Ashamed

The fancy dinner at Stellenbosch, which I mentioned in the previous post, was probably the best dinner I have ever had in my entire life. The restaurant was called Moyo and it was SO BEAUTIFUL! It was on a winery, with tables underneath these huge trees with lanterns hanging from them. I then participated in the largest buffet I have every been a part of. Seriously. I ate three plates of food, probably 8 different kinds of meat and 7 kinds of veggies, along with 6 desserts. And the wine. the wine is quite good here. Quite good indeed.

Also, Phil Pleune, I tried some Castle beer at another establishment on Long Street.



Anywho, that dinner was absolutely incredible. So much good food that I didn't even know-I just tried everything. Dancing afterwards with African music and drums then back home to Chapel.



The next day we had a tour of Bo-Kaap, and the slave lodge. This was were the Dutch enforced slavery and held slaves en route with the Dutch Indian Trading Company. It was very sad, I was ashamed of my heritage a little bit. The Dutch did some not very nice things, which I had known before but it didn't really sink in until this tour. Our guide, Bilquees, showed us all around the area, the houses (brightly colored!), took us into the oldest mosque in South Africa (and Capetown for that matter), built illegally when the Dutch Reformed church was the only religion allowed. After that we were taken into the home of a couple and ate some incredible traditional Malay (which is not Malasian food, but a combination of the different ethnicitys that make up the region). SO GOOD. I've eaten so so so much good food so far, all different and delicious.



Later this night, we had a chill evening, chatting sharing lives with each other. Enjoying our beautiful new home. The people in my program are wonderful and I love them.

Woke up early the next morning for 8am church service at the Methodist church right behind our house with Alyssa and Megan. Then 9:30-3:30 Tobo took us on a township tour of Langa (South Africa and Capetown's oldest township/slum area). Looked at art, listened/watched music and dance, walked around through the shacks and lean tos, drank African beer from a bucket in a shack, tried to visit a medicine man, and were basically exposed to the 3rd World part of Africa. The contrast is so immense between white, colored, and black areas. Between where we live and the townships. For lunch Tobo took us to Mzolis, famous for their brai meat. We were served a HUGE platter the size of car tire piled high with chicken, lamb, beef and sausage. Along with it was served mealy white cornmeal-that looked like mashed potatoes, served with salsa. This all was eaten with our hands. After we returned home, several of us hiked up part of Table Mountain, its only a 30 minute walk from our house to the base of the mountain. SO BEAUTIFUL. SO STUNNING! We had family dinner, lots of veggies due to the mass amounts of meat we had been eating. It was wonderful preparing the food, eating, talking and cleaning up all together as a family. Sharing food and life are two of my very favorite activities. Then another chill evening. I like it.

Today: Early morning hike (wake up at 5:30 am)-met up with Remmy from Rwanda who bikes trails on a unicycle!!!, orientation meetings, tour of campus, lunch, chill, Coco Wawa for free internet with coffee, visit friends house, back home to journal and chill more, finish decorating room, talking with friend, blog posting!

peace and love

kristen