Country Roads, Take Me Home

Wish I could say the idea was original, but I thought the best way to sum this up would be in a list, or rather, a series of lists:

Things I will miss about Cape Town:

1.) Looking up at any time of the day and seeing the most unbelievable mountains

2.) Living on not one, but two oceans

3.) My apartment, for all of its shortcomings and wonderful things

4.) Friends that became family

5.) The Upper Liesbeek community

6.) The walk up to campus, believe it or not

7.) The adventure of minibuses 

8.) Dialect- "hectic, bru"

9.) Vast array of wonderful food- cheese croissants, liquifruit juice, coke light, samoosas, kudu, springbok, ostrich, rotis, kingklip, hake, biltong

10.) Wine. Enough said.

11.) The reward of always finding something cool and new when you get lost

12.) Ever-changing weather

13.) Being surrounded by multiple languages at any given moment

14.) Power outages that we all came to look forward to 

15.) All of the tiny little places that have knotted themselves into my memory with such significance that I know I could never forget them  

Things I won't necessarily miss about Cape Town:

1.) Constantly thinking about safety

2.) Lack of bagels

3.) Rain at a moment's notice

4.) Poverty in stark contrast with exorbitant wealth

5.) Exams that are worth 50% of a class grade

6.) Racism

7.) Cockroaches, though I grew to tolerate them

8.) Pay-as-you-go internet and phones (though I really will miss my little Nokia)

Things that I am excited for, being back in the States:

1.) Family

2.) Friends

3.) BAGELS

4.) Coffee

5.) Free internet 

6.) Seeing how things have changed since I left 5 months ago

7.) My car

8.) The freedom to have independence

9.) My bed

10.) Picking up where I left off and all of my travels ahead

Things I will bring back from Cape Town:

1.) Various trinkets and curios from shops, vendors, etc.

2.) The knowledge that I have the ability to do anything and go anywhere 

3.) Some phrases I've picked up unconsciously along the way

4.) Countless stories

5.) A newfound sense of adventure

6.) New, fantastic music

7.) Lots of change, soon to be exchanged into pounds, which will be a rude awakening 

8.) A tolerance and appreciation for the new and different

9.) TIA- flexibility and and unhurried approach to life 

10.) A deep desire to go back 

Now I'm home, and terribly excited to see all of my family and friends that I have missed so much while I was away. It's a weird feeling, though; as if i had hit a pause button when i left and just now am hitting play to resume the life I had left. I am comforted to see that really not much has changed, and that much is as I left it. Now I will have to reconcile my changed self with these same surroundings, and figure out what the time I spent in Cape Town will come to mean as it all resumes, and I take on yet another adventure with my senior year in college and a fabulous summer ahead of me. The picture above is the sunrise over the city from Rhodes Memorial, nestled into the side of Devil's Peak. The morning I left, we climbed Rhodes just before the day broke to see one last all-encompassing view of Cape Town before we had to leave for good. It's with a heavy heart that I say that leaving Cape Town was terribly difficult, as those months that I spent there came to be some of the best times of my life, and some of the people that I had the privilege of spending time with came to define a large part of that experience, and who I have become.      

Back to where we started

        I'm packing up my room, and it's completely surreal. A pile of books on my desk that seems like it goes on forever, a suitcase that I'm not exactly sure how to close, and a fridge that I frankly don't even want to look at. This is the end of my Cape Town experience, knotted with errands like closing my bank account and dropping off my laundry to have it done for one last time before I go. God knows how they fold those close so damn neatly; it's going to make packing a breeze. I had all of these grand plans for my last momentous days on the African continent, and I'm content to say that I've just been content. Nothing too crazy, just trying to spend time with some friends that have become more like family. I did manage to squeeze in the obligatory trip to Robben Island, which proved to be a really great experience. It was momentous to finally see the place that had become such an iconic part of South Africa's recent history. Nelson Mandela's prison cell and Robert Sobukwe's isolated house were two highlights, as they were two really influential leaders of the ANC and PAC, respectively. Also cool- Robben island is one of South Africa's largest penguin colonies! Who knew?! 

On Tuesday, I did probably the most American thing I have done since being here and went to a Counting Crows concert. I relived my childhood and sang along to classics like Mr. Jones and A Long December. It was in this really cool venue- a palatial casino about half an hour from city center. I've also been eating at some cool restaurants and trying to eat all of the delicious meals that I loved so much the first time. Unfortunately, I have a cold, so it's been slowing me down only a little. An arsenal of Advil and vitamin C has worked wonders, and now it's been reduced to a nagging cough. I can't wait to see how my final days in Cape Town will end up. I have to say that I'm thrilled to come home to my family and friends, but also really uneasy about how my life is heading for this pretty sudden change. Thankfully, I have so much to look forward to.  

Yesterday

When I haven't been studying, I've devoted this week to other pursuits, scholarly or less. More often less. This past Saturday, I went to perhaps the most fantastic place on this earth- the Woodstock farmers' market. It's this really quaint little market where all of these Capetonian venders and trendy yuppies come to spend their afternoons sampling pesto and bloody marys.  Naturally, I had a fantastic time. This past Monday (yesterday) was a really cool day. I took a final for my class Liberation in South Africa, which wasn't so cool, but once that was over, I had a really great day. A couple friends and I headed into the city to spend some time at this really great bookstore called the Book Lounge and then get lunch at one of our favorite restaurants that serves Ethiopian food.  While we were at the Book Lounge, we saw this really big protest that was expressing the refugees' discontent with the latest events in South Africa. They would walk by in huge groups, wearing shirts that said "foreigner" and carrying signs that said things like "South Africa is not safe for us." I had never witnessed a protest on that big a scale, and it was a really interesting thing to see. We walked to the Ethiopian restaurant and had a really fantastic lunch, then walked around for a little while and took a minibus home. We went out for a little bar around the corner that night and I proceeded to get stuck in the bathroom, and was saved by a very energetic woman. Naturally, all of my friends found this hilarious. Now I'm sitting in my bed prepping for my next two finals, which are tomorrow and the day after. I can't wait until they're all over and I can enjoy the time I have left here in Cape Town. Here are some photo highlights of my week:

The farmer's market:

Most punctuation-challenged sign I have ever seen, outside my local grocery store:

The view on the walk up to campus this past Sunday afternoon: