July 16-21: Getting my toes wet...

Hello there! Back for some more? Good. I’ve missed you.

The past week I’ve spent acquainting myself to my new life in Cape Town, which has revealed even more differences and more similarities to my life in Philadelphia, all at once especially interesting and startling. By this point, not only am I all registered for classes, but I have also already started my fall semester, having attended first lectures today. School In July!? After winter in July (and believe me, it’s nippy here), school seems like not so much the strangling. But let’s rewind.

I’m starting to realize how much at Penn I have taken for granted, especially in terms of infrastructure. After going through a snoozeworthy introductory lecture series (this was no Penn NSO, folks), we were compelled to sit through a three-hour standardized test similar to New Jersey’s 8th grade GEPA, basically to see if we could speak and write English. Aside from that, registration was a beast, with a lot of running around to different departments on different parts of the mountain (University of Cape Town sits at the base of Table Mountain) with different colored forms to get signatures from people who were either still on vacation or perpetually at lunch. The main issue is that they don’t have the technological support to allow everyone to register online at their leisure, so eventually my three different forms and I made it to a computer lab, where someone registered me on something similar to Penn-In-Touch. Most of the registration was done by hand, though, which as a computer-dependent American was completely foreign to me. Registration was well rounded off, however, by an AWESOME drum lesson! All 300 of us American students got these loaner drums and banged our hands raw with the help of these great guys from this place called “Drum Café.” They were really good; it never occurred to me how much skill is required to get such a sound out of those things. I wasn’t quite successful, but I still had a great time.

I kind of forgot that there was a “study” part to this whole “study abroad” thing, but regardless, I’ve been ready to start settling into some sort of routine. This first day was overwhelming; the student body is more than twice the size of Penn’s, and everyone was running around hugging and kissing each other, asking how each other’s “holiday” was. I was tempted to affect a British/South African accent after being told that my accent was “strange” (!), but I fought the urge and tried to look confident. The demographics of the school are especially striking. I had read that the school had “proudly” maintained a 50:50 ratio of whites to blacks for a while, but the mix is very stark. Everyone either looks very African or very Australian-esque. Since we hadn’t seen a lot of white people yet, it was refreshing and really interesting to see everyone swarming around together. You get the feeling that the university is truly a vehicle, or an emblem, at least, for where the country hopes to take itself.

Not to be a nerd, but I’m super excited for my classes! I was nervous going in, but the majority of the people in my selected courses are Americans. It’s just how the cookie crumbles; Americans come here and want to learn about Africa and therefore take classes pertaining to the topic; most Africans wouldn’t be attracted to such. I’m taking a class on African literature, a class on Africa and colonialism, Xhosa (the click language!), and a class on development economics. All the professors seem great, very passionate and accomplished. My professor for my econ class used to be the chief economist for the South African state, which is so impressive. The perspective of the developing country seems to seep through everything. At home, our econ classes are pretty cut and dry, all capitalism, all the time. Here, the country is moving towards a capitalist economy, but there is the passion of assuaging the problems of the past that is of utmost importance. Employment is the largest issue here, and people are actively striving towards it. Nevertheless, some views of capitalism are skewed, I think. When a cab driver tried to charge us 100 rand to drive us home from a place it had taken 30 rand to get to, one of my South African friends said earnestly, “What can I say? He’s a capitalist, and as an American, you should understand that.” Huh? Again, the big, bold AMERICAN stamped across my forehead spoke for me, but not exactly the truth. Capitalism and opportunism are not equivalent, and there seems to be some sort of misunderstanding about that… at least among meter-less cab drivers. I just got plain pissed tonight when one cab company tried to charge me R 150 to drive 10 blocks, which normally costs about R 20. I curtly turned him down and hung up the phone, all the while damning this Jersey twang.

Friday was Nelson Mandela’s birthday, which was a huge event! (Anyone know when Dubya’s birthday is? No, neither do I, and nor does anyone care.) On July18, people celebrate the “Rainbow Nation” and its poster boy. We all wore black and white to represent the post-apartheid state. (Originally, it was supposed to be rainbow colors, but essentially, it would look like any other day.) There were “birthday parties” all over town for “Madiba,” which is what Mandela is called here, and we all sang “Happy Birthday” to him at the soccer game we went to the next day. I’ve decided I really like soccer. And yes, they call it “soccer” here, and not “football.” The game we saw was between the Kaizer Chiefs of Johannesburg and Manchester United, and it was soooo exciting! We had great seats, and the stadium (which, interestingly enough, looks like an office building from the outside) was PACKED. Weird, but most people here are Man U fans! The crowd was a sea of red. I think it’s because the Kaizer Chiefs are known to be pretty bad, but let me say that their goalie was on his grind that day. For those who know me when I’m either really pumped up or around celebrities, I was like that for about 2 hours. It was exhilarating through and through… until it ended, in a tie! No overtime, no shoot-out, just tied, one-one, good game. Lame! But I’m definitely looking forward to going to another game; at about $20 a ticket, why not?

As I’m settling into my academic life, I’m also starting to explore some extracurriculars to keep me busy. (Come on, you all know me.) I’m especially looking forward to activities here, though, because everything I will be involved with will help me to learn more about myself and this new place and everything about it. The most significant thing I did this past week, besides making sure I was properly enrolled, was to explore different arenas of volunteerism, ranging in focus from homelessness and tuberculosis treatment to orphan education and charter schools for township children. Above is a picture I snapped with two kids at a shelter called Arc, which is humongous and run entirely by private donations. Although there’s a lot to do there (cooking, computer literacy, drug rehab, the list continues), I really enjoyed meeting these kids for only a few moments. The little girl’s name was Lashawna, and the little boy couldn’t tell me his name (he probably spoke only Xhosa, no English), but both were so glad to see us there, if only for a brief introductory visit. At the TB hospital, I picked up one little girl who seemed really distant and unresponsive when I talked to her, but completely broke down when I put her back on the floor. (All the kids are on treatment, so it’s quite safe for me to be there. I’d be more likely to catch TB on the SEPTA bus back in Philly, from someone who doesn’t know they have it.) At the charter school, a young Ph.D student who directs it talked to us about the “life training” they put their kids through, trying to reconcile the large issues they face with the reality of their everyday lives. There is also a program with orphans that sounds a lot like the Beacon program (GATOR!), although I regret that I didn’t get to visit it. Walking away from the tour of places that all need help equally, I thought about how academically, at least in the U.S., we tend to “pathologize” problems, turning them into phenomena that seem almost insurmountable. Here, though, I’m seeing more and more that struggle and hardship is universal, and it’s just life, and it’s up to the individual as to how one handles it. These kids here are quite like my kids in Philly; the neighborhoods and shelters they live in are very much their homes. There’s very little shouting about victimization, though; Africa carries her head high. I’m not sure which program I’ll work with yet, but I know that this, like every other volunteer opportunity I’ve ever taken, will be instrumental to my understanding more about how this mess of a world doesn’t spin off its axis.

Again, I miss you all and hope you’re doing well. Emails, Facebook messages, blog comments, scrolls in bottles, etc. are, as always, welcomed with toothy smile! Let me know what you think, and keep Cape Town in mind for vacation! (Mom tells me that it’s just been named one of the best bargain vacation spots… and I assure you, in this seemingly dire recession, the R 7.5/$1 exchange rate feels oh-so good.)

Keeping my fingers crossed that next time I write, I will know how to say “Love” in Xhosa,

Christina