11 Mar 2009 – Hosting Dinners and Moonrise from Lion’s Head

We launched into Monday morning less than twelve hours after stepping off of the van from Plettenberg, and the pace of the weekend has not slowed, since then. After our internships on Monday, most people had to go food shopping, and we’d arranged to have Vernon over for dinner to make up for the class we’d missed last Thursday. We had tried to arrange a plan for buying and preparing the food for the communal meal while on the road back to Cape Town the previous night, but between 4 and 7PM on Monday, the main house kitchen was a frantic rush of activity. About half of the house had some direct hand in the purchasing and preparation of the meal, which included meat and vegetarian options for the main course of sautéed sausage, peppers, and other vegetables, baked potatoes, rice, and side salad.

The dinner had come together surprisingly well by the time Vernon and Marita arrived at the front gate. We scrounged up silverware from the pool house kitchen and all convened in the dining room to eat and discuss our newest class assignment. The night would not have been complete without the reiteration of the weekend’s most interesting moments, however, so there was much reenacting and recounting of funny and dramatic moments from the Garden Route.

Tuesday marked the second to last full moon of our time in Cape Town, so we had planned a trip to the local’s favorite moon-viewing spot, Lion’s Head Mountain. Every month on the full moon, hordes of Capetonians climb the jutting mountain peak to watch the sunset over the Atlantic and the moonrise over the city of Cape Town. Lion’s Head sits between Signal Hill and Table Mountain, and as the pictures show, the peak itself is a bare, narrow wall of rock that from certain angles resembles the profile of one of Africa’s “Big 5” animals. Through their activist project, several members of our group have become friends with a young man Khayelitsha, and he helped to organize our transportation to the base of the mountain at 6PM. We’d been

prepared to ride in the back of a pick-up truck – since that is what we’d been told to expect – but just before 6, a van like the one we’d taken to Plettenberg rolled up outside our front gate. The eleven of us who’d opted to do the hike hopped in the van for the twenty minute trip into the city, where the driver dropped us at the bottom of the steep, wide trail up the mountain.

The sky was already turning pink as we began the ascent, so we took off quickly, in hopes of catching the sunset on the Western side of the mountain. The dirt trail wound once around the mountain before narrowing into a tricky, hand-and-foot rock climb for the second half of the hike. The twilight shades and shadows on Table Mountain and the Twelve Apostles were breathtaking as we rounded the southern face of Lion’s Head, but we were moving at such a fast clip that we were splitting into smaller groups as we hiked. Clusters of other hikers also on their way to the top began to separate our group, and we wound up taking separate paths towards the peak. Three continued on the “recommended route” (the most gradual and lengthy path, ending at a slightly lower peak) and eight of us took a narrow trail that zigzagged up the eastern face of the cliff at a disorienting angle. The view at our backs was the sprawling city bowl, the moon rising over the clouded mountain range at the far edge of the cape, and the hulking shadow of Table Mountain. Kevin, Dan, and I scrambled up the mountain as fast as we could, trying to reach the top before sunset, but the rope chains and bouldering were a little too exciting (and dangerous) to speed through.

When we reached the “nose” of the lion, we got our first glimpse of the sun hovering over the sea, poised to sink beneath a broiling layer of orange-yellow clouds that rippled just over the water on the horizon. The ridge to the top of the head required us to climb a steep strip of rocks so narrow that it reminded me of Knife Edge on Mount Katahdin in Maine. The 360 panorama as we reached the approached the top was simply overwhelming. Below us to the south stood Table Mountain, with Camps bay lying just beneath the reddish peaks of the Twelve Apostles. To the west stretched the vast expanse of ocean and low-hanging clouds, awash in sunset hues. To the north, the slope of the mountain arched upwards into Signal Hill, which nestled between the Waterfront, Green Point, and Bo-Kaap. And in the east rose the flat, white face of the full moon against the dark purple sky over the twinkling Cape Town metro. It didn’t matter how many times we spun around at the top – the view was impossibly beautiful. The colors! The contrast between night and day! Watching the sun melt into the Atlantic inch by inch was purely cinematic.

When we’d finally trudged up onto the small, rocky peak of the mountain, sweaty and out of breath, we were surprised by the number of people already lounging on the cliffs facing west. At least a hundred people – most wearing clothes that wouldn’t seem conducive to a technical climb – sat in groups either chatting or snacking, all bathed in the surreal orange light. We took countless photos in each direction off the peak, lingering on the sunset for the next fifteen minutes, until the yellow orb had shivered its last shred of light over the ocean.

Though the western sky continued to resemble an oil painting, we devoted the next hour to surveying the moonrise, as other members of our group joined us. In the end, eight of us gathered on the eastern face of the peak and watched the sprinkling of city lights multiply under the ever-darkening sky. Clouds were moving in over the distant mountains, and the lights they partially obscured seemed to flicker and dance in the darkness. We stayed at the peak until long after dark, realizing around 8:30 that we still had at least an hour and a half’s climb down before we could drive back to Rondebosch.

The climb down was admittedly treacherous by moonlight – even full-moonlight – and certainly nothing any of us could imagine being able to do in the United States. While scooting down the rock ledges in the darkness, I repeatedly turned to look back up at the cliffs behind me to see the seven other shadow figures moving slowly downwards against the starry night sky. The camera simply couldn’t capture the scene.

We made it down the chain ropes and rock scrambles with the gracious help of a Capetonian couple wearing headlamps. And despite one person’s twisted ankle, we reached the bottom of the path around 9:45. Our van and driver were waiting for us by the side of the road when we arrived, so we returned to the house just after 10 o’clock, feeling both accomplished and fortunate to have been able to see such a rare and stunning natural event.

8 Mar 2009 – Tsitsikamma and Plettenberg Bay, Pt. 4

Note: More photos to be added shortly.

On Sunday morning the sunny, sleepy town of Plettenberg Bay was quieter than ever. It was also very gray and cool. Ordinarily the change to cooler weather would have been welcome, but given that our AM plans were to head out on the ocean in open water kayaks, it was a bittersweet turn of events. The eleven of us who remained committed to the adventure walked about ¾ of a mile down to the beach around 7:45, looking for a place to eat breakfast. Eventually, we decided to try the resort hotel on the edge of the beach peninsula, so we walked into the lobby of the monstrous building and asked to be seated for breakfast. Apparently our request was not unusual, and we wound up sitting on the patio overlooking a broad expanse of artificially green grass and lawn chairs sloping down to sea.

Most of the kayak group spent the half hour over breakfast waffling over the decision to actually go out on the water. The sea was choppy and the sky hardly bright and sunny, so when people caught sight of the sign for spa massages, they rotated the full 360-degrees in the revolving door and re-entered the hotel on a mission. The other four of us walked down to the beach to meet up with the kayaking crew at Dolphin Adventures, but the 16-person reservation and 4-person arrival set us off on a shaky foot with the staff. Feeling a bit put off, ourselves, as the manager preached to the choir about failing to show up after making provisional bookings, we dialed as many cell numbers as possible to try to contact the other members in our group, and thankfully, three of them happened to walk by before we suited up and set out on the water.

The weather remained gray with an offshore wind until the moment we returned to land, but the two hours on the water were still quite enjoyable. We were paired in tandem kayaks with a guide joining our seventh person, and once we got out past the crashing (cold) surf, we learned to steer and paddle together very quickly. We set a brisk pace toward the rocky point around the hotel, and then set off through choppy seas, hugging the coast as we approached a nature reserve. The laborious paddling – especially after days of other physical activity – eventually slowed everyone down, and we settled into a four-boat holding pattern at the far end of our journey, surveying the water for friendly fins. Unfortunately, we encountered no aquatic wildlife, and the fifteen minutes of bobbing and rolling on the waves took its toll on my stomach.

The paddle back to the launch site seemed to be much faster than the trip out, and we conquered the rough waves on the push in to shore. The two young English women in the fifth kayak were not so lucky and had to drag themselves from the water with their boat, sopping wet. Dolphin Adventures provided us a warm shower and a cup of tea before we departed for lunch at the Surf Café, a spot the English women had recommended. We walked down the beach opposite the way we’d come, and then took a long a curving suburban road in a wealthy area out of view of the ocean. Just before we gave up the search, we spotted the restaurant sitting on the second floor of a small, well disguised store complex. The restaurant would have fit in perfectly in Southern California with its bohemian surf vibe. We spotted a black, upright piano against the wall when we walked in and a guitar case sitting on top of a bookcase in the corner. Colorful surfboards hung on the walls and the tables and chairs inside and on the patio had a rustic, bleached cottage look to them.

Surf Café also happened to be a Mexican restaurant, so we ordered our quesadillas and tacos and relaxed on the big bean bag chairs that circled our low table on the platform in the corner. Mellow American music streamed faintly in the background – artists like Jack Johnson, Snow Patrol, Bob Marley – and when we finished our meals, we were all very content to remain in the almost-empty restaurant as we waited for the rest of the group to meet us outside with the van. We each made trips to the QuikSpar grocery store a few doors down to pick up snacks for the ride back to Cape Town, and around 2:30 we finally got on the road.

The ride home to 20 Loch Rd. was overall more agreeable than the previous trip, as the day was cool and the passengers were more prepared for the tight quarters. We all caught up on the events we’d missed from the last few days, like the small groups trips to Monkeyland and the Elephant Sanctuary (where a few people even rode the elephants). Those of us who didn’t zone out to books and iPods right away were treated to the other half of the Garden Route – the part we’d missed in the darkness on the way to Tsitsikamma National Park the first night. The coastal mountain road continued to remind of Big Sur, while another person in the group likened the landscape to New Zealand, where she’d recently spent a summer.

The road snaked inland to the rolling yellow-green hills of farmland that remained our backdrop for most of the seven hour ride home. We changed up the seats every two to three hours as we stopped at rest stops for snacks and bathrooms. We opted not to stop for dinner, despite the hour, so that we could reach Cape Town by 9:00, and when we finally pulled up to 10 Loch Rd, there seemed to be a collective sigh of homecoming relief. Amidst musings on how strange it was to feel like we were truly “coming home” (after all, we’ve only lived here two months), people made their way into the locked up house. The amusing stories of the last 72 hours continued on and on, until the last people headed to bed sometime after midnight.

7 Mar 2009 - Tsitsikamma and Plettenberg Bay, Pt. 3

Saturday morning marked the biggest event of the weekend trip: jumping from the highest commercial bungee jump in the world. The Bloukrans Bridge was located just fifteen minutes West of Tube ‘N Axe Backpackers Lodge, so after a breakfast similar to the previous morning, we loaded up the trailer and piled back into the van. All morning the group had been anxious and jittery – some more excited than others, I suppose – and the short ride to the Face Adrenaline Bungee site was filled with nervous chatter and worried confessions.

The group was such a bundle of nerves that the process of checking in, paying, and getting fitted with our harnesses still seems rather fuzzy, but the feeling of sheer exhilaration was undeniable. We gaped at the 218m gap between the top of the bridge and the Bloukrans River valley below, standing on tip-toe and leaning out over the edge of the viewing deck to try to find the end of the rope that dangled from the jump spot at the center of the single-arch bridge. The differences in the ways that people processed their fear and excitement were almost as interesting as the prospect of the jump itself; some were very vocal and fidgety, seeking reassurance, others retreated into themselves and grew very stoic (though the terror still showed behind their eyes). Eventually, a guide led us out onto the catwalk that hangs on the underside of the bridge, and the group proceeded single file to the jump spot. The catwalk had been declared the most visually frightening aspect of the entire bungee jumping ordeal, because the river valley sinks beneath you as you walk across the mesh-and-grate passage, revealing the height from which you’ll be jumping.

Once we arrived at the middle, however, we were shuffled into our jumping order and greeted with the thumping, adrenaline-pumping music from the tech booth near the jumping pad. Though we’d expected the jumps to go according to weight, the order was staggered and Michelle was the first person to be tied into the leg harnesses. If we weren’t nervous enough already, the sight of her simply disappearing over the edge after the shrill, 5-second countdown sent all fifteen of us into a flurry of shrieks and yells. A flat-screen TV on the inside of an overhang by the jump pad played a live feed of the jumpers from a camera on the side of the gorge, so we were able to see what happened every time one of our group members fell out of view. It was truly bizarre.

I was the fifth jumper, so I was fitted with the leg harness while jumpers three and four were heaving themselves over the edge. While others huddled and shook in panic behind me, I slung my arms over the Face Adrenaline jumping staff and hopped to the edge until my toes curled over the rim. Until that moment, all I’d felt was pure excitement. Logically, I knew that no one had so much as needed the back-up harness when jumping from the Bloukrans Bridge, so I was never worried for my safety. But the sight of the river valley nearly 700ft below sent ripples of tension through every muscle in my body as I waited the 10-second eternity for the pre-jump countdown. The music thumped frantically at my back, mingling with the encouraging cheers of the group. The forested hills stretched up the valley and into the distance ahead of me. And all I could do was remind myself to jump forward, throw my arms out, and 3-2-1-BUNGEEEEEE!

In the four-second initial plummet – before the bungee cord begins to tug – the most striking thing is the sudden silence. Sure, the wind is whipping past your ears at an alarming rate, but in an instant, the music disappears, your friends’ cheers have faded, and you are simply dropping down, down towards a green expanse of cascading mountain cliffs. Your stomach flips a few times, but then you feel the sharp tug on your ankles and all of the blood rushes to your head as you begin to bounce upwards again. Your hands dangle freely overhead as you float up in the middle of the valley – a peculiar, inverted Y. You feel gravity taking over again after a moment of weightlessness, and so begins the cycle of falling down and springing up, plunging and levitating. The head rush is disorienting, but the beauty of the wild, Tsitsikamma forest spinning upside down around you is an overwhelming source of calm…

Out of nowhere, a disembodied voice greeted me with a perfunctory “hello”, and then a pair of legs appeared in my line of vision. A few seconds of jostling and the clicking of a carabineer signaled the beginning of our ascent back to the bridge. As we approached, a camera appeared over the edge of the concrete arch and I waved as animatedly as possible. When the bungee staff had finished pulling me back onto the bridge and freeing my legs from the harness, I jumped to my feet and ran over to the rest of the group, which still clustered at the center of the jump area, watching the screen as another person dove off the side.

The first seven jumpers had to exit the bridge so as not to overwhelm the people in the souvenir shop, so we walked back across the catwalk and into the Face Adrenaline shop to see (and purchase) our pictures and DVDs of the jumps. Soon, the other eight jumpers joined us, and we all recounted the jumps we’d had or seen.

Jordan’s jump was of particular interest, given that it resembled something of a feet-first cannonball rather than a graceful swan dive. For many people, the adrenaline high and the feeling of success that followed the daring feat brightened spirits for the rest of the afternoon. We drove the half hour to Plettenberg Bay, where we checked in at Albergo Backpackers Lodge just a few blocks from the beaches, and then ate lunch at a café on the corner, before splitting up to see the town.

Plettenberg Bay bore a striking resemblance to the coastal towns of southern California, except that the streets were eerily vacant of traffic and people. The steep hillside sloped towards the sea, tiered with white stucco, orange-roofed buildings and fancy, walled-off villas. The bright blue Indian Ocean sparkled down the hill, beyond the tops of the main road’s shops and restaurants, and the mountainous bay curved in a wide arc into the hazy distance. Palms and other African flora swayed in the afternoon breeze as Dan, Jill, and I made our way down a secluded path to a boulder-strewn beach. The little “undiscovered paradise” upon which we stumbled became an irresistible photo-op, and aside from a five star resort somewhere out of sight on the cliffs above us and a few fishermen on the rocks far to our right, we had the cove to ourselves. Waves rushed in and swept out as we climbed the rocks in the surf, and then we maneuvered our way up and out of the cove towards the bay along the cliffs. Only after an hour of wandering the Plettenberg coastline did we decide to walk back up the impossibly steep hills toward the hostel.

We met up as a group at 7PM and walked back to the main road for dinner at a slightly fancier restaurant than we usually frequent, and then stopped for ice cream next door before walking back for an early night in the Albergo dorm. Twelve of us shared six bunks in one of the upstairs rooms, and the inevitable antics that coincide with such a large group kept everyone awake until nearly midnight.

6 Mar 2009 – Tsitsikamma and Plettenberg Bay, Pt. 2

Note: Tubing pictures to be uploaded, soon.

On Friday morning we awoke before 7AM, and groggily prepared for a morning of black-water tubing while sharing two small bathrooms. We checked in at the desk/bar in the main room, which resembled the stick house from The Thee Little Pigs and was open to the cool morning air outside. We all ate some combination of granola, fruit, yogurt, cereal, and toast for breakfast, and then we met outside around the campfire ring to listen to the black-water tubing guide (Marius) run through an introduction to the morning’s activities. Our bleary-eyed group immediately perked up when we walked to the side of the hostel to don our super-stylish wetsuits, helmets, and life vests. We resembled something between Teletubbies and Action Heroes once we were all suited up, and the random shreds and tears in some of the suits (“shark bites,” according to the guides) only added to the peculiar image.In classic rural African style, we loaded into the back of a pickup truck and tube trailer and bounced our way along a rutted dirt path through indigenous forest. The guides had explained that the forest in Tsitsikamma contained more floral diversity than anywhere in the world, and many of those unique trees proceeded to pummel us as we drove past their low-hanging branches. The excitement amongst our group of sixteen grew steadily during the fifteen minute ride to the edge of the Storms River gorge, where we hopped off the truck into the forest clearing and grabbed our tubes. Brief safety lectures bookended our steep climb down into the gorge, during which we clung awkwardly to our tubes with one arm and a series of ropes and trees with the other.

The black-water guides and two of us with waterproof cameras took pictures during the three hour float-paddle-swim-kloof-rock jump trip. Our first few minutes on the water had most of the group in fits of laughter and grinning broadly beneath soggy water helmets. We floated through black-water pools that were fresh enough to drink (but blackish because of the tannin, the same ingredient that gives tea its dark color), and awkwardly hopped along the rocks and marsh grasses in the places where rapids would be located in high water. Our guides playfully flipped our tubes or challenged us to tube-standing contests. Four or five times during the trip, they pulled off to the side of the narrow river to climb the walls of the gorge, and jump from 4-8 meters into the dark pools below. The steep, forested walls of the gorge rose high on both sides of the river, but in certain places, it was possible to climb the rocks using small ledges or small tree trunks as hand and foot holds. At the designated spots, the guides would jump first, and then one by one we’d decide whether we had the mettle to follow. The first jump was only about 15ft, so all sixteen of us braved the climb and the fall, and the second was a shorter tube-jump, that required landing on your little yellow tube about 10ft below. For some reason, that latter jump required several attempts for most people, as landing in the rectangle tubes was more difficult than it looked.

The jumps grew steadily higher, however, and soon, it took more coaxing to convince people to jump. One jump had a precarious landing between several rocks, and a few minor bumps and scrapes drove most of the group to sit out the tallest of the jumps. The nearly 30ft jump attracted only the bravest (or perhaps foolhardiest) members of our group, and produced many fretful double-takes from the top, peering down through the tree branches into the water below. By the end of the trip, we had had at least two disastrously awkward jumps, several bruised limbs, and a 26-second tube-standing champ. Several of us did a final medium-height jump before trudging out of the water and over to the waiting truck and trailer. Despite the group’s fatigue, the smiles had yet to vanish, and people were already crafting the best recitations of their tubing anecdotes as we drove back along the bumpy forest path to the hostel.After shedding our gear and rinsing off in the thatched-roof shower hut, we met at the long row of picnic tables inside the lodge for lunch. The consensus seemed to be that everyone like the family-style atmosphere, which was repeated later at dinner. In the afternoon, many people caught up on sleep or lounged in the hammocks that were scattered around the property. We moved our bags into the rooms for our second night, which put four of us out in elevated canvas tents (very cool). We walked into “town” along a wide, old dirt road that oddly reminded me colonial Williamsburg. Tall trees arched over from each side of the road, and for a brief stretch, half a dozen one-story buildings lined the road, housing trinket shops, a general store, and a post office. The long, covered wooden porch along the front of the shops looked like it belonged in an old Western.As the heat wore off and the sun began to set, several of us took a lazy walk down the quiet dirt road at the back of the hostel. We’d aimed to take pictures of the sunset behind the tall mountains that flanked the little village, but in the foggy twilight, we stumbled upon a rural township and got lost in the sound of children playing yard games and dogs barking through the muted mist. After dinner, we met in a common area outside Ben’s room at 9 o’clock to play a rousing game of Mafia as the crickets and stars came out for the night. We had another early morning on Saturday, so we didn’t linger around the fire for very long. The hostel was bustling in the dim light of the bar and campfire, and a few of us played pool or Pictionary before turning in for the night. I set my alarm for 3AM so that I could wake up and take in the stars, once again, but as could be expected, my attempts to capture the mesmerizing night sky in a photograph were futile.

5 Mar 2009 – Tsitsikamma and Plettenberg Bay, Pt. 1

This weekend was more than just a three day trip out to the Eastern Cape Province; it was an adventure into the wild, adrenaline-pumping world of kloofing, bungee jumping, and “backpacking” through hostels along the rural and scenic South African Garden Route. After our Thursday morning class, we returned to the house to pack the rented van and trailer for the expected six hour ride to the Eastern Cape. We’d planned to leave by 3:00, but due to several delays, did not end up on the road until close to 5PM, and the weather was hardly conducive to sitting inside a poorly ventilated automobile.

Driving southeast through the rolling hills outside Cape Town, our 15-seater van was flanked by the coastal cape mountains and the occasional brightly colored township village. It was 35 degrees Celsius – around 95 Fahrenheit – and despite the stagnant, late-afternoon heat, the seventeen of us (including our driver, Parks) squished together in the slightly-too-small van, too hot to doze. The lack of air conditioning and dearth of retractable windows made the back two rows especially stuffy, which drove us to create a seat rotation schedule before we hit the first rest stop. Books and white ear iPod earbuds lay strewn across the rows of arms and legs and tote bags, while sections of the van engaged in energetic conversation. In the first hours of the trip, we devoured the chips, crackers, dried fruit, and chocolate that people had packed for snacks, but that didn’t deter us from stopping for dinner at a rest stop around 7PM, just as the sun began to sink below the wide African horizon. According to those who ordered burgers and fries, the Steers take-out was subpar, but the Magnum ice cream bars were delicious as always.

On the road, again, the hot, dry air had cooled to a more pleasant breeze. It whipped in through the few windows and brought with it the smell of pine and summer florals. We’d already climbed up and over the mountains South of Cape Town, and the winding mountain road had been lined by thick evergreen forest that was oddly reminiscent of northern Maine. Now, however, we drove across the expansive rolling hills of coastal South Africa, where the yellow grasses of the farmlands stretched in all directions. The mountain range at our left fringed the fields in blue ridges that gave way to a broad, pale sky, and our two-lane highway wound like a black thread between the golden hills. At different times and from different angles, the landscape could have been Oklahoma, California, or Alaska. After dark, we hugged the rocky coastline as the road curved around cliffs that plunged straight into the frothing Indian Ocean (by then we’d passed Cape Agullus, where the oceans “meet”), and on the way home Sunday afternoon, we would comment on how much it looked like Big Sur.

A few weeks ago, most of our group watched the recently released movie Blood Diamond about the African diamond trade. The main character delivers the line “T.I.A.” (This is Africa) several times during the film to acknowledge the utterly outlandish or unbelievable things he encounters in rural Africa. The abbreviation has become a favorite in our house, as well, and it has never seemed more fitting than it did in reference to the panorama out our van windows.

En route to Tsitsikamma National Forest, we were repeatedly delayed by traffic police stops and road construction (always funny in the middle of an empty rural road), and we stopped several more times for bathrooms and stretch breaks. A lightening storm lit up the inland sky from time to time as we rolled east through the night, silhouetting the mountains that loomed distant in the darkness. The Tube ‘n Axe Backpackers Lodge in Storms River Village expected us to arrive before eleven o’clock, but I had them on the phone three or four times between 10PM and 1AM, negotiating how we’d manage our very late arrival. Nerves were at their last end when we finally rolled up along the bumpy dirt road beside the hostel, and they were aggravated by the confusion over finding the front entrance in the pitch dark rural village. The shock of seeing a million stars over head, however, lulled us all into a familiar awe, and we stumbled across the dark hostel grounds into our 15-person dorm with the milky-way twinkling overhead.

4 Mar 2009 – Clint Eastwood! Morgan Freeman!

Oh how I wish I could be telling this story in the first person. (And had pictures to back it up.)

Last night around 10 o’clock, Ben drove about five people from the house to a nearby restaurant to buy Magnum Ice Cream Bars. The circumstances were ordinary enough; no one thought much about jumping into the car and driving the five minutes down to Durban Rd for a late night dessert. As they were approaching Mowbray, however, just a few minutes from the house, they had to stop at a road block, where a security guard indicated something about “a shooting” up ahead. There were nervous whispers in the back seat, but Ben drove ahead to a second detour spot, where another guard expanded on the explanation, and the anxiety in the car turned to fits of unrestrained excitement. There was a movie being shot on the next block. A big movie. A Clint Eastwood picture starring Morgan Freeman and Matt Damon – and two thirds of that famous trifecta were filming a scene just around the corner.

Within weeks of arriving in Cape Town, we’d heard about the upcoming film The Human Factor, based on a book about the pivotal 1995 Rugby World Cup victory by South Africa’s Springboks rugby team. The moment had been symbolically frozen in time, as the new president Nelson Mandela had handed over the world cup trophy to the Sprinkbok’s captain, representing the end of the racist sentiment that had plagued both the team and the nation for decades. We’d heard that the film would be shooting in Cape Town in March, and we all knew the big names behind the feature. So I’ll admit to having spent a good chunk of time trying to track down a shooting location schedule online over the past few weeks.

Reading a local news article a few days ago, I discovered that Matt Damon and Morgan Freeman had actually attended the same rugby game at Newlands Stadium that many of us had seen two weekends ago, and that fact alone seemed exciting… Then around 10:45 this evening, the house exploded with energy (intervening on a hair-raising run-in with a fist-sized cockroach in the pool house kitchen), when the car full of ice cream fetchers returned with their star-struck stories of suddenly running into Eastwood and Freeman on a random back road just a half mile from our house.

Through peels of wide-eyed laughter and squeals of disbelief, they relayed the following account of their encounter with these bastions of American cinema: after the roadblock, they’d decided to park the car around a corner and skulk down a dark street to the edge of the partitioned filming area. When they reached the shoot, the artificial “dawn” lighting prevented them from moving much further without being seen as a nuisance, but they watched as Morgan Freeman – playing Mandela – jogged down the street past a shop that had been reconstructed to resemble a window-front full of news headlines and pictures of Freeman-Mandela. During the scene, a van slows down by “Mandela”, and he and the two body guards jogging with him stop nervously. A second later, the van rolls on, and the three characters continue on their morning jog. Out of context, the scene seemed rather benign. It will probably be cut, one cynical person in our house complained as she recounted the night’s events. Regardless, they watched Eastwood instructing from behind the camera as Freeman enacted the scene a few times, running through the motions just feet from where they stood. We made eye-contact! They insisted. And he had such a swagger as he moved! Their exuberance in telling the story made the rest of us all the more jealous to have missed out.

According to the signs posted discretely around the shooting area, the crew was set to film in that location until 2AM. Some of us seriously contemplated calling a cab to drive us down there (we’d have walked if it weren’t too dangerous at night) so we could see it for ourselves. But our practical sense won out, and after a half hour of further discussion about star-sightings and movie shoots, many of us turned in for the night. The crew is supposed to be back in that location tomorrow night to film, as well, but of all nights, tomorrow we will be headed for Plettenberg.

4 Mar 2009 – Brief Update, Prepping for Plett

Tomorrow afternoon the group will head off to Plettenberg Bay and Tsitsikamma National Park on a three and a half day self-organized “mini-excursion”, and when we weren't working on assignments and papers these last few days, many of us were arranging the last minute trip plans. The smallest details – adjusting the laundry schedule, planning out how and what to pack, and figuring out when and where we’ll need to be throughout the weekend – have been complicated by the need to account for and include all sixteen (Ben will be joining us on the trip) individual perspectives. And of course, determining the mini-excursion budget is a task all by itself.

To back track a bit – the last four days have been fairly unremarkable, at least in the sense that they included no new or particularly exciting events. It’s safe to say, now that we’ve officially reached the halfway point in our time abroad, that our internship-day schedules have become a steady routine. After a Sunday split between attending friends braais, walking to a nearby park (with swings), and trying to get ahead on class work, we headed into three days of work at our internships. At Black Sash we’ve been working on several long-term research projects involving social security and also consumer protection after the melamine scare in dairy products. We’ve helped to compile a two-year history of the organization’s recommendations to government through press statements, as well. At some of the other internship placements, students have been involved in activities ranging from teaching classes at the elementary and high school levels to tracking down rogue porcupines in the suburb of Durbanville. In general, most of us seem to have been fully incorporated into the daily projects and assignments at our respective internships, no longer wallowing in the somewhat awkward “is there something I can do to help?” stage.

On Tuesday evening we had our weekly house meeting, returning to occupy the usual space in the upstairs common room. We ran smoothly through Plettenberg logistics before turning to more cumbersome discussion topics like house guest policies and community appliances, at which point the meeting unraveled into a rambling dialogue about communally-agreed-upon rules and regulations. As usual, we couldn’t escape the protracted expansion of our own ideas, and the meeting lumbered on until after 9 o’clock.

Wednesday, the pending thrill of our weekend plans kept everyone fairly busy after work. Finishing assignments for Thursday’s classes and packing for Plettenberg were paramount to the usual post-work activities of chatting and unwinding in the common room. Last Wednesday, three of us had participated in the weekly time trials around the Commons, which involved running once (or twice) around the 2.5km loop while being officially timed. The Wednesday evening event functions much like an informal race, but without number tags, registration, or awards. For those who choose to run the 5k, however, correctly predicting the amount of time it will take you to complete the distance will win you a small monetary prize.

This evening, just two of us jogged out to the Commons just before six o’clock to run the one-loop course, again, hoping to improve on our previous times. About thirty runners were signing in and stretching at the far corner of the Commons when we arrived, and despite the generally cooler weather so far this week, the beating sun had driven the temperature back up into the high eighties. Despite the heat, it was an exhilarating run and a pleasantly familiar experience to be running amidst a group of seasoned runners. And tomorrow we will undoubtedly be thankful for having stretched our legs this evening, as we sit cramped inside the rented van for the six hour trip to Plettenberg.

28 Feb 2009 – Classes, Cleaning, and Thandakhulu

The heat wave continued Thursday, though it abated enough in the morning that our walk to UCT was bearable. In the morning class, Vincent took us through the turbulent political events leading up to the current election season, followed by a lecture on the role of the state in South Africa’s economy. After lunch, we discussed our internships, papers, and activist projects in Vernon’s class, relaying interesting anecdotes and information about our placements and recent accomplishments.

With just under two hours of free time between our afternoon and evening classes, about half of the group decided to stop at one of the cafés on Main Rd, and the rest walked back to the house to cool off and exchange notebooks. For the first time in several weeks, Marita’s class did not include an invited speaker, so we spent the first half discussing the week’s reading assignments and debating the issue of racism in South Africa, as well as the impact and significance of Obama’s presidency on racism in America. While eating another delicious dinner, we watched videos on the “invention” of race and the continued manifestations of racism in the United States. The short films were thought provoking, but I’ll be the first to admit that the food (the biscuits!) had my attention about fifty percent of the time.

After class, as has become customary, most of the house went out for the evening. Five of us went to the Baxter Theatre to see the one-woman play “Red Winter in Gugs”, about a young woman growing up in the township of Guguletu during the struggle against Apartheid. The actress did an impressive job embodying the half dozen characters in the riveting and emotional story of racism, politics, and mortality. About one quarter of the play was in Xhosa and much of the English was spoken in too thick an accent to understand, but we followed the story well enough, and particularly enjoyed the reactions of the audience, most of whom were locals who seemed to relate to the events on stage.

Friday morning, five of us headed for the TEARS shelter, again, around 7:30. The morning was cool and misty, a pleasant change from the stifling heat of the week. The sun had burned through the thin layer of clouds by the time we began walking the dogs around 9:00, but with the other handful of volunteer walkers, we managed to finish the kennel rounds by 11:30, before the worst of the heat set in. We’ve begun to notice that some of the animals we’ve gotten to know in our weeks at the shelter are no longer there when we return each week. This revelation has generally cheered us because the animals’ absence indicates they’ve been adopted. TEARS, as I’ve mentioned before, is located on the edge of a township, several miles from the nearest major town, and as we walk the dogs up and back along the sleepy, industrial road, it is hard to imagine how anyone would know that there were animals in need of a good home, waiting inside the walls of the gated compound. Fortunately, their website and advertising/fundraising campaigns in neighboring towns have been helping to attract local pet-seekers.We took the hour and a half minibus/train trip back to Rondebosch and stopped to buy groceries at Checkers before walking back to the house. After a shower and lunch, two of us took on the daunting task of scrubbing clean the pool house kitchen, which hadn’t been done thoroughly in about a month. The lack of window screens and the ever-open pool house door makes the kitchen a breeding ground for ants and other bugs, and the crumbs and sticky films along the shelves, countertops, and floor had reached a point at which the thought of actually preparing food in the kitchen was kind of revolting. We worked with a limited assortment of cleaning tools – a roll of paper towels, a bottle of “Handy Andy” cleaning solution, and a broom that shed a trail of broken bristles with every sweep. We cleared the shelves of all our foodstuffs and became ruthless ant-squashers as the little bugs scurried across every solid surface we encountered. For lack of a decent mop and vacuum, we dragged the kitchen mats outside and scrubbed the floor with paper towels and the bleach-based cleaning solution. In the end, it took about an hour to get the kitchen back into sanitary, working condition, but it was well worth the effort.

(So after that thrilling description of our afternoon housework…)
Other people drifted in and out of the house all afternoon, returning from their activist projects at township daycares and community centers and heading out to the beach or to run errands. After dinner, several of us watched the latest Woody Allen film Vicky Christina Barcelona in the Common Room, while others went out.

Though there’d been plans to organize a day of kloofing (the South African adventure sport involving a combination of rock scrambling and cliff diving) with a local outfitter, the trip never got off the ground, and Saturday saw people splitting up in all different directions. Some people headed off to a small shopping mall in Claremont, some went to the Waterfront and Camps Bay, and I accompanied Emily A and Faina to Thandakhulu High School, where they’ve been doing their internships Monday through Wednesday. They’ve been involved in teaching a computer class to about fifty students after school on Mondays and Wednesdays, and their students were supposed to be coming into school that weekend morning to take a test for the class. Wanting to encourage and reward the students – all of whom come from nearby townships and very humble means – Emily and Faina had decided to make muffins and crepes for the class, and the baking had begun very early Saturday morning. At 9:30, pressed for time, we took a minibus from Red Cross Hospital to Mowbray, stopped to pick up more jam in Shoprite, and then walked the few more blocks to the school.

I’d visited the school with the rest of our group during our week of internship introductions at the beginning of the trip, but waltzing into the modest building that served as the main office and teacher’s lounge, I was immediately acquainted with the laid back atmosphere of the school. We talked to a teacher, casually dressed in a yellow t-shirt and cargo shorts, who advised us to set up the food on the reception counter. He also informed us that the computer test had been postponed because most of the school was in session that morning, as students from UCT had come to give lessons in the Maths and Sciences. In the middle of talking to us, it suddenly dawned on him that the school was ten minutes passed switching time, and he ran out to ring a bell that signaled the end of the first period.While waiting for the mid-morning class break, during which the computer students would be summoned to the front office building for the (now irrelevant) treats, Faina and Emily gave me a tour of the school compound. I took pictures as we wandered around the main building, which had two floors and about ten classrooms, and then as we walked passed the two rows of square, satellite class buildings, uniformly lining a long, packed-dirt walkway. When we returned to the front building, we talked to a few of the college students running the Saturday session, and then watched the computer students stream in and dive into the surprise pastries. We tried to explain why we’d brought the snacks, but the room grew a bit too loud to make the announcement every time a new batch of students arrived, and eventually we just watched them happily devour the treats before moseying off to their next classes.After cleaning up the mess of crumbs and jam on the office table, we bid the few teachers goodbye, and walked the half hour back to Rondebosch for lunch. The rest of the afternoon several of us devoted to assignments as we realized the next weekend would be lost to the Plettenberg excursion we’ve been planning for weeks. Once the afternoon heat cooled to a reasonable temperature, I took a long run several times around the Commons, and returned for dinner around the same time as many people who’d been out and about during the afternoon. Enjoying the weekend atmosphere, most of the house headed out again in the evening, and those of us who stayed home took advantage of the quiet to Skype home, relax under the stars on the patio, and watch more movies from the anthology of films we collectively brought on the trip.