Elise @ Wynberg Girls' High School

On the 29^thof March it was finally the day where Rick, Fearghas and I had been waiting for. We were leaving for Durban to travel from there along the coast back to Cape Town! Now we got to see some more of South Africa instead of just in and around Cape Town. I think all three of us, or at least myself, definitely didn’t really know what to expect. But I’m pretty sure I can speak for the three of us when I say it was amazing and much more than what we expected!

Break up day for the Easter holidays was on the 24^th of March, so I had a few free days in Cape Town still before we left. Because of the holidays hostel was completely empty because all the girls go home. Unfortunately Janey left us because she was going home too, so that meant that Bridge and I had the whole of hostel just for ourselves! Sounds nice, but being in such a big, old building with just 2 girls can really be quite creepy!! Bridge and I spent fun times being tourists and exploring even more (not that I thought that was possible after the two weeks spent with my parents, Meike and Thijs) of Cape Town. We went to the annual Cape Town Navy festival in Simon’s Town where we visited some of the ships and submarine’s that are now active along the Mozambican coast. On our way back we had a very interesting trip on the train.. where we accidently ended up in 3^rd class, being totally squashed (always nice when you’re my height and you fit perfectly under people’s arms after a hot day like that….) for about an hour and half. Also we were both not just scared to be pick pocketed but also to fall out of the moving train as the people left the train doors open while moving!! Let’s just say we were very very relieved when the train finally arrived at our station.

We also spent a full day on the red bus tour through Cape Town, although we had both seen most of the places that the bus passes we could see all of it from a different angle being on top of the bus and listening to the information they give you about the places. The red bus is definitely a must do when you visit Cape Town!!

Then on Thursday the 29^th Brigde took me to the airport and I got on my flight to Durban to finally start our trip! Rick and Fearghas had a flight earlier so they were already there, hired a car (with trouble!) so that they could fetch me from the airport as I arrived at night and taking a taxi on my own in Durban at night is not a very good idea. So they fetched me, had some dinner and we went to our backpackers hostel right on the edge of town. Now, Cape Town is the only big city in South Africa where you actually go into town, in the other cities like Joburg, Pretoria and Durban you just DON’T. The guys had experienced the hectic traffic that afternoon (luckily I wasn’t there yet)  in town when they were looking for our hostel. The mini bus taxi’s pop up out of nowhere driving way too fast, no one pays any attention to traffic rules and many people randomly just cross the streets. Quite something else than Cape Town!

So we arrived in our first hostel where we shared one room with the three of us. Luckily this was the first hostel we stayed in, so that we couldn’t compare it with anything yet.. but along the way we figured what a dump that hostel actually was! Dead and live cockroaches under our beds, mattresses so thin that you’re actually sleeping on the wooded planks of the bed, pillows that are supposed to be white but turned yellow because they’re so dirty and I could go on with more disgusting things for a while.. But, we didn’t let it bother us! We had a good laugh when Rick found out his ‘host-brother’ had put a fake gun in his suitcase without Rick knowing! He was so lucky he came through his flight without getting caught..The first thing we noticed (besides the difference in temperature, Durban is unbelievably hot and humid) was that Durban is sort of South Africa’s personal India.. as you see Indians EVERYWHERE! Also unlike in Cape Town, the sea water in Durban is so nice and warm that you can actually enjoying swimming without a wetsuit and they have shark nets at most beaches so you don’t have to worry about being eaten by a great white either!

AVICII concert

We stayed in Durban for four nights, we went to an amazing AVICII concert, Ushaka Marine world and spent lots of time just walking around, lying on the beach and enjoying life! Then on early Monday morning we were being fetched by the Baz Bus, our transport for the rest of our trip. The Baz Bus is a hop-on-hop-off bus that picks you up from your hostel and drives all along the coast where you can get off where you want. I reckon it’s the best way to travel through South Africa as it is very convenient, easy, safe and so much fun because you get meet so many people from all over the world! But of course, we’re still in South Africa.. so it was a miracle for the bus to be on time and when you look for the TV you find a big hole in the wall because it got stolen.

Ushaka Marine World

Our first drive on the Baz Bus was one of our longest ones, (with not many stops… I remember that very clearly and so does my bladder….) we drove from Durban city center to Mthatha, where we were going to work in an orphanage for a few days, which was about 8 or 9 hours. But the scenery you see on the way there is absolutely amazing, once out of the city you drive through the middle of nowhere, valleys of bright green grass, stunning parts along beaches and even jungle type of feeling once we drove more in-land. South Africa’s diversity keeps on surprising me!!

Transkei

Onze we arrived in Mthatha we had to find a lift to the orphanage because the Baz Bus only drops people off at the hostels. Mthatha is a town in the middle of nowhere, very rural in the Transkaai. ..goodbye civilization, hello proper Africa!! (you should google Transkaai or Wild Coast South Africa to get a better idea of what it is like) In Mthatha you will not find a single normal taxi, but only the mini bus taxi’s and the mini bus taxi’s are not a real good idea to take as foreigners with ALL our stuff with us. But we actually really didn’t have a choice so while we’re waiting for a mini bus taxi to come along there drives a police bakkie (pick-up) our way. So we decide to ask them to give us a lift to the orphanage, thank the Lord they didn’t mind! So there we are, 3 foreigners in the back of a police bakkie driving through Mthatha.. We got some very interesting looks thrown our way! We noticed the police men didn’t really care about the speed limits, or about wearing their seatbelts or about the law that says it’s illegal to phone while driving.. Along the way one of the police men said that we had to stop somewhere at a primary school to look for a guy that they’ve been trying to catch for a while. So we stop at the primary school, the one guy gets out walks to the gates of the school and starts banging at the gates and shouting: ‘HELLO! ..something something in Xhosa..’ he waits a couple of minutes, bangs a few more times and walks back to the car, gets in and finishes his sandwich. So, job done for today.

Orphanage in Mthatha

When arrived safely at Bethany’s children’s home, we find Sarah, Fearghas’s friend who has done voluntary work in the orphanage for a year. She shows us around and we get to meet the 85 gorgeous kids (0-8years old) who live there. Shame, it really hits you when you enter the room and you see all of the big brown eyes staring at you, knowing that all of them were just left by their parents. It was a very good experience though; we got to work a few days with them. We would start at 7 in the morning, sing songs together with the kids to pray, feed them, play with them, take them out for walks, draw with them, and bring the older ones to school and so on. Because the kids don’t get a lot of attention, whenever they get the chance to do get some attention, they do everything to don’t lose it. So they are all really demanding, which is very sweet but gets really tiring! What makes it even harder is that none of them speak or understand English but only Xhosa so communicating with them was not easy.  It was ridiculous hard work, unbelievable how the ‘mama’s’ that work there to that every single day!!

Coffee Bay

From Mthatha we hitchhiked to Coffee Bay, where we luckily arrived safely with all our stuff still with us.. Coffee Bay is so small it doesn’t even deserve to be called a town or village, it is really in the middle of nowhere but it is amazing. For a 1,5 hour drive, there’s nothing but green valley’s with random little round huts where people live in. Potholes in the road about every 50 meters and goats and cows walking everywhere, just randomly crossing the roads. So we finally arrive in this little place called Coffee Bay and we walk around, stunning place in the Transkaai! We hired surfboards and went to the beach to surf a little bit. On the way to the beach you have to cross 2 little rivers  but we didn’t realize that the tide changes so that the river gets deeper… so on the way back we suddenly had to cross a much deeper river than  before! That night a guy who worked in the hostel took us on a little walk up a mountain so we could see the sunset. Really relaxed vibe, hammocks everywhere between the trees and everyone is just enjoying life to the most. We wanted to stay longer but unfortunately we didn’t have time for that!

Our next stop was the Addo Elephant Park in Port Elizabeth where we had a full day tour together with a Swedish couple who we became quite good friend with! We saw so many animals, among others, lions standing up only 3 meters away, elephants so close we could touch them, buffalo’s and many many Pumba’s. That night also had another proper African experience as we had a power failure in the safari park due to the thunderstorm and it took forever to go back on again. Quite scary trying to walk back to your room outside in pitch dark knowing that there’s all kinds of creepy creatures like scorpions crawling everywhere..

Addo Elephant Park

The next verrry early morning we went on our way to Jefferys Bay which is one of the most famous surfers towns in the world. We were unfortunately very unlucky with the weather as it rained and freezing cold most of the time. But this didn’t stop us from taking surf lessons, we had to being in one of the best places in the world to surf.. although luck wasn’t with us with the weather, we definitely had a lot of luck with our rooms! We booked 1 room for the 3 of us and we got a little apartment across the street from the actual hostel. Fully equipped with a kitchen 2 bathrooms and 3 bedrooms. So we had to share this apartment with other guests, the first night we were joined by a Brazilian couple, who were also very nice! But the next 2 nights we had the whole apartment for ourselves! And that just for R110 a night! We invited our Swedish friends over for a braai, which was a lot of fun!!

And so it was time already for our last stop of our trip… it was Plett, short for Plettenberg Bay.  The closer to Cape Town, the more you forget that you’re actually in Africa, there’s nothing left of the feeling you have when you’re in the Transkei… different but still very nice! We met some very nice Dutch girls in Plett, where we spent some time together. We went to the beach, had drinks here and there… in other words enjoying life! We also went on a kayaking trip on the sea where they promised us we would see some dolphins swimming next to us, obviously we couldn’t say no to that! Unfortunately there were NO dolphins in the full three hours we were out at sea and our instructor told us he had never been out at sea without seeing dolphins, too bad! He did take us to the part where a seal colony lives so we got to see thousands of seals chilling on the rocks and swimming beneath us! The smell was horrific but seeing all those seals next to us was pretty awesome!

Proof!

And there was the day we all looked forward to but which we also dreaded and hoped that it wouldn’t come too soon… (especially Rick) 2days before the end of our trip we booked ourselves for the highest bungee jump OF THE WORLD !!!! of the Bloukrans bridge just outside of Plett. We drove over this bridge already on our way to Plett…. Shitting ourselves big time already, it is so unbelievably high! I think the three of us didn’t really have a good night sleep knowing that when we would wake up we were going to jump off a 216 meter high bridge.. but we did it!! I have to say, it was definitely the most scary thing I ever did in my life but also one of the best things I did in my life! People ask me… How do you jump off a bridge so high? Well, I don’t know I guess when you stand there and you hop to the edge of the bridge you don’t really think at all! Two guys hold your arms counting down  5, 4, 3, 2, 1…BUNGEE! Then you just go, flying into the nothingness of a 216 meter distance to the ground.. AMAZING!!

Bloukrans Bridge

Jump!

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I know it’s been waaaay too long since I last wrote about my stay here in this beautiful part of the world, but I have to say the last weeks, or months actually, have been absolutely amazing and very busy!! So much has happened and I have to admit that I would never be able to write about everything, so here’s just a little summary of the highlights of the last months until the end of March because about those weeks I’m planning to write a separate post!

Table Mountain view from Robben Island

In the beginning of Feb I joined WGHS on grade 11 camp in Simons town, Rocklands for 3 nights. This is a stunning little town, situated near the sea. The whole grade 11 camp is based on the leadership program. When the girls are in grade 11, they can apply to become a leader in their Matric year, representing the different pillars. So during the grade 11 camp the girls get many sessions about leadership, what it really is and how to become a leader. Also they got to do activities and fun games focused on this. They asked me before the camp if I wanted to do my own session with the girls… I could think of anything myself as long as it was focused on ‘discover yourself in being a leader’. So I prepared something for them and the second day of camp it was my turn to do my first session with half of grade 11. There I was in front of a whole lot of girls and I have to admit I was pretty scared and a little insecure! But in the end everything went fine and I was so glad to see that the girls really did their best with my assignment. The second time with the other half of the grade went even better because now I got the feeling of it and knew what I could improve, so I had a second chance to do it differently.

Besides that, school work was more of the same with many little things. Most of the time, before I start working in the morning I don’t know what I’ll be doing that day but I’m always busy and surrounded by very nice people! After school I’ve been helping out with training the swimming team, road running, debating and walking, which I very much enjoy! Living in hostel is really an experience… that you can only truly understand when you’ve lived in a place like this. You learn to love, hate and appreciate every single aspect of living in a huge boarding house with about 50 other girls. I wouldn’t want it any other way! Living with friends, day in and day out . Especially 2 of the boarder mistresses J. and B. who’ve been living with us since the beginning of this year, made time fly for me because we had so much fun together!!

Camps Bay

And so, before I knew it the time had finally come that my parents, sister and Thijs my boyfriend came to visit me!! After all this time I could now actually show them where I’d been living my life the last months, instead of trying to describe it to them. I showed them around WGHS and took them to one of the assemblies. I think they were really amazed as it is so different from what we’re used to in Holland! Also I showed them around in hostel and let them meet some of the teachers and some of my friends. It felt so nice that they now knew exactly who and what I was talking about earlier. Afterwards, we spent 2 weeks being the biggest tourists… From the world famous Table Mountain to tiny hidden places like High Tea in Wynberg, we did everything in and around Cape Town that we could do!

Kirstenbosh gardens

We stayed in a very nice apartment in Camps Bay with the 5 of us, not just exploring everything of Cape Town but of course also just having a relaxed holiday. One of the highlights was definitely the safari we did for a weekend in the Karoo, in the private game reserve Inverdoorn. Thijs (our very own safari expert as he did quite some safari’s in his life) warned us so many times beforehand to keep quiet when we would see animals, because otherwise they get scared and run away. But as excited as my sister and I were, although we tried so hard to keep quiet and not let out a quick shout when we spotted an animal, it took a lot of practice!! We saw many many giraffes, several boks, rhinos, hippo’s, zebra’s, lions, wildebeest and buffalo’s. It was such a nice experience being so close to the animals instead of looking at them from behind bars like in a zoo… we were actually really close to them! 

Also the wine farms were definitely lovely spots to visit, amazing views and scenery around the Constantia and Stellenbosch area. And let’s not forget the nice wine tastings we did in some of the wine farms we visited. Where my dad couldn’t resist and bought some bottles of these verrry good wines. We collected some nice memories as we visited one of the wine farms, Buitenverwachting, where Thijs was once bitten in his bum by a big dog. We walked into the wine farm and suddenly Thijs recognized the field… and even the dog itself! So sorry Love, that we had to put you through this traumatizing experience again! (Although we had such a good laugh about this haha!)

wine farms

Unfortunately for our Thijs’es, us girls obviously had to do some shopping in Cape Town! We went to the HUGE shopping centre Canal Walk. This place is so big that you get lost very easily! But once you find your way, you will find absolutely anything that you need in this place. Naturally, we had to go to Simon’s town and Boulders beach to see the penguins. Thijs Jr., Meike and I climbed over and through the boulders to get closer to the penguins and we carefully tried to touch one. When we succeeded, the penguins were not so happy and (as we could’ve seen coming) they tried to bite us… On our way back to the car after spending some time at Boulders, we spotted a penguin crossing the street, and -no lies!- it first looked left, then right, crossed the street towards a restaurant, jumped up the stairs step by step to enter the place, turned left and went somewhere in the back of the restaurant like it knew exactly where it was going!!

Another highlight were definitely some of the restaurants we visited in and around Cape Town, where we really had delicious food!! Unbelievably fresh and full of taste like we could never really get it in Holland or Europe even. (We even got a raspberry so fresh that even the live centipede we found in it couldn’t resist to eat it…)
We had planned to go up Table Mountain before sunset to watch Cape Town turn into the city that never sleeps… not knowing about the fact that the wind usually picks up on the Camps Bay side of the mountain in the afternoon, which makes it impossible to go up with the cable car. Just like we didn’t count on the famous Tablecloth (layer of clouds on top of the mountain) that will cover the whole top and block your view. So, we were waiting and waiting for a day on which the wind would not blow or the Tablecloth would not appear late afternoon. Obviously this did not happen, so we decided to go up Table Mountain on one of our last days on a stunning sunny morning and this proved to be a good idea… saving the best things for last!

View from the cable car going up Table Mountain

 

On top of Table Mountain

Doing so much in a short while, we spent quite some time in the car with long boring drives but we had so much fun and had such good laughs together that this was never really a problem! Although before we finally found a road map in a big book store, after searching for it for a long long time in many different places, the tension could get a bit high in the car. (Especially because my dad had to drive on the other side of the road with A) Mom who tries to make sure we do not crash with the car and B) three annoying, impatient and over-excited ‘kids’ in the back.)
Also, with everyone sort of expecting me to be a ‘tour-guide/navigator’ throughout the West Cape and me being too stubborn to admit when I actually do not know the way but still keep on giving directions, things could get a little tensed in that car!!

With (part of) my hostfamily, the Ludens

Unfortunately before I knew it, it was time for my parents and sister to go home… luckily Thijs stayed for a few more days that we could spend together!! We stayed at my friends L. house where they made us feel right at home. We filled our last few days with lots of fun, love, friends and road trips around Cape Town (where we, somewhere between Muizenberg and Fish Hoek, ran out of gas and we had to walk back to a petrol station…). And of course, all good things come to an end so there was the day that I sadly also had to say goodbye to Thijs. That ´sucked big time´ but was also quite exciting as Thijs was soon to leave for his trip through South East Asia!

Amazing would be an understatement for the time we spent in South Africa together, and I’m now definitely not the only one who has fallen in love with this country!!

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After my great holiday at home with all my family, my boyfriend and friends it was eventually time for me to go back to stunning sunny South Africa. Leaving home and saying goodbye will never be fun, but the time was right for me to go back again to my life on the other side of the world! The moment my flight started to arrive in Cape Town and I saw the million little shining ‘stars’ of the lights in the city I got this warm ‘coming-home’ feeling inside of me. And I felt this even more when the Ludens picked me up from the airport as for my first day back at school and everyone welcomed me so warmly !

The day I got back in Holland I immediately felt like I never left.. The same happened when I arrived back at Wynberg Girls High. It felt so nice to be back, back to my friends, my ‘home’, my normal daily routine. And of course the verrry nice hot weather! I have been busy since moment 1 with a million little things at school, which is very nice! I never get bored of doing the same thing because there’s always a big variety of little things to do. I did some coaching for the swimming team last week, assisted in history classes, admin work and of course the never-ending textbooks stuff. Now in another new school year, with new (very cute!) grade 8’s and new staff members I finally don’t feel like ‘the new girl’ anymore.

My first weekend was one we could only have in South Africa with the Ludens! Friday night we had a braai (of course) and Saturday we left early in the morning to go crayfishing at Cape Point. It was a beautiful day and apparently a great day to go fishing as we caught about 12 crayfish!! And later on that day we enjoyed these in the most fresh crayfish salad I’ve ever had. That Sunday we went to zone 7 to go quadding again, it really was an awesome track! Covered in sand and dirt we came back home Sunday night, ready to start another week!

Cape Point

That week at school flew by and before I knew it, we had weekend again. I started my weekend Saturday morning with a great new experience, I went for my first surfing lesson at Muizenberg beach! Of course no one at home was keen to hear about this… as everyone is terrified that I’ll be eaten by a great white shark. But of course, nothing like this happened, I just had a very nice time being taught how to surf!! And like it or now, I’m definitely planning on going again Saturday night 2 of my good friends had their 18^th birthday party. What a fun night with good friends and music! The next morning I felt that this party may have been a little too much fun.. as my alarm went off at 6:30!!! Robyn and I joined the mountain club at school and that day we were off to go do the Du Toit’s kloof hike. After a hour drive we arrived, parked the car and with a group of about 15 girls and a few teachers we started our hike! The first part was quite easy but beautiful.

Hike @ Du Toit's Kloof

Mr. Bodenstein told us that this was the first time that he’d ever done this hike without sunshine and with rain.. but while hiking we were all so thankful that it was drizzling and that the sun was not shining, otherwise it would have been waaaay too hot! As we moved closer to the actual kloof the it became harder and harder. The was no longer a path, we had to climb through and over big rocks and eventually even barefoot because with shoes the wet and socky moss on the rocks was too slippery to walk on. Hectic, dangerous and quite scary but coming to the end of the kloof it was totally worth it! We ended at this huge waterfall and a little pool of the nicest fresh river water. We all swam in the water, under the waterfall, jumped of rocks into the pool and had lunch. After this 8 hour hike we arrived back at the car, all of us completely exhausted.

Waterfall @ Du Toit's Kloof

Another week at Wynberg Girls High flew by, this time it started with sore legs and shoulders from the hike but yet full with busy days and fun with the girls in hostel. Friday one of my other dear friends turned 18! Talking about birthdays, a lovely tradition the girls have at Wynberg is buying a whole lot of balloons, tie them together (and sometimes sign them all) and give them to the birthday girl! That afternoon I went with the waterpolo teams to Stellenbosch to see them play and support their game. They fought really hard but sadly the other team won.. but this professional first team of Wynberg wouldn’t let this ruin their day as most of us went to town that night to celebrate A.’s 18^th birthday!! Once again such a fun night with the girls! I stayed over at my friend’s L. that night and the next  morning we went with 2 other friends for breakfast at Jonkershuis in the middle of amazing Groot Constantia! The best way to start your Saturday. L and I were going to the J&B Met in Kenilworth. Really nice and fun experience! For you South Africans who are reading this I suppose I don’t have to explain what that is.. as The J&B Met is a quite famous and very popular annual social event. It’s based on horse races and the fashion contest they have every year with a different theme. You’ll see the most extravagant outfits! Sunday was a very chilled day, we went out for breakfast again because it was L’s and her daddy’s birthday. After that we did some shopping in Canal walk and a huge China Town! And of course we watched the men’s final of the Australian open… I won’t be commenting further on this as I was VERY disappointed with the outcome…

Girls!

So this was my little update again from Cape Town! Tomorrow morning I’ll be leaving to go with on the grade 11 camp until Friday. And… in only three weeks my parents sister and my amazing boyfriend will be arriving here in Cape Town!!!! I can’t wait to show them everything and everyone!

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Like we all know.. time flies when you’re having fun! And I can’t believe how time has flown by for me the last few weeks. Now I’m actually starting to feel sad that I’m leaving in 4weeks.. so I’m glad that I’m coming back in January because I feel like it’s not my time to leave yet. Not for a while! The last weeks have been much busier and a lot of fun with everyone I’ve been around. Cape Town is really starting to feel like my second home now, especially with the Ludens! It is such a nice feeling to come back ‘home’ after a week at school. The last few weeks I’ve been very busy with taking over classes for teachers who couldn’t come to class. One week I did “consumers” which was nice! And the other week I did geography which I really enjoyed. The geography teacher gave me a whole timetable for the week with what I had to do with the girls. I liked having the grade 8’s, I had them several times in one week and it was nice to bond a little with the girls and actually ‘teach’ them a little, rather than sitting with them and watching them. Besides the classes I was busy with the matric textbooks, which I just do whenever I find the free time. Every day there’s a large number of books waiting for me to tick them off on several lists, so I have to make sure I don’t get behind otherwise I would get lost in all those books! It seems like a boring job but it’s not that bad actually.

a few of the books..

In between the textbooks and the lessons I help the secretary with filing lots of papers for the new grade 8’s which are coming in January. Two weeks ago when I was busy filing in the staffroom the secretary came in and asked me if I would mind to come to the foyer for a second. This I found a strange question because the foyer is the main entrance of the school and is only used for visitors at Wynberg. But obviously I followed Mrs. T to the foyer, I opened the door.. and there was K, my mom’s friend from Holland, suddenly out of nowhere standing in the foyer at Wynberg Girls High!! I was shocked: ‘WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE?!’ She laughed so hard when she saw my reaction haha. Her partner flies for KLM so they were in Cape Town for a few days and she decided to visit me! She even brought a little package from my parents and sister with a little note and Dutch sweets. It was a great surprise!! Since this week the girls don’t have lessons anymore but only final exams and study sessions at school. Every day school ends at 1 and most of the extra murals are done for this year too. That is sad but I help some of the girls in hostel now with studying after school. Instead of taking over classes I now invigilate during the exams. Which was a weird feeling the first time because I used to be the student working myself to pieces on exams and now I had to be the teacher walking around! Two weeks ago all the ‘houses’ worked on a new house challenge with which they could earn points. This time it was a house photo challenge.

Silverlea house photo

Every day it was one of the houses its turn to show up during first break at the brink quad with as many girls from the house as possible in their house t-shirt. The house photo with the most girls on it IN their house t-shirts would win. The challenge is done but we’re still waiting for the results… So I’ll come back to that later in my next post! Now that this school year is really coming to an end there won’t be any more teaching things to do, but next year there will be lots of exciting things to do for me with the new grade 8’s coming!
The last two Friday’s I stayed at school with Robyn to support the Wynberg Girls waterpolo teams. Every Friday afternoon they play against other schools in Cape Town and we won both games! It was nice to see lots of girls staying at school on a Friday afternoon to support their school. Robyn worked on the tech table both the games, which means that she keeps the scores and times and several other things during the game. It was interesting for me to see that because that way I really got into the game and could understand how everything works!

waterpolo match at Wynberg Girls' High

My last few weekends were great with the Ludens and other friends! Of course we had a few delicious braais again, I really will never get enough of that! Something very weird but memorable happened one friday afternoon.. M. fetched Robyn and me from school and while driving on quite a busy road, Robyn suddenly shouts: ‘O my word, what is THAT?!’ we all look in the same direction as Robyn and in the middle of a stopstreet there was a woman who just pulled her pants down and starting peeing!! Quite an odd thing to see on your friday afternoon but funny too! That weekend my friend A. from school took me to town to visit the Eastern Food Bazaar, which was very nice!! The food was delicious and the vibe was really good. She also took me to the Indian fair which was placed in a very big hall. It was full of little markets with Indian clothing, food, carpets, jewelry, art and lots of other things. A really cool experience! The Ludens took me for an amazing little bike ride up to Chapmans Peak. This is a road along the mountain with an amazing view over beautiful beaches like Hout Bay.

motor bike ride to Chapmans peak

 

view from Chapmans peak on Hout Bay

Last weekend the Ludens took me for a new but awesome experience… quadding on the sand dunes in Atlantis! I actually drove a quad myself now! It was soooo scary but amazing to do. H. would ride in front of us and Robyn, P. and me would follow him. Which was good because H. knew exactly where to go. For us it would be quite dangerous to drive on our own because when going down on the dunes you can’t always see the surface because of the white sand and the light, so you wouldn’t see a hole in time to avoid it and just fall into it! (good thing you didn’t know this before I went, hey mom?!)

So that was my little update from down here in Cape Town. I’ll be coming home for a little break in December so I can spend my holidays, Christmas and new years at home with my family and friends! But like I said, can’t wait to start with the new school year in January at Wynberg Girls High School!

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