One Last Post...

so its about 630 am here, and i can't get myself to stay asleep. (thanks to this lovely fear of flying) its really crazy to say goodbye to people here, and know that we won't actually be seeing eachother that often again. 3 people already left, and 5 or 6 of us are leaving today. I think after tuesday there will only be 2 or 3 people left in the house.

most of the other students in the house are taking a re-entry class spring quarter together. however, this whole me having graduated now thing puts a halt on that for me. i've promised that i will try and make special guest appearances, though :)

these last couple days have been really good, although a little sad. On Friday I said goodbye to Zanele. She's the lady who cleans the common areas of our house. I got fairly close to her when I was here two years ago, and again this time. I decided this time to take charge and raise money from everyone in the house to help pay for her children's school fees this time around, and I am really really happy that we were able to raise about 1000 rand for her. Here's a picture of Zanele and I together in our kitchen:

Zanele lives in Guguletu, and is planning to remodel and add on to her house so that people can start renting rooms and staying there with her. Especially with the world cup coming to South Africa in 2010 it is all over that there will not be enough places to stay downtown or any of that, so anyone across the city can make a good few bucks by renting out places to stay. I really hope to be able to save up enough money to make it back (with my mom!) by then and stay with her! Also, she is in the process of learning to drive and getting her drivers license, and is really excited to get to drive us around the next time we are here.

Friday night almost our whole group went out to a happy hour/dinner in our neighborhood together one final time. Most everyone went downtown to Long street for a final night, but Rebecca (my roomie) and I decided, as usual, that we'd prefer a quiet night in.

Yesterday (Sat) i spent a good deal of time packing, checking weight requirements, and getting bags on and off of our one scale in the house. Then Rebecca and I decided to do one final sundowners on Camps bay. Despite the massive winds (we had 60mph gusts), we settled in for one last time and watched the beautiful sunset before taking a taxi home. I got great pictures of it, but unfortunitely my camera cord is already packed away, so I cant share them right now. Perhaps when I am back home in seattle.

Anyway, so its now about 650am on Sunday, and i'm getting ready to hop on to my plane(s) to make the long long looooooooooong journey home. First, I am going from Cape Town to Johannesburg, then Joburg to Washington DC, then (finally!) Seattle! Just yesterday, there was a big article out on the front page of the newspaper (www.capetimes.co.za) to be careful in the Johannesburg airport because of roaming gangs, which was really comforting for someone who is already afraid of just the plane! I already disliked the Joburg airport when i was in it in january (it was really confusing and inconvenient), and now I have more reason to not want to travel through it!

Also, on my flight from Joburg to DC we have a random "technical stop" somewhere during the flight. however, i cannot find anywhere that says where this stop will be, so i'm a lil freaked out! Additionally, on that same flight (which, i might add, is 17 hours long) i checked my seats and i am in the very middle of the middle row at the frong bulkhead IN BETWEEN FOUR BABY BASSINETS. I fully intend to beg, grovel, and cry in order to not have to sit there. Its more for the baby's sake than mine! My layover in DC is only 2 hours long, so hopefully the plane is not delayed since i have to go through customs there before racing off to my plane in seattle!

Anyway, I need to go shower and finish packing and calm myself down some more, so I shall be off. I will see a lot of you really really soon on your side of the world!

xoxo

wish me luck on these flights

kate

Getting ready to leave....

I can't even believe how fast my time here has gone by! Although I am quite ready to come home, I am really going to miss Cape Town. I really want to try my best to come back for 2010...

I'll do a quick recap of my last week:

I forget which one it was (maybe Friday?), but either thurs or friday my roommate Rebecca and I went to do some gift shopping downtown at green market square, and then headed to Camps bay beach to sunbathe and then eat and watch the sun go down. Rebecca got pick-pocketed for 300 Rand (about 40 dollars) while we were downtown, so I decided to treat her to dinner while we were at the beach. Pictures of the beach/sunset:

On Saturday 3 of us got picked up at 530 am to go to Aquila game reserve and see animals: yay!!!! It was really really nice, we saw a lot of animals, and they gave us champagne to welcome us, mimosas with breakfast, and champagne during the break in our game drive. Its a good thing they fed us lots of food to go along with it! Here's some pictures:

Ostritch:

Zebra:

Buffalo:

Elephants:

Rhinos:

Wildebeast:
ground beetle: Lions:

giraffes:

On Sunday, our entire group left for Boulders Beach (the one with the penguins) for our final retreat. Here are a few pics from that:

We got home from Boulders Tuesday, and then our group from the Hands for a Bridge/Literacy Through Photography project went to say goodbye to the Bellville learners on Wednesday, and the Isilimela learners yesterday (Thursday). Also, yesterday morning was my last class of college ever!!!! I'm really really scared, but excited at the same time. Last night is when the first girl from our group left, too. It really drove home that we are at the end of our time here...

Today we all woke up at our own pace, and a lot of us ate breakfast together. (One of the girls here is a vegan and made these amazing vegan chocolate pancakes and vegan coconut pancakes with pinapple sauce). Then Rebecca and I slowly got ready and headed to the mall to do some last minute shopping. I picked up a few really really cute things that I'm excited about!

Tonight is our last night haning out together as a whole group (besides Suzanne who left yesterday) because tomorrow is when everyone else starts leaving. I think we're going to dinner then out to Long Street. Tomorrow during the day i plan on finishing my souveigner shopping and heading to the beach, and then i'm packing!

Sunday I have to leave for the airport at 11am. It feels so surreal!

update on my update...

so we seemed to have topped out temperature-wise for the day. i would just like to put out there that we topped out at about 95 degrees. however, the discomfort index (temp. it actually feels) was 43 degrees. THAT'S F 110 DEGREES. and we're at 60% humidity right now. this type of weather usually does not happen in cape town!!!

i'm burning up

this is what i get for complaining that the weather was cooling down!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

it is currently 35 degress here, aka 95 degrees with no breeze and no ac anywhere in our house or the school i'm going to in about 5 minutes

10 days till i leave, 11 till i'm home

Alright, so as usual it has been forever since i updated last! i'll just have to do a quick day-by-day at this point.

Tuesday the 26th: All piled in minibuses to go downtown and see Woza Albert. Unfortunitely, it had sold out in the 1 days since we last checked ticket availability. Trekked back home to Obs and went out to the sushi restaurant in the neighborhood.

Wed the 27th: Sat around and did a lot of nothing. Did some laundry. Read a book. Sometimes its really nice just to sit at home

Thurs the 28th: Went to class, ran last-minute errands for the HFB community celebration. Went to Isilimela after school and set up the photographs and collages in the room and worked on piecing together the final performance with all 3 schools. Awesome final performance, then all of the CHID students booked it out of there because we had to go to dinner for Joy's birthday. We piled 23 people plus a driver into our kombi (minibus). Illegal? yes. Hilarious? yes.

I sat on the floor between the driver and front passenger seet with several peoples' feet all over me :) Everyone was either sitting on top of someone else or had someone else on top of them or some combination of the two. We all dressed up and then went out to dinner at this fun performance-dinner place where all the service staff are performers and did songs, skits, dances throughout it. Then, our whole house managed to get in a fight- I retreated and went home.

Fri the 29th- Went to class, then thanked the god that I dont believe in that Roosevelt students/teachers are leaving town and I have far less things to do now. Bummed around Obs some more. Took the cable car up table mountain with my roommate, Rebecca, and another girl in the house Katie (her full name is Kathryn spelled just like mine!) to watch the sunset. it was amazing!!!

And all the clouds starting to come over the top of the mountain were beautiful! (they're known as the table cloth) I think i took about 60 pictures of them alone Went to the sushi place in our neighborhood again (vegetarian sushi is so refreshing! given all the oily pastas and pizzas around here, i've been craving sushi a lot lately) and had a great dinner with the 3 of us.

Saturday the 1st: Woke up fairly early, read some, worked on my journal/scrapbook some, waited for most everyone else to wake up (they went out the night before....) and then we piled ourselves into a taxi and headed down to cape town's pride parade! it was quite lovely, although smaller than seattle's. (and from what i hear i dont think anything could ever compare to san fran's) We ended up joining the parade, and then after having lunch we went to the carnival afterwards and enjoyed some music and wine before heading home.

Sunday the 2nd: Woke up really really really early to be out of the house by 630 am to go canyoning. (walking/abseiling down a canyon with waterfalls in it) it was scary as hell, and, me being me, i managed to hurt my knee fairly badly. i got half carried down, half forced down the mountain. i think the best pep-talk i ever had was when i was sitting at the bottom of one of the waterfalls crying in pain and they told me there was no other way down. there's no cell service, and they cant do helicopter rescues. thus, i made it down. however, i did have to be lowered down the last waterfall because i couldnt even get myself down. and people took turns giving me piggy-back rides back to the cars

Monday the 3rd: No class (yay!) I got escorted by two of the girls in our house to the doctors office. He said that one of the tendons in my knee was extremely inflamed and might have a small tear in it. Also, my knee cap was really gritty feeling, and got irritated, but was probably just acting up due to previous injury. He prescribed me seriously strong anti-inflammatory medication and told me to stay of my feet for a few days, and if it didnt start feeling significantly better i had to go see the orthopedic doctor. Bummed around the house all day being bored while everyone else was at the beach mostly. :(

Tuesday the 4th: Swelling in the knee went considerably down, and I could even put a little weight on that leg again! Still, no class. Still, I had to stay home. Also quite unfortunate: the main side effects of the anti-inflammatories made me sick as a dog. I had quite a rough night on Tuesday.

Wednesday the 5th: Knee looked considerably better, could put a substantial amount of weight on it. Gave up on taking the prescribed anti-inflammatory because I did not need to feel that sick ever again. Switched to tylenol/ibuprofen. Recovered from the sever illness the night before with lots of bread and energade (gatorade). Cleaned my room and did laundry. Highlight of my trip: one of the friends we have met here,Maggie, is origionally from seattle, but lives here now---WITH HER DOG!!!!!!!!!! We went to the dog park yesterday with Naartjie (the dog), who is part pitbull part mutt of questionable descent. Naartjie also has a thing for ears like Louisa, so i got TONS of kisses and ear nibbles. After that, I went to sushi (yet again- haha) with my roommate. Also, it was sooooo warm!!! It hit about 32 degrees (90), but there was no wind to go along with it.

Thursday the 6th (today!): I got woken up lastnight at about 330 am by 1/2 of our house coming home drunk as usual, being loud, and banging around making food in the kitchen. I seriously cannot wait to go home to my nice beautiful bed and only the sound of dog noises to wake me up! Dog noises at least come with fun dogs, these noises just come with annoying drunk people. We have class at 10 this morning, and then those of us who worked with hfb are headed to Isilimela to have a quick debrief with them and pick up some film.

I dont know about our plans for tonight or friday, but on saturday i'm going out to see more animals!!! 3 of us are headed out to do another safari-thing. i just cannot get enough of seeing animals! On Sunday our whole group is headed to boulders beach to start our end of the quarter retreat, and then we are getting back on tuesday afternoon. the time is flying by so quickely now!

Anyway, after that long, long wrap-up, I hope you guys are still awake!!! Hope all is well, and I'll be seeing a lot of you soon......

I don't miss the rains in Africa

hey all!

sorry, it has been a while since i last wrote again! Its been a hectic week. Right now it is pouring rain outside- booooooo. We're kinda transitioning from summer to fall over here, so the weather is going to be going downhill permanently soon here. Since I last wrote we had time with all three schools from hfb together, and went on the retreat this past weekend. CHID (and thus UW) as a program might be pulling out of participation with hands for a bridge in the future. I dont really feel like explaining everythign, but basically our role is not being acknowledged, nor are we treated as adults with a stake in the program. It was overall a really really frustraiting week that made me wish I had chosen a different project to work on this time around.

Yesterday I managed to get this 24 hour flu that is flying around our house, so I did not do much of anything. Today is a day off for all of us working with hfb, until around 7 tonight when we are all going to see a play called "Woza Albert". It is a two man protest play that was written during apartheid and hypothesizes what would happen if jesus came and saw what was going on during that era. We shall see if i enjoy it.....

The final community celebration with HFB is on thursday, which also happens to be one of the birthdays of one of the girls in our house. So i think we are community celebrating, and then all going out together. yay! This upcoming weekend should be fun, too. Not only will the Roosevelt students/teachers be out of town, but it is also the second weekend of pride here. Some of us are going to go to the pride parade and celebration on Saturday, and then we are going canyoning on sunday. (repelling down waterfalls, etc. -i'm a lil nervous!)

Anyway, I'll try and keep this thing updated more often this week!!! Hope you all are doing well!

p.s. i know i already wished all 3 of you this, but happy birthday dusty (21st), oma (22nd) and lani (25th)!!!!!

...and the chaos begins

Hey all! quick update here...

Our whole group did an absolutely fabulous Valentine's day bash together! There has been a lot of tension brewing in our house lately (understandable when we all live, work, and go to school together), so three of the girls in the group decided to arrange this whole dinner to bring us all back together as a house. They stayed home from their community engagement projects on Thursday, and when the rest of us came home from ours there were personalized invitations for a valentine's day event and instructions to dress our best and meet in our courtyard. So, everyone got all dressed up and excited and we all met out there at 715. The girls who arranged everything then came out and explained that they were cooking for all of us for the night! We were served cosmos and bruschetta in the courtyard as our appetizer as Michael Buble was playing from a laptop for us :) After that, we were led into our candle-lit living/dining room where we all had full place settings complete with name cards. We had a first course of caeser salad, a main course of pasta casserole with mushrooms and all kinds of good cheese and veggies with another drink called the love potion #9 to go with it, and then dessert of flaming turtle chocolate fondue with pink champagne. I could go on and on, and i'll post a few pictures later, but it was the most fun i've ever had on valentines day, and it really did bring our house back together.

Our entire group did Robben Island together on Friday. Its amazing what a toursit trap it has become, and the script that guides are supposed to follow. Even within two years I can see some of the changes, and its a shame how many of the just plain tourists were there and not quesitoning anything. It felt like there were a lot of people there to just go through the motions without really thingking about the fact that they were on on island that was once a place to send criminals, then turned into a leper colony, and then a prison where some of the most notorious political prisoners were kept. I could talk a lot about this, but i just dont have the time right now!

We had a fairly low-key weekend. I spent a lot of time around our neighborhood and working on my journal/course pack that is due ina few weeks. My roommate, Rebecca, and I went on a 4 hour shopping adventure at Cavendish mall which is about a 15 minute combie ride up the road from us. I spent about 1250 rand ($160) on 3 dresses (one of which i'm almost positive i'm wearing to graduation because its purple!!!), a pair of shorts, a pair of leggings, a shirt, and a pair of shoes. My roommate cleaned up just about as well with a few dresses and shirts etc. Sunday Rebecca and I had brunch with Sarah, one of the girls who was on our program two years ago. Sarah is actually staying about 2 blocks away from us in the other house that is owned by the same guy that owns ours, and she is here until right around when I leave as well.

Now I am off the the first meeting of all 3 of our hands for a bridge student groups together! ack! Also, EVERYONE in our house is freakin sick with either the stomach flu or a really really bad cold, so i am taking massive amounts of vitamin c and echinaccea (sp?) trying to ward the germs off! Wish me luck!

So freakin hot...

Wow, so I dont have much to say right now other than it is so uncomfortably warm right now! It reached into the lower 90's today, with the "discomfort index" (i guess the temperature it actually feels?) reaching 100. right now, it is 930 pm and i just checked weather.com and it says that it is still 85 degrees. I can usually deal quite well with heat, but this is damn near unbearable right now. I'm sleepy, but i cant even find any comfortable position on top of my bed right now because the cold side of my pillow disappears in like 2 seconds! Some thunderstorms and rain are supposed to come through tonight, and i can only hope that they come soon so i can get some sleep!

In other news, for valentines day our house is doing a secret valentine exchange. we all put our names in and then drew someones name out of the pile to give gifts to. i decided to go old school, so i made my valentine a good ol' construction paper + glitter + macaroni + puff paint card. i also got her a super-classy single serving can of champagne and some chocolate and a stuffed bear. everyone in the house is going all out on this... people have gotten crazy cards and balloons with presents stuffed in them and flowers delivered and all kinda of amazing stuff. i have put the word out there that whoever my secrent valentine is i would appreciate a puppy or a dog, but somehow i do not think that's happening...

Today we had the first meeting with Isilimela and Bellville together to figure out there buddies and work on a few activities (we met outside in the middle of the afternoon- sooooooooooo hot), and then on Saturday the Roosevelt group arrives. I'm pretty sure i'm going to be busy beyond belief from the 16th of Feb when they arrive to the 29th when they leave! Tomorrow most of our group is going to go up table mountain for sunset for v-day :) Some of the more adventurous in our group are climbing it-- being that more people have died on table mountian than on everest....and being that I am not such an adventurous person, I am taking the cable car up :)

Anyway, i'll leave you guys with a few more pictures from along the trip since i might not be able to update for a while:

Margaret and I at the poetry festival that our whole group went to a few weekends ago at Spier

Wine and cheese tasting two Sundays ago

Georgia (our teacher) and I walking to the beach in Port Elizabeth this past weekend

one of the Kudu that we saw at Addo last weekend

another elephant picture from Addo...i seriously took so many pictures there that i could make a book at this point

bunch of elephants at the watering whole with a warthog in the foreground. seriously...i have so many animal pictures!!! i wish i could put them all up here!
the endangered flightless dung beetle (i'm not making this up!!!) it is illegal to run over these or step on these in the national park

And lastley, (in order) me, our tour guide, Joy, and Ashley in Addo.

Wish me luck on getting sleep now!

...and we're back in Cape Town!

Alright, so since I last posted we have done a considerable amount! The sunday after meeting Tutu Doogs (from DAC) took us out to Paarl, where he is from. We went wine and cheese tasting at Zevenwacht wine estates, lunch at a restaurant in the township that he lives in, met some of the old ladies that are pillars in their community, and met his family. It was pretty much an amazing time!

Monday and Tuesday we spent with Erwin, who is a teaching artist that was flown in to do a workshop with our group, as well as work with the hands for a bridge group when all three schools are here together. We did a lot of work with words and movement etc.

Thursday- bright and early at 645 AM- we took off for Port Elizabeth (PE) to meet up with the group of UW students that are studying there. We spent the first day going out to some of their community engagements before having a braai (bbq) at their flats. There was lots of eating and drinking going on to say the least....

Friday we spent almost the entire day in cars!!! We drove out to King Williams Town to visit the Steve Biko foundation (If you dont know who he is, look up Steve Biko- he's a very very important figure here) It was a 5 hour drive in for a 2 hour heritage site tour, and then a 4 hour drive back to Port Elizabeth. Being not so enthusiastic about going out and drinking all the time, I was the one student from our group that stayed in Friday night :) I ended up having an amazing time, too! I watched a little TV (we dont have TV in our house in Cape Town, so it was the first time I have watched TV in 5 weeks!), attempted taking a bath (water kept scalding me so i gave up...), and did some reading.

Saturday we spent with the entire group for about 4 hours doing drama/learning/i dont know how to explain them exercies with Erwin and talking a bit about the previous days. I had sunscreen on, but it did not last the entire time, so I got considerably more burned than I had hoped to... After the exercies we all went to lunch, and then some of us took off for the beach. The PE side is the Indian Ocean so we were all really excited because they have much warmer water! Unfortunitely, Saturday had really high winds, so the sand stung us as we were walking along the beach, and there was a jellyfish warning in the water so we couldnt go in :(

Sunday three of us woke up at 7am to drive out to Addo national park and watch elephants and animals :) We ended up taking a taxi out there, through the park, and back home. We also got one of the hop-in guides that was offered. We had such an amazing time with the 3 of us and the 2 of them! Between the sleep deprivation and the jokes, we were laughin almost the entire time. I have tons of pictures of animals from then, but it takes forever to upload onto here, so I'm only going to put 2 up here...

I have to run to class now, but i'll try and put morepicture up later! The baby elephant picture is for you mom! :)

Today...

was amazing!!!!

So we all woke up this morning at like 530 AM to go see Desmond Tutu at 7AM at Saint Georges's Cathedral downtown. (The Anglican church) We attended a small service/prayer thing/ I don't know what its called because I don't know anything about religions but it was quite small and there was prayers and people took communion. Anyway, so we attended that, got to shake hands with Tutu, got to talk to him and take a group photo with him, and then were invited out to coffee with him. I didnt get to talk to him much, but I did say hi for you mom :) Also, I can say that from what I did get to experience of him, he was a really really down tow earth, kind, and surprisingly funny man. Pictures:inside St. George's

our group with Tutu

So after the coffee, Doogs (the guy from the DACPM that organized all of today for us) had arranged a tour of the National Parliament with one of his friends for us. It was not the most exciting experience ever, but it was definitely one of the most informative things that we have done. I had no idea how their two parts of parliament were set up! Anyway, a few pics from parliament:

Inside one of the corridors. The floors and some of the marble in this area date back to the late 19th centuryInside one of the two houses of parliament. In this house, each province gets to have 10 people representing them. People vote for the party that they want representing their province, and then the party choses people to sit here. Great thing: the party can chose to pull anyone anytime that they put in these seats if those serving are not following the party/peoples wishes. Also, 3 of the 10 seats for each province are rotating. So, any given day depending on what is being discussed different experts come in. I.e. during the recent sessions dealing with the current energy crisis different people who know about electricity and the power stations, etc. filled those 3 seat for each province.Inside the National Assembly part of parliament. These are 400 positions total filled be people electing who they want to represent them as a nation. It is possible to vote for one party for the provincial representatives and another party for the national ones. Also, the president has no veto power in their government, and the two parts of parliament are considered equal in power. View of part of the downtown from right outside parliament.

After parliament we walked over to the Cape Castle. This is the fortress/castle that was built by a combination of Dutch and British over time. We went on a tour, but the history they gave was very one-sided. They did not really mention that it was slaves that were forced to build the castle and that continuously through history it was used to house prisoners and torture some of them. As a group, we actually confronted the tour guide and her manager about it after the tour. It was an extremely intense meeting to say the least. My head actually hurts thinking about it right now. Anyway, after all that, we went out to lunch (we were starving!!!) Then some people stayed downtown- I chose to head home.

Tomorrow we are going to a bursary ceremony held by the DACPM. It is a ceremony giving scholarships to mothers of people lost in the freedom struggle for use with their surviving children. After that, we are making the trek to Spier winery in Stellenbosch for a poetry/hiphop/art festival that is going on all weekend. We're so excited! We expect to arrive home at midnight to 2am that night.

After all that, Sunday we are headed out for the several hour drive to Paarl. Doogs, the guy from the DACPM who has arranged all of this amazing stuff for us, is from there and showing us around. We are going to a wine and cheese tasting at an all-black run winery that some of his friends own. Additionally, we are meeting up with some of the former leaders of the ANC from the 1950's. We are also possible talking with former trade union leaders, and two men who were political prisoners at Robben Island for 30 years.

I'm gonna need a break after my weekend!!!!! Also, Thursday at 7am is when we leave to go to Port Elizabeth. I dont think we're gonna have a break for at least 10 days here! Now I'm off to go try and rest up for the rest of our weekend!

NEWSFLASH

Such exciting news! So our group is officially meeting Desmond Tutu this Friday the 1st of Feb! One of the guys from the Direct Action Center for Peace and Memory made it his personal mission to get us a meeting with him, and he definitely succeeded! I'll try and snap a picture with him- wish me luck! And I will say hi for you mom :)

Finally Some Pictures!

Alright...well I've finally decided to throw some pictures up on here. This week we've spent mostly between classes and our community engagement projects. We got delayed starting at Belville, so we are spending extra time with them this upcoming week. Thursday night we went out with some people that we met here to this club called Hemisphere. It's on the 38th floor of one of the downtown buildings, so it has an awesome view. Yesterday we all decided to have a low-key night around the house and in the neighborhood. Today some of us went horseback riding. It was really fun, but it is really really hot here. There were also fires int he mountains close to where we were riding.

And with that, here's (finally) some pictures:

our first night out all together as a group a few weeks ago:

some of the scenery around here:

Suzanne's birthday (thats a picture of all the cupcakes and shot for everyone lined up):

hanging around one of the local bars here:
Camps Bay beach:

getting ready to go out Thursday night:

all of us horseback riding on the beach today:

me on the horse today:

And, finally, (this if for you mom!) Moss's son Lemi...he took this of himself on my camera:

We Still Need Donations!

Hey all! So real quick, we still need donations for the project that we're working on :) If anyone has an extra $5-$10 or knows anyone else who would be interested please please please forward this on! Our letter explaining our project and how to donate is below!

Thanks in advance!


Dear Friends,

We are writing to invite you to participate in an exciting opportunity! During this Winter quarter, eighteen students from the University of Washington will be studying abroad in Cape Town, South Africa with the Comparative History of Ideas (CHID) program. While staying in Cape Town we will be participating in a variety of community engagement projects. One of the projects that a few of us will be working on promotes understanding between students from Roosevelt High School in Seattle, Washington and students from Isilimela and Belleville High Schools in Cape Town. This project will consist of a number of creative elements including photography, writing and other arts-based activities.

This project will be groundbreaking in its capabilities to create bridges between American teenagers, as well as teenagers from two distinctly different cultures in South Africa. Despite the fall of apartheid, the majority of students in South Africa still live in very segregated conditions and rarely communicate with one another across race and class divides. In February 2008, sixteen Roosevelt High School students will visit Cape Town for two weeks, spending time in Langa Township and in Belleville. It’s a unique opportunity to learn about one another, dialogue about difficult issues, and build new friendships.

We plan to help facilitate this exchange by giving students a unique opportunity to understand each other through self-expression and artistic communication. We will do this through a series of guided photography and writing workshops. We have been working this quarter with a program at UW called “Literacy Through Photography,” where we learned how to develop and lead this kind of youth exchange. Given an irreplaceable opportunity to work in groups consisting of one student from each high school, students will use their photos to create dialogue. Photographs, artwork, writing, and performance open up a space for youth from vastly different backgrounds to communicate with one another. Important aspects of this project will include movement and performance workshops with a professional teaching artist, an overnight retreat and open mic where students will present their written pieces and finally a public celebration in Langa, where the students will be given an opportunity to share their photos and artwork to members of the community. Additionally, we are hoping to bring some of the photos back to Seattle to display in the spring.

Here is where you come in: we have the heart, but we are still seeking resources for the final funding of this project. Our goal is $4000. We have raised some money already, and though we realize this is late notice (we leave at the end of December!), we are still hoping that you may be able to help. The donated funds will be used toward cameras, 100 rolls of film, art supplies and developing costs. Any additional funds beyond our practical needs will be used toward helping Roosevelt fund the work of the teaching artist. Again, we apologize for the late notice. For many of us working on this project, this is a once in a lifetime opportunity. We hope that you will consider supporting our efforts. Happy Holidays.

Donations can be made via check or online:

Checks:
Checks for any amount can be made out to The University of Washington Foundation and should reference Cape Town Photography

Please mail them to:
Amy Peloff
Comparative History of Ideas Program
Box 354300
University of Washington
Seattle, WA 98195-4300

Online:
To make a donation with a credit or debit card, please visit the CHID website at http://depts.washington.edu/chid/giftsandgiving.php, choose the Jim Clowes Local/Global International Fund and reference Cape Town Photography in the comment section.

Any help you can offer us will be greatly appreciated. Please let us know if you have any ideas to help us or can point us in any new directions. We could even bring back a sample of our work for you and/or your organization if you are interested. If you have any questions about this project, please contact one of the members of our group listed below. If you have any questions about making a donation, please contact Amy Peloff at 206-543-7991 or apeloff@u.washington.edu.

Thank you,

Tessa Adams
Suzy Hu
Kate Jesse
Mallory Loflin
Joy MacTavish
Alena Marshak
Mehret Weldu

Instructor:Georgia Roberts

Whirlwind week!

Wow! It is hard to believe that we are entering into our third week here!

Lastweek was another great whirlwind of a week! On Monday we went to the University of Cape town and toured around the historical sights. Monday was also Suzanne's birthday so we made dinner reservations and went to a few bars.

Tusday Ron was nice enough to move our classes to the afternoon to accomidate the poor condition that some of our group was in. We met downtown at the Jan Smuts statue, and then walked to Idasa, where one of Ron's friends works. Idasa formerly stood for institute for a democratic alternative in South Africa, and now stands for Institute for Democracy in South Africa. I'm sure they have a website, my best guess at its address would be www.idasa.co.za. That may be way wrong though...Either way, Ron's friend was a wealth of political information! It was almost to the point where we felt embarassed for knowing so little and not even being able to ask intelligent quesitons of him! Also, since we met in the afternoon after lunch, and it was a warm day, and Ron's friend had a slightly monotone voice it was almost impossible for us to stay awake! I was genuinely interested in what he had to say, but I still ended up giving myself a bruise on my hand from poking myself with a pen cap tyring to stay awake! No wonder professors hate teaching afternoon classes!

Wednesday was our first group outing into Isilimela High School and Lovelife in Langa. Isilimela is the school that CHID (Comparative History of Ideas) and HFB (Hands For a Bridge) have a strong relationship with. It is the shcool that I helped teach English in last time, as well as doing the photography/art/writing/poetry project. Lovelife is a type of afterschool/teen place that is like a boys and girls club a little bit. However, the focus of it is HIV/AIDS awareness, education, and prevention. They have a free clinic that is frequented, as well as a radio station, and games and activities to keep teens and young adults off the streets and engaged in their communities. One of the girls in our group works with the Seahawks corporate offices and actually got some donations from the Seahawks to bring to Lovelife. I think a few of the people from our house might work on teaching flag football there, as well as running some sore of basketball tournement.

Thursday we had our last class with Ron :( We discussed our readings for the week--the Freedom Charter as well as the South African Bill of Rights from their Constitution. THe bill of rights here is really quite amazing. Instead of just including civil-political rights (i.e. right to vote) like most, it also includes socio-economic rights (i.e. right to adequate housing). While everythign promised in it sounds great, not a lot of the rights are being fulfilled right now. I really could go on for days abouth this.... a lot of our talks thursday reminded me of a couple of the human rights courses I've taken at the UW.

Friday was a pretty relaxed day. We had a brief meeting with Rebecca (our peer facilitator- she was here two years ago with me), and then there was a house soccer game. I think a good half of the house made it to the soccer game. Some of us (like yours truely) decided on more leisurely activities (i.e. napping). Friday was also Ashley's birthday! (yay she's 5^2 now!) We had a great big huge house braai (bbq) and trashed the place before going out that night. I dont think i've ever seen so many dirty dishes and pots and bags of garbage everywhere- and that's saying a lot!

Saturday and Sunday were both fairly relaxed days. Georgia arrived Saturday morning (yay!) and Ron left on Saturday night (boo!) Its quite sad to see Ron go, but I'm excited that Georgia is here with us now. I chose to stay in and read and work on my journal/scrapbook for most of the time. (Our journal/scrapbooks that we're keeping are 40% of our grade since we dont have any tests or papers) Sunday we ventured out to the beach at Camps Bay, but it was so windy it was painful to stay on the beach too long. The sand was ripping our skin off. My town and my sweatshirt also blew into the water :( It was fairly cold for me after that point.

Today was our first class with Georgia. Also, our group doing the Literacy Through Photography project with the HFB students met to finalize a syllabus for our project and print up handouts. Tomorrow we are going out to Isilimela (the high school in Langa), Wednesday we are going to Belville (in Belville- a mostly Afrikaans suburb of Cape Town), and then Thursday we are back at Isilimela. Hopefully that schedule will continue so that we are meeting at least 4 hours a week with the learners at Isilimela and 2 hours a week with the learners at Belville.

and with that I will end this crazy long post! I really need to work on doing these more often so that they're not just weekly recaps...

It's gettin hot in here....

Hey all!

Sorry it has been a while since I updated- we've been fairly busy! Last week we wrapped up our work with the Direct Action Center. Yazir has requested that we refrain from describing all of the work and sights we visited online so that others who come to work with them dont have a heads up about every little thing that will happen. So, out of respect for him I am not going to put it on here. If any of you are interested, you can email me (krjesse@u.washington.edu) and I can write back any answers or a personal description. All in all, it was a great experience, and I would say we all learned a ton and had good fun at it.

Thursday we got a day off to reflect and relax after our work with DACPM. Then that night we had a pizza party at one of our prof's (Ron) house. I think our group tore through 9 or 10 pizzas and an entire fridge full of beer and wine. Thats what happens when you have college students over! It was really fun, and the house that Ron is staying in is owned by a lady with a couple of dogs. A few of the girls and I went and petted and played with the dogs. I miss Louisa so much! (Although,if she were here she would not be able to deal with the heat at all!)

Friday we had class in one of the local restaurant/cafes. It was a good discussion and debrief time. After that we all rested a little bit, and then went out to downtown on Friday night. We went to a few of the nightclubs that I remember from last time, and had an awesome time. (Pictures to come soon)

Saturday we relaxed after the crazy week. It was generally a pretty chill day. And then Sunday, we got ready and left the house at 830 to go river tubing. We drove about 1 1/2 hours outside of cape town. We all were in lovely little wetsuits, helmets and life jackets (be happy mom!), booties, and gloves that turned our hands into little flipper things. It was generally an awesome time, although I'm a little sore today! I didnt realize how much of a workout it was.

Today we went and toured the University of Cape Town and some of their historic sights and monuments. We had good discussions about Rhodes and why he is all over Cape Town. He is quite a controversial figure. Next to one of the statues of him on campus theres a plaque thing that makes a little bit of mention about the controversy surrounding him, but then it says that the University wouldnt be there without the land he donated. My question is, how do you donate land that wasn't yours to begin with?! (Look up the history of Cecil Rhodes if you dont know what I'm alluding to.) We also hiked up part of the mountain to the Rhodes memorial that looks out across cape town. Great walk, but it is hot as hell today which makes it really really rough! I think it was supposed to be like 90 degrees today, but it felt like more than that!

Additionally, the rolling blackouts have started today. Cape town does not have enough power stations for how many people live here, so pretty much theres rolling blackouts every summer while they maintain all of the ones here. They are working on building more power stations, but its going to be about 5 years until they catch up to how much power is needed in the Western Cape.

Today is also Suzanne's birthday! (yay!) So we have reservations at the mexican restaurant in our neighborhood for the whole house. We already raided the bottle store (liquor store) for tonight as well. I cannot wait for a nice cold margarita with some rice and beans on such a warm day! I think we are going out within the neighborhood tonight as well. We convinced our professor to move class until tomorrow afternoon because the birthday girl might not be in good condition tomorrow morning :)

With that, I'm off! It is way to freakin warm to be sitting with a computer in my lap right now!

First Day of Classes

This will be a brief post because its 7 am here and I have to get ready for class soon... Yesterday was our first day of classes. We are doing our first three days with the Direct Action Center for Peace and Memory (http://www.dacpm.org.za/). Its an organization founded by a former member of the Umkhonto We Sizwe- the military wing of the African National Congress.

The main guy, Yazir, is freakin intense as hell. The last time I was here we spent a day with him, and all I remember from then was everyone crying and being questioned. He's quite good at making everyone uncomfortable. It was honestly not an enjoyable experience for me before, so I was kind of dreading these first few days. However, I went in with an open mind this time....so I'm doing slightly better. Its still really hard not to have strong emotional reactions to everything that is going on around us.

We spent yesterday doing introductions, and then touring around the main core of the city and the original peripheries. Today we are doing the tour of rememberance, which is journeys around the city and to the townships to visit sights where people lost their lives in the peace struggle. I'm bringing tissues again...

Anyway, I'm off to go shower and get ready for the day!

P.S. Dad and Lillian: the first aid kit/medicine kit thing that you guys gave me is making me quite a popular girl around here....

28 hours...and I'm finally here!

January 6, 2008
My journey to Cape Town:

Flight #1: Sea-Tac to Dulles (DC)

So I took off Friday morning at 745 AM from Sea-Tac for a flight to DC. The good news: the flight wasnt full so I got a whole row to myself. The Bad news: it was so turbulent the entire time that they literally never turned of the fasten seat belt sign. Did I mention I get motion sick?! Good think I was exhaused and took lorazapam, so I managed to sleep through most of it.

Flight #2: Dulles to Johannesburg

Layover in DC was uneventful- I took another lorazapam and then read a few chapters in my book. Upon boarding, I realized that I forgot how big planes can be. I was in row 63, and there was definitely at least 30 or 40 more rows behind me. Unfortunitely, the plan was full- and not just full FULL OF CHILDREN. The next 17 hours were spent alternately watching movies, wanting to throw babies overboard, and sleeping while I could. I did manage to watch 5 movies on the plane: Ratatouille, Transformers, No Reservations, The Ex, and something else that for the life of me I cant remember the name of. I took my contacts out on the plane (yay me!) but somehow during the course of the flight woke up with pink eye. (Exciting picture to come: I promise!) The man I was sitting next to was quite kind, and helped me manouver my luggage after we got of the plane and did customs. Just listening to most of the white people waiting for their luggage in Johannesburg was a little disgusting though. Few random quotes: "Make sure to open your stuff up here, you know how these people are with their sticky fingers" "Honey, pick up one of those forms for stolen items, just in case we notice our things are missing when we get home" etc. etc. The opposite of the plane happened to- all the big Afrikaaner guys pushed me out of the way and then wouldn't help me lift up my bags. I kinda forgot how sexist the South African culture was too....its all coming back to me.

Flight #3: Joberg to Cape Town

So, by the time I'm out of customs in Joberg, I'm about 25 hours into my journey here. And just because the world loves me so much, in Joberg after customs if you are continuing on you have to physically walk all your luggage over to the terminal and wait in line, and re-check it, and get new boarding cards, go through security again. So I pushed my heavy little cart about a mile (ok, maybe it was more like 1/2 a mile...but it was long!) to the domestic terminal and went through all of that again. Then, I just headed straight for my gate and waited for the Cape Town flight. For those of you wondering what someone looks like 26 hours into their journey with pink eye, here ya go:

gorgeous, huh?! Anyway, got on my flight to Cape Town and met a wonderful couple from here whom I chatted with most of the flight. Arrived in CPT, picked up luggage, and low and behold there's no one to pick me up from the airport. I waited about 15 mins (Moss is known for running late) before I lost my patience and just grabbed a cab. Good thing I know where I'm goin around here!

So I settled in last night. Rebecca got us our awesome room:

with our aweseme private bathroom:

...and I devoured my first piece of lemon meringue pie already:

Now its off to start my day! I think i'm going to wander around the neighborhood and see whats changed, and then I think Rebecca and I are going to go shopping, and pick up a few things we forgot. Its a rainy day today (so rare for Cape Town this time if year!!!) so it'll be a good one to stay in doors and rest up. Classes start tomorrow at 8am!