Sorry I'm a Slacker

Once again I've done a pretty piss poor job at updating this thing, and for that I apologize. In my defense since my last post I've had 3 huge papers and 3 huge finals with my last one tomorrow morning. I'm partially questioning why I'm writing in this blog when I have a final in about 8 hours, but I digress.

Anyways, Today is November 11th, technically the 12th in Cape Town I suppose. I leave on my trip (my super awesome trip to Durban and Lesotho and Swaziland and Mozambique) on November 19th. That means I have 7 days left before I leave Cape Town pretty much for good. 7 days left in my house, 7 days left with my roommates, 7 days left with all the other amazing people I've met here, 7 days left in the city I've grown so attached to, 7 days left before i have to say goodbye to my kids, which I'm dreading the most I think. Part of me is happy at the thought of going home and seeing the people I've missed so much, but a big part of me wants to cry. I'm no where near being able to process this whole thing or being able to explain or articulate it to anyone who hasn't been through this with me, and I'm not particularly looking forward to the adjustments or decisions or changes that are waiting for me at home. But I guess most of all I'm grateful for everything that I've been through and gotten to see and experience during the last 5 months of so, for the next month of my life which should prove to be possibly the greatest 30 days ever.

But enough about my ramlings...In other news, trying to name some highlights of the past two weeks...I got my hair cut and got emo bangs. They're pretty fun. At first I really hated them..the woman who cut my hair kind of messed up the bangs, I think she had a nelly furtado vision that went really wrong. So I left the salon and had a minor (major) freak out..their were tears...but my roommate grabbed some scissors and fixed me up and now they look pretty sweet. I'm enjoying them. Picture!:




........God I'm so vain:


In other news, the Rugby victory parade was last week. The parade route went along the road that my house is on, so I watched out the window while frantically writing a paper until the players were close. The parade was so fun, it honestly made me so happy. All of the schools in the area let the kids go watch so there were a bunch of little kiddies running around with flags in the yard infront of my house, and they went nuts when the team drove by. I know I said this last time but the Boks winning the world cup was seriously one of the coolest things I've ever seen or been a part of. In summary I really like parades and I really like sports and I really like South Africa:







Ok I should probly like.......study now. But I'm saving a story for tomorrow when my finals our done so check back soon. hooray.

RUGBY!!!

I've spent the last 2 days trying and trying to upload video of the footage I took after South Africa won the Rugby World Cup on Saturday, but my internet is just too darn slow. Oh well.

But Anyway, in case anyone hasn't heard SOUTH AFRICA RULES THE RUGBY UNIVERSE. I for sure did not know anything about rubgy until recently, but it's super popular. The national team is called The Springoks and Springbok merch is everywhere. The World Cup started in the beginning of September so it's been going on for a while, and the final match was last Saturday the 20th against England. I watched it at a Bar close to where I live and it was super intense. The best part was after SA won watching everyyonnneeee in Cape Town loose their minds. A mini riot/celebration broke out down the road from my house, it literally stopped traffic. The only thing I could compare it to would be that must have been what Boston was like after the Sox won in '04, except more nuts. At one point, a beer truck tried to drive through the crowd and people were ripping the sides off of the truck trying to get the the cases. In all seriousness, one of the coolest things I've ever seen in my life, and it was awesome to a city that's so divided become so unified, even if it was for a night.

Heres some pictures, sorry for the blurriness it was a bit hectic:




The beginning of the Castle Lager truck fiasco



My roomies with random South African. I think this guy picked me up too



Happy mob.




AHAHAHAAH. Cape Town, I will miss you.

RUGBY

That time I almost got eaten by sharks.

Cheers.

So first off, I just want to say that the Yankees have broken my heart, and I really hope that they don't fire Torre. But on the bright side, BC football is apparently #3 right now, so hooray for that. Suck it Notre Dame.

but ANYWAY, this will probably be a picture heavy post because that's more interesting. My life is running pretty smoothly over in this corner of the world, and other than the fact that I'm trying really hard not to get sick Cape Town has been treating me really well. I only have two weeks of classes left before school ends, which is insane. I really can't believe how fast my time here is flying by. The longer that I'm here the more difficult I find it to summarize anything- what I've been doing, experiencing, learning, feeling- anything. But I suppose I should keep trying, so here are some highlights since my last post:

Well first off the most crazy/scary/insane thing that I have done in Cape Town slash done in my whole life was go shark cage diving. A little while ago it was Heritage Day/National Braai Day here SA and because we had the day off from class a bunch of us decided to go check it out, and we were most definitely not dissapointed. For anyone who doesn't know what shark cage diving is, basically you head out to sea on a boat and when you reach great white territory, the crew throws chum (fish parts...lovely..) into the water to bait the sharks, and then you climb into a cage that's strapped to the side of the boat and wait for them to come.

The cage is fairly big but there are pretty big gaps between the bars so you have to make sure you don't stick any limbs outside. SO basically these sharks kept swimming by kind of far away so I remained relatively calm, but one time a shark caught the bait and like trashed around and banged up against the front of the cage, and HIS NOSE CAME THROUGH THE BARS. Basically, I flat out panicked and totally screamed underwater, but managed not to get my arm bitten off. I can't believe I did that either... I felt like I was inside shark week...here are some pictures but even they don't say enough:



That's a good shot of the cage, you can see how far apart the bars are. I'm out of my mind.


Another highlight was last weekend I finally made it to Robben Island, the prison where Nelson Mandela was held for 18 years along with many many other political prisoners. It was definitely a pretty powerful and educational experience, minus the fact that the ocean was very rough and everyone got sick. I'm really over boats. But yeah, Robben Island pictures, because nothing I can say will do it justice:





4th window in is Mandela's cell

Mandela's cell complete with props





i just thought this was funny.


Ok its getting late here so this will have to be cut short, but i have more pictures/stories to put up tomorrow. for anyone who cares South Africa just advanced to the Rugby World Cup finals, hellz yeah.

word
Ellen

OMG I'M UPDATING

OH, my gosh, i am the worse blog owner ever. I can't believe it has been so long since I've updated this thing. Seriously, my apologies to anyone who checked this and saw nothing new. My b, it will never happen again. In my defense, I did go 10 days without internet, but that’s still not a very good excuse.

So I guess I should pick up from where I left off...Pretty much I spent the first week of September buried in papers and homework. It was the equivalent of mid-term week, which is never very much fun no matter what country you're in. But hey, it didn't really matter because i had spring break to look forward to, which turned out to be the coolest week EVER.

For anyone who didn't know ( I cant remember if I mentioned it) for spring break I went on a tour that started in Jo'berg and ended at Victoria Falls, which is on the border of Zambia and Zimbabwe. If you don't have a map (haha) that means we flew to Jo'berg, and then drove up through Botswana and the panhandle of Namibia, and ended in Livingstone, Zambia. I can't even try to summarize all the bizarre and insane things I saw and did, but I will try via some high-low.

Highs:
-I actually enjoyed camping. I don't really know how that happened. I guess a lifetime of abuse via family vacations has finally paid off. Thanks dad.
- Meeting some cool people from all over the world who were on the tour with us. It was awesome to meet some South Africans not from Cape Town, and just talk to so many people from so many different places with such cool stories.
- The fact that I got to go visit countries that hardly anyone gets to see, and how realizing how lucky that makes me. To put it simply.
- my passport looks way cooler now.
- Going white water rafting in Zambia, which was INSANE. We totally flipped and I flew like 10 feet out of the boat. Good thing I can swim.
- Seeing animals, such as elephants and hippos and crocs, INSANELY close. Which was kind of scary and totally ridiculous.
-Victoria Falls wins for nature-y beautiful thing I have ever seen. Its one of the 8 wonders of the world, and I totally get why. Go there.

..i could really go on forever but that would be boring for everyone, so instead i will put up some pics.

Me flying a plane over the Okavengo Delta in Botswana...or just sneaking in the cockpit after we landed..
Sunset in Chobe National Park, Botswana


Vic Falls, Zim side...


Swingin' in Zimbabwe...


Seconds before this croc decided he didn't like having his personal space invaded and dove back into the water right next to our boat...At which point everyone screamed and fell into the aisle..I got mud sprayed all over me..ask to see the video when I get back it's hilarious


heck yes monkey...this guy hung around our campsite in Namibia...he bit me but it was cool.



I dunno I just thought this was funny...


The only low I can think of happened on the last day. We had a flight at 1 45 but we wanted to go into Zimbabwe early in the morning to see the falls, because they have a better view from that side. So we made it through the border, but on the way back we get help up on the Zim side because of a huge line. SO, on the bridge that connects Zimbabwe and Zambia, we were all in a very big rush and I was getting stressed out. In my moment of anger, I happened to look up and make eye contact with a mommy baboon and her baby. This proved to be a fatal mistake. Apparantly i threatened her, because she proceeded to pick up speed and like crawl/walk right over to me. At that point I yelled and started like walking really fast away but not running. I looked back and that baboon was totally on my tail. So then I started looking around for help but everyone was just laughing at me. Eventually, she started following someone else and I made it to border control. But I was definitely almost beat up by a monkey in Zambia. moral of the story is don't piss off baboons when there is no one around to save you from their wrath.

Ok, it's time for me to sleep. Once again, I'm sorry I've been neglecting the blog for so long. It will never happen again. Expect a post in the near future, because I definitely have some more stories.

much love from the western cape
Ellen

This is the fertility vase of the Ndebele tribe. Does that mean anything to you?!?

I'm actually writing a paper on the Ndebele tribe right now. Oh, the irony...

I'm gonna apologize upfront for the length of this post.

The past week has been pretty eventful..

1) I wrote and handed in my first paper, which normally isn't that noteworthy except it totally kicked my ass seeing as i forgot how to write over the summer, plus i had to figure out how to use the UCT library and complete an obstacle course to hand it in on time, but hey...work always gets done, unless of course it doesn't...

2) On saturday I went kyacking. Which was AWESOME. It was supposed to be whale watching slash kyacking, but sadly we saw no whales. However, I made the mistake of eating a huge amount of food shortly before departure and got totally sick mid-kyack. Yeah....that part wasn't really fun..but it's a good story I guess. It was still so fun though, and the view was amazing. I brought my camera but was too scared to take it out and use it because I didn't wanna drop in the water...oh well.

3) Yesterday was awesome. It was Sunday so I spent it at Heaven's Nest, which is always a good time. One of the women who works there, Joan, asked me if I wanted to see some of her pictures, so I said yeah. I figured they would be of her dog or something, but then she busted out all these pictures of her hanging out with NELSON MANDELA. I almost dropped the child I was holding. She and him were like activist buddies, and her father in law was in prison with him and apparently they used to surf together. I'm not making this up. So yeah, Joan is pretty much my new hero, she's started education programs all over cape town and I want to be her when I grow up.

and I got some pictures of the kiddies....


haha this makes me laugh when I look at it...The boy on the left's name is Ctaum but it sounds like Storm with their accent, and they call him stormy, which is badass. And the girl's name is Candice and her lips are purple because they were chapped and thats what color the medicine was..everyone asks me that...



Julian..this kid's a fireball.. I have really entertaining video of him dancing but I can't figure out how to post it...notice all the fuzz stuck in his hair hehehe...

I could post like 8 million of these but I'll spare you all...

It's weird, I've been in Cape Town for about a month and week and It feels like no time at all and an eternity all at once. Now that we're all getting into a routine, and the work is really starting to kick in, It's finally feeling like I'm really here and this isn't some surreal summer camp or vacation.

I've been a little bit homesick lately, which I think is because I just realized I'm not coming home for 4 more months. It's a little bit hard to think about everyone moving back to BC, which is why I'm swearing off facebook till spring break because I think that's the root of the problem hahaha. Damn newsfeed...

Don't get me wrong though, life is outta control here in a totally good way. Everything makes me think....lately I've been thinking alot about how I'm perceiving people. Abroad students are pretty much bombarded with safety talks all the time by everyone- don't go out by yourself, watch your stuff, don't give the kids money, don't ride the taxis alone, blah blah blah. And the safety issue is definitely a reality that I can't really escape. But when I find myself crossing the street to avoid homeless people at night, or ignoring people that talk to me on the street, or not trusting minibus guards, I feel guilty, because I'm essentially judging people by how they live or what they look like..ehh..I am confused. Some food for thought I guess...

OK i really need to write this paper. Thanks for reading this whole thing, if anyone did. More to come soon...

lovelovelove
ellen

Happy Feet

hey hey hey

So I've been meaning to write in this thing for a couple of days, but the internet in my house as been a bit haywire, so my apologies.

I mostly just wanted to post a picture of thisssssssss:



oh yeah..penguins. We finally went to see them this past weekend in Simon's Town and it was fantastico. They were adorable, as this picture demonstrates. It was kind of weird to see them on a beach in 75 degree weather though, since I always picture them with the north pole or something..

And this is Betsy, the seal that we saw a couple weekends ago.

.

Ok that's enough animals...

Things have been going pretty smoothly over here. I finally hit the month mark, and now that i'm a little past it I feel like things have smoothed out and I'm getting into a routine...

1) I planned my spring break trip! Me and some of my roommates/amigos are flying to Jo'berg and then taking a tour up through Botswana and Namibia, and ending at Victoria Falls, which is on the border of Zambia and Zimbabwe. (although we probly won't get to go into Zim because of everything going on there) I'm really excited about the trip so hooray...! I just need to get through 5 papers before then...awesome

2) Some people have been asking for my skype name so here it is... ellen.mccartney....creative i know. and in case anyone wants to send me love letters, my address is
2 Church St.
Rondebosch 7700
Cape Town, South Africa

3) I hope everyone that's doing Summer Appa is having a blast this week...I gotta say it's a little weird not being a part of it, or not packing to go back to school, but hey...

I hope everyone at home is getting pumped for a new semester, it's strange that I've been in school for so long and the rest of the world is still in summer mode. Soon you'll all be joining me in the world of papers and classes and reading...bwaha.

umm..i dont really no what else to say write now..my brain is kind of fried at the moment. lately I've been a bit all over the place...

I'll write tomorrow when I'm more coherant but for now this will have to do. and good luck to everyone who's getting ready to go abroad. Be safe, have fun, and learn alot. and tell me all about it.

word
Ellen