It’s been just under a week since I’ve been in the beautiful city of Cape Town, South Africa. Seven days ago I was spending my last night home with my family and getting anxious about what was to come. Now, I’m sitting in my new home with new friends feeling like this has all been such a dream.
Yesterday I officially fell in love with this place.
We spent the day traveling and exploring around the peninsula. It was one of those moments where I wish I could fly all my friends and family here to see how truly magnificent this place really is. I was reminded that it is in fact summer here and when the sun is out I will get sunburnt and it will hurt. Regardless of my now fire engine red skin, it was one of the best days I’ve had here thus far. Some of the places we went were Hout Bay, Cape Point, and Boulder’s Beach (penguins!!!) just to name a few. Simply incredible. (pictures that would load are below)
We did a lot of traveling yesterday and while looking out the bus window in between stops something struck me in a way I can’t really describe. One minute I would see a very wealthy community with huge houses with private pools and just five minutes later we would pass a very poor community with houses made out of any scraps people could find. It reminded me of the quote “Sometimes it strikes me how poverty and privilege became neighbors. But the world keeps going, because it has to” from One Tree Hill. It just doesn’t seem right that people living so close together are living under such vastly different conditions. It shows how there are still strong remnants from the apartheid and makes me very eager to get closer to the townships when we start internships next week.
After resting for a few hours we headed out as a group for our first night out in town. Despite the safety briefings by the American Consulate who made it sound like the most dangerous place unless we stayed locked in our house all day and night long, I felt just as safe as I would in any city and had so so much fun. Everyone we met was super friendly and we even met some people from the states! Looking forward to more nights to come.
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I feel like I’m using words like “amazing” and “incredible” in just about every other sentence but today was yet another one of those days. It’s almost challenging writing this blog because I don’t quite know how to put down in words what I’m seeing and how I am feeling.
Today I officially fell in love with its people.
This morning we participated in a “township faith experience” in a Baptist Church in Gugulethu. It was something I will never forget. While driving there, it was not hard to realize that it was one of the poorer areas that I mentioned above. However, the people were some of the most lively, happiest, and friendliest people I have met so far in this journey. Randomly throughout mass they would erupt into songs that made it impossible for you to not want to join in and dance along. Although we could not understand a majority of what the people were saying, everyone was so friendly and not only tried to translate some parts for us but also gave us their personal music notebooks so we could follow along.
We ended the day with a summer sunset concert at Kirstenbosch Gardens which was perfect way to end an exhausting week. Heading to bed early tonight so I can enjoy these next 10 days exploring what’s around this amazing (couldn’t help myself) place before classes and internships start up. To everyone reading, I wish you could be here to see it all for yourselves. Until I write again…
jenniferklinecpsa 