cape town, south africa

so much has happened since my last blog entry.

cape town, south africa for five days was an experience filled with so many different emotions. we arrived on wednesday, february 18th and that's when the journey began for me.

i spent the first day exploring the two story mall filled with all of its outlet stores like levi, j. crew, coach and the list goes on and on. i was able to get a great lunch filled with lots of tofu (the ship has good food but its hard to get enough protein)

after lunch i came back to the ship to get ready to attend a play called freak country at cape town university. the play was good-a short story but very powerful.

the next day i was the trip leader for 57 people going to tour cape town, apartheid and a township. our tour of cape town took us through the city where we learned about its history which included dutch influences, churches, long street and the town hall where nelson mandela gave a speech they day he was released from prison.

we then headed to the district six museum where we learned about apartheid-residents of district six were displaced by the government and forced to live in squatter camps. although apartheid ended in 1987, there is a feeling that is still exists today when you hear people refer to others as colored or mixed. we drove to the sight of the squatter camp and it has been destroyed-there is nothing left but dirt, trash and weeds.

from the museum we drove to the largest township, khayelitsha, with over one million people. words can not begin to describe the feelings or the emotions i had when i first saw township after township as we drove on the highway to get to khayelitsha. each home is made from items that people find abandoned on the side of the road-sheet metal, pieces of wood, cardboard, etc.

when we arrived in khayelitsha it was overwhelming to see the levels of poverty. i struggled to be there are we drove up in big air conditioned buses, taking pictures of the township and touring the township. when we are in the states in harlem or five points, we don't have tourists get off of buses and take pictures of us or our homes, so what were we doing? we walked past a daycare filled with children who wanted to play with us, touch us and talk to us. some of our semester at sea students had stickers and the kids loved them! we then walked to a bed and breakfast within the township where we met the owner, vicky. vicky was a very passionate, knowledgeable and proud individual. she told us that each house had at least three children or more and extended family such as grandparents or aunts and uncles. we were reminded not to give the children money because if we did then they would always expect it and if they did not get money they would begin to beg, and although the people in the townships are poor they still have their pride. south africa has a forty five percent unemployment rate and over half of the country's people have aids/hiv. as we left the township we observed women of the township preparing dinner as the skinned goats' heads and placed them on make shift grills.

from khayelitsha, we visited another township where we had lunch. it was amazing to see the drastic changes from one township to another. the second township had small lawns that were being cut by hand with shears and were made from concrete blocks.

after lunch we hopped on a boat to robben island-the prison where nelson mandela stayed. we were given a tour of the prison by a former prisoner. we heard about daily life, saw mandela's prison cell and learned about the inhumane treatment of the prisoners including the discrepancies in amounts of food based on whether you were native, mixed or colored. working in the limestone quarry was another form of mistreatment since the limestone was not used for anything and the work left prisoners with t.b., poor eyesight and bad backs.

the next day i joined joan (ship nurse), bob (semester at sea 1978 alumni) and kendra (semester at sea student and csu student too!)on an adventure to table mountain-the world's oldest mountain at 260 years old. it is absolutely beautiful-if you get a chance google it (although i'm not sure pictures can do it justice) i had hoped to hike to the top but i'm still a little bit under the weather so i opted to take the cable car to the top-not a bad option since the cable car rotates as you travel in it giving you a panoramic view of the mountain and cape town. i spent most of the day exploring the mountain top and walking from the atlantic side of the ocean to the indian side of the ocean-it was incredible. i even had a great view of the soccer stadium that is currently under construction for the world soccer cup in 2010.

after table mountain we decided to visit the kirstenbosch national botanical garden-it was the first botanical garden in the world to be established to protect the local flora. after the gardens we returned back to the ship. i had hoped to catch a rugby game but missed the group who was going. :(

the next day, i hopped the red double decker bus with andrea (llc) and we toured the city of cape town checking out table mountain again but this time getting to see the backside of the mountain as we drove along the cape. after the tour, we headed back to the ship for lunch and then went to the mall in search of a coffee shop called melissa's. at melissa's one can get a hot chocolate but not just any hot chocolate-this hot chocolate was lined with nutella along the inside of the cup. having never had nutella i was told i would be in for a treat and i was-it was delicious!

the next day i chose to hang out with the witwer-dukes clan as we went in search of a market selling local goods. i should have known better after my last excursion with the witwer-dukes'- we walked and walked only to find out that the market was closed due to a 5k race that morning, as well as the construction on the soccer field for the world soccer cup in 2010. we ended up at another market and then the mall. i was unable to find anything i thought you all might want so i walked back to the ship empty handed. well i did have some pringles and some dark chocolate.

after having to stay an extra night in cape town due to the weather, we are now on our third day at sea as we make our way to mauritius. we are scheduled to be in mauritius on friday so the captain has us cruising along at 27.6 knots-looks like at that speed we will be there on time.

last night was the captain's dinner and since i was invited i thought it might be a good thing if i cleaned up a bit. i wore a blue suit (okay, pick up your chins from the floor and close your mouths) and sat right across from the captain-i think i kicked him under the table a couple of times. prior to dinner we had wine and appetizers in the faculty/staff lounge then we walked to dinner on the aft (back) of deck five. we had more wine with our dinner rolls and salads, then we had more wine as the main course arrived, after the main course we had more wine with our creme bruele and then after dessert we had more wine. the dinner ended after eleven- i had a good time chatting with the captain at times and the other faculty and staff at my table.

we are now eleven hours ahead of colorado time and after tonight we will be twelve hours ahead-sleep has been difficult with the time changes so it will be interesting when we have two days of april 12th.