a woman wearing  a fuschia colored ball gown and clear plastic heels waltzed past me. Everyone seemed confused by her appearance, especially me. She looked a bit lost, but I wasn't sure what she was doing in DHA in formal wear. Perhaps she wanted some attention, but I think the type she was aiming for, she certainly wasn't getting.

After the woman who probably knew Caesar personally gave me my paperwork back I bolted out of the DHA. I can only take so much oddness in at once and that was a bit much. After going outside, I called  a very reliable taxi company I use all the time to scoop me up. Oddly enough, they were late and while I was talking to the driver, I found out why. Apparently, the South African Police (SAPS) was out trying to catch people with outstanding warrants or ticket fees. How they do this is simply by setting up computer booths on the public roads and stop everyone. After doing a fingerprint scan and a computer lookup, if you happen to owe money they will ask for it on the spot, and if you owe A LOT of money they will arrest you on the spot. Pretty effective system, except for the fact that it made all the drivers in CT super paranoid and everyone was driving as if they were drunk. It was hilarious but the morning exhausted me and it wasn't even 11:00 am.

After a nap ( I stress sleep) I got up and did work. Vacation in less than a month. Super excited.

All is well,

Carolyn

Kids, kids, kids

My friends,

I apologize for the delay. It has been far too long since I have spoken to you all, and it is shameful on my part.

The reason is that I have been SO busy with work I honestly haven't had time to sit down and blog. I have even been missing meals (and more importantly sleep) because of it.

Thankfully today, I am able to catch up a bit. I have no new pictures (since I just recharged my camera) and unfortunately can't take pictures of the kids I have been working with. I have been visiting secondary schools as part of my internship here, and it has taken me to the extremes in terms of socioeconomic status. I have visited the ultra posh private schools with waxed floors, and the schools in the townships, where children fight with each other for a desk. It's not uncommon for the children to sit two or three to a desk.

I can say this much about my visits. The children in these schools are much more disciplined than I feel they are back in the states. I don't know why, but I intend on asking around when I start interviewing school personnel. When I know I will let you all know and report back.

In the meantime, I hope that you all are enjoying your summer. I have been hearing about the heat  wave in the States, and to those in the midwest and east coast, I really do sympathize. I guess I got lucky when I decided to leave the country for the summer. Cape Town has been in the 70's lately and sunny.

Take Care,
Carolyn

Simplicity

I didn't do anything exciting this weekend except grocery shop, clean, and do work. Therefore you aren't missing out on anything. This weekend however, I have been invited to do something lovely--something that is considered a right of passage in Cape Town.

I'll share once I've done it.

Tah Tah

Carolyn

Will report tomorrow

Perhaps I will have an exciting event to report to you all tomorrow. I'd rather share my experiences of doing interesting things then not. . . .

I'll try to take some photos. My batteries are currently recharging.

Bon soir,

Carolyn

Somewhere over the rainbow

way up high. .

I'm busy as ever. More pictures of my evening adventures below. Dominic felt it necessary to show off to his buddies Travolta and Tinoshe how good he was at pool. (Epic eye rolling)

Dominic and Tinoshe. 

Tinoshe and Travolta

We did this a very peculiar bar which had very dirty names for their vodka drinks which I am not going to repeat here. The bar was called "Bob's" and it is located on Long street.

Good food and good people. What more could you ask for on a Tuesday evening?

Carolyn

The Cape of Good Hope, Simon's Town, and Stellenbosch

My newest Saturday adventure began way to early in the morning. At 8:30. You have to understand that this is painful for me on the weekends, as Saturdays are the only days in which I usually can catch up on my sleep. However, it is worth waking up early here in this mountainous paradise because it is so scenic.

 This mountain range you see here is along Camp's Bay-the equivalent of Beverly Hills, California. It is very expensive here but very scenic and pretty. It's on the backside of Table Mountain. The Mountain range was named the 12 apostles, because some Dutch guy named it so, after this place was established. The town has grown drastically and none of the buildings you see here were there 100 years ago. This town also had a resident donkey and horse (named Donkey and Philly respectively) who used to roam around the town begging for food. They became so well known, local wives started baking them carrot cakes daily.

 If you keep driving along the coast you will eventually reach Simon's Town-where the penguins live. The one's in the photo above are baby penguins who haven't developed their proper tuxedo like attire. They are called "baby blues" because they look bluish in the light. South African penguins are on the endangered list unfortunately because there are less than 10,000 of them left due to predators and people.

Cute and cuddly. They are about to go fishing for the young.

Isn't he cute trying to cool off a bit? 

The coast nearing the nature reserve at the Cape of Good Hope. The nature reserve is home to all sorts of wild animals, shrubs, and educational centers.

The Nature reserve-at the edge of the coast.

Ice plant! (Technical name is sour fig)

I got excited when I saw this because these are also located in California!! I used to play with this as a young girl when I was living in California. Proof that pangea existed!!

African Ostriches. Very dumb. The size of their brain is so small you can fit their brains on a tea spoon.

Baboon (female who also happens to be pregnant)

They're mischievous. Be aware.

Cape of Good Hope Peninsula (at the top of the lighthouse tower) walking up was so exhausting.

Stellenbosch!

A large university is here where they only speak Afrikaans. Afrikaans for those of you who don't know is a language that is a form of Dutch. Dutch of course was brought here by the Dutch sailors who forced the people to speak Dutch, however, over time the people modified the language a bit (similarly to how French is different in different francophone countries around the world) and it became known as Afrikaans. It's a very interesting language to hear. This is a shop along a quaint little street in Stellenbosch.

Anura Vineyards. Excellent wine here. Better than Groot Constantia, and much younger too. Anura is a latin derivative meaning "Frog" so naturally their mascot is the frog.

Natural Cheese from the local cows.

Anura Interior.

For those of you who asked-some photos of me. More to come from my friends who also took some (my camera died in the middle of the day :( )

Me at the penguin colony

Me at the nature preserve

Me at the vineyard. It was such a beautiful day out we opted to sit out in the sun and drink. Perfection in my opinion :-)