Tuesday, February 24, 2009

2/18-2/24

Text ColorNow that school is in session, I don't get to do really really exciting things every single day. I have been going to classes and when I have a couple hours break or when I am done for the day I lay out by the pool...tough life.

This past week was a couple of my good friends on the programs birthdays...Bronson and Matt. To celebrate on Wed. for Bronson's we went to Obs and I brought along Steph and her sister Jen and Diane. As always, Obs was a good time...it never disappoints. Nothing eventful happened in the next couple of days. But on Sat. we went to a braii (aka the SA's version of a bbq) at this guy named Alex's house. One of our friends on the program, Alec, had met him somwhere during our first week here and we have hung out with him a lot since then. He was so nice to invite about 15 of us Americans over to his place with his SA friends to eat a ton of good food and drink. His mom Val was really great and hospitable with all of us. Oh! Also...weird coincidence and small world story. So if you have been reading the blog I talked about how i went to that woman's house with Laura and Julie for Shabbat dinner one of the first weeks I was here. Well there are 4 kids in the fam. One of the daughters, Erin, is a first year (freshman) and had met ALex (SA friend) the previous weekend at a party. He had also incited her to the braii when they met so oddly enough we ran into her at Alex's. I thought my world was small at home but apparently it is in cape town as well. Totally weird and nice to see her again. She told us her fam totally loved us and want us back for another Shabbat din...woohoo! We also met 3 SA brothers that were really nice and cute who we are going to go out with this weekend. I only remember the ones our age names..Mario and Georgio. (They are Greek, not Italian, weird huh?) I guess the names don't really translate too well from the U.S. I kinda just want to start calling them Tony for the hell of it. 

Sat. night Laura and I went to this guy named John's 21st birthday party at a bar called FTV by the Waterfront. We met him at the horse races and exchanged numbers. That turned out to be a lot of fun especially because we got away from the American crew for the night and hung out with all SA's. Sunday was probably the most lazy day Julie Laura and I have had since we've been here. We basically slept and went to Cocoa Wah Wah (internet cafe) for 2 1/2 hrs. Nothing too exciting but I guess my body was hating me enough to tell me I needed to sleep the day away. 

So today (Tuesday) I had a full day of school then went to my first day of SHAWCO. SHAWCO is the volunteer program I signed up for that is affiliated with the university. I signed up for the program called Kenstep where I tutor kids in grade 6 English. The program gave me a guide book before I met with the kids to show me what I would be going over with them. Every Tuesday there is a bus that picks up about 25 UCT students and brings them to a school to tutor the kids. It's not in a township but in more of a middle class region of CT. I am tutoring 8 6th grade girls with one other girl from UCT. They are so adorable and funny. All they wanted to know was if I knew any celebrities...Chris Brown, Beyonce and Rihanna especially. All little kids in SA that America is a place where celebrities are walking around on every corner. They were so confused at why I didn't know any...I guess I let down their hopes of me being super cool. Damn. They also wanted to see American money. For some reason I have a couple dollars left in my wallet that I didn't get converted to rand so I was able to show them that. They were really taken aback by what it looked like and described it as being thicker and tougher feeling wise than the rand is. It was really cute to see all of them so excited to meet an American. 

AHHH! Seth and Matt I have been meaning to tell you guys this since I first got here. Well remember how when I told you I was coming to SA, you guys said they are only going to be clicking to me? Welllll there is a language that involves a lot of clicking called Xhosa (pronounced Kosa). A lot of SA's do speak that as another language besides English. Just htought you would really enjoy that fun fact and like to know that people do "click" here. That is all for now...

Stevi

No comments:

Post a Comment