Less than two weeks until we're back in the states! Trying to soak in the life of Cape Town without getting preoccupied with leaving this amazing group. Lais and I have been blessed with an amazing homestay family, who is really hip and relaxed- our Dad's name is Fergie (we catch ourselves singing Fergilicious numerous times a day) and he is an ex-navy engineer who used to work at the waterfront port as a ship bolter and welder. Before that he worked for 6 months at a time at sea on oil rigs. Now he has a private workshop in his garage where he is welding in his jumpsit and cap all day on furniture, railings, and other steel products. Mom works as an anaylist for a petroleum company here and welcomed our estrogen open-armed; she has three sons (Shadli-30-technical engineer/works with steel with Dad, Shahin-27-IT guy, and Hisham-20-works the night shift for Walmart telecommunication customer service). We have a pet pitbull mix, Titus, who is a friendly 12-year old stalky fellow who roams the streets and nibbles on our dinner leftovers, and a pet bird Charlie who Fergie trained to make kissy noises and cat-call whistles. Our rooftop provides us with the perfect 360 view of Signal Hill, Lion’s Head mountain and Table Top Mountain- we’re at the top of the hill of Bo-Kaap that is lined with brightly painted houses (it reminds me of Old Town Puerto Rico that has a law that houses can’t be painted the same color as their neighbor). Mom has cooked us delicious cape-malay food like Frikadelles (fish or beef mixed with spices, garlic, ginger, bread and an egg- similar to a homemade burger), and beans and rice that have hints of cardamom (throw back to India!).
This weekend Mark hooked us up with a private van tour of the peninsula with his previous director of World Teach, Peter, who is in essence a guidebook of South Africa and Cape town from his history of teaching, living, and working here all is life. We went through Camps Bay and Clifton Beach that were swarming with people playing beach volleyball and sitting under the umbrellas of quaint restaurants. We drove along Chaplin’s Peak on a road that was carved in the hill and paved by POW’s and is now owned by a company to promote black empowerment but has created new tolls and charges for the population. We climbed down to the stoney waterfront and held Perriwinkles- mini starfish- and snails that held tight to the granite rocks that were glazed with bird poop from flocks of gulls that swarmed around us. We saw a wide beach that is well utilized by horse stables close by and has houses with grey thatched rooftops that look like a mixture of the Goetheanum and the Houseboat from Kottayum in India. We entered the Cape of Good Hope National Park that inhabits over 1300 species of flora and fauna- many of which are mutually exclusive and are unique to this single area of the world. Troops of baboons, ostriches and zebras usually can be seen milling around but we only spied a couple baby baboons on the roof of a house and picking from a trashcan at Cape Point. There are little white monuments topped with crosses for both Vasco de Gama and Bartolomeu Dias for their historical maritime influence in the Cape. We drove through a seaside fisherman’s town that has some of the highest rates of teen pregnancy in the area due to the lack of presence from a patriarch for most of the year. We also stopped at Kalk’s bay for a glimpse at the harbor that was scattered with colorful boats-even one named the Taj Mahal (what are the odds..).
Yesterday we had a site visit to Kaylitscha which is a township just 20 minutes outside the city center and was historically created by the government during their messy period in the 80’s to relocate blacks in matchbox houses. We sat in a one-roomed church that had a banner at the front of the room “HIV no boundaries. You are Living with HIV. You are still my brother. You are still my sister in Christ”. Monwar and Zemtse spoke to us about their community outreach projects in support groups and social development for those suffering from HIV and AIDS. During our walk around the township we saw that inequalities are thriving in not only housing, access to water, electricity and sanitation but in employment, malnutrition, alcoholism and violence. We spoke with a representative from the Treatment Action Campaign about their efforts to provide treatment and preventative technologies to HIV/AIDS patients and to the community, and then spoke to Zemtse in her house-converted-support group facility about her struggles with supporting HIV patients, alcoholics, orphans, rape victims, and elderly in the community. The day was capped with 10 of us running/walking in the Twilight Community Chest 5K Silly Run around the city center that consists of over 20,000 participants that dress up in crazy costumes and run/walk/drunkenly stumble around the city in support of over 400 local organizations. Mike and Greg wore silk dresses that they for some reason had from China, Colin wore her traditional Indian Salwar Kamis and I safety pinned 9 running numbers all over me (leftovers from people who had last minute dropped the run). It was a beautiful run down Long street that is now glistening with Christmas lights, and through the Company Gardens towards the huge red inflated Coke arches- commercialism shone through as only powerade and coke were provided at stops to runners. Returned home to some card tricks and Arabic lessons with the family- trying to learn a few words a day! Bahebak!
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