My Life is Plagued with Fire

As I returned home from a lovely night of sokkie last friday, or should I say early Saturday morning, I found myself having the following conversation with the friend who was dropping me off...

Me: Ummm What’s that large orange glow?
Friend: Fire.
M: That’s awfully close to my flat, isn’t it?
F: Yup.
M: Damn I was really looking forward to going to sleep
F: Yup.
M: I’m not going to be able to do that now, am I?
F: Nope.
M: oh kak

As she dropped me off I observed a group of students from the building next door shooting a stream of water from what can best be described as a garden hose onto the trash can and tree on fire in front of my building. Watching this measley amount of water evaporate before it even hit the fire were the cops and paramedics...the fire department no where to be seen. This went on for about 15 minutes and just as the garden hose was starting to melt from the heat, our heroes in red decided to pitch up and put the fire out in a good 30 seconds. Oh will the adventure never cease.

Then Saturday and Sunday we went to SonA's house to have a braai, make breakfast on a waterfall and attempt to play tennis and pseudo-jenga.

Last night was EB's last night in Stellenbosch, so we decided to be as lame as possible. We went to a local pub because there was free food. Then we proceded to half sleep on the couch while watching month old horse jumping for much too long until we got so fed up with it we just left and went to bed. In case you care, Eric Lamaze (the Canadian show jumper) came second! Woot woot!

The rest of this week was spent avoiding the planning of my trip to Namibia with EB and his two American friends. Despite our best efforts at not planning this trip, it has somehow worked out and we are leaving in (theoretically) an hour. I'll let you know how that all went when I get back!

Friday Night and the Lights are Low

The last two weeks of my life have been utterly consumed by ballroom dance. Last weekend we had “dance bootcamp”. This consisted of being trapped in a hall away from Stellenbosch with no form of escape due to the sketchiness of the neighbourhood, while being yelled at to “Stop and do 20 cha chas!” I exaggerate only slightly…

Then this weekend was intervarsity…yes, they have intervarsity for dance. Now, let’s not start up the argument of whether or not dancing is a sport. They have intervarsity for wine tasting too, so they’re obviously not that picky here…

“hmmm this Pinotage has a hint of black current”
“No it doesn’t! That’s red current! You fail!*”
“Ok, but this Chenin Blanc definitely has a hint of gasoline with just a touch of burnt rubber”
“Full points!”

But I digress… Intervarsity went very well. Stellenbosch came second overall and we won the spirit cup, which we’ve won every year since we bought it (except last year, but the University of Cape Town stole it, the jerks!). I personally wasn’t incredibly involved in this impressive second place, but my dance partner and I did better than I thought we would. This is not saying much as I thought we’d be kicked out after Round 1, but we made it to quarter finals, which, as my English co-worker so kindly pointed out, makes us mildly better than average :-)

I can’t believe that for all the clubs I joined and didn’t get involved in for the four years of my university career, it took traveling to the other side of the world for me to actually get involved. But I guess that IS what it takes. You have be all alone in a country, miles from home without your safe group of friends in order to *shock and horror* move out of your social circle.

The only problem with getting involved in a club on the other side of the world is that you eventually have to return to your original hemisphere. That’s kind of the stage I’m at now. Since intervarsity is over, everyone’s planning for next year’s intervarsity. They’re all picking partners for formation (where you all dance together as a group), but (although I would love to try it) I won’t be here (it doesn’t help that practice is on trivia night either) (ok, that’s enough parentheses for one sentence). I mean I would even consider joining the committee next year if I was going to be here. And joining the committee would involve commiting myself to doing regular voluntary work; that’s how much I enjoy being part of the dance society. But alas, that is life…

Time Management

Last week, my officemate (the South African one, not the Belgian one who is back in Belgium now) and I decided that we were going to language swap. She would teach me Afrikaans and, in return, I would teach her French. A much better swap for me as my French is rustier than my bike! Anyway, we had just taught each other the months of the year, so I decided that I should multitask and instead of just wasting time walking places, I would practice my Afrikaans while doing so. There I was, briskly walking to one of my many very important meetings and in what I thought was an ingenious form of time management, practicing my months. “Januarie, Februarie, Maart, April, Mai…” I had just reached Julie, when all of a sudden the man walking towards me shoots me a weird look and furtively crosses to the other side of the street, mid-block, almost getting hit by a surprised driver in the process. Some people just have no consideration for the safety of others! I’m sure wherever he was in a hurry to be could have waited until there was a safe place to cross...

Fair of Face

My dear friend, who I have been so thoughtfully refereing to as Prego for the last couple enteries...is no longer. This is not to say she has departed this life for a better one among the heavens. It is simply that calling her Prego is officially a scientific inaccuracy. The parasite that for so long resided within her loins has chosen to depart and consume air and nutrients of its own accord. Thus I would like to welcome a new little Monday's child to our midst.

Welkom, liefie!

Oh boy!

I wasn’t going to update today, but I fear what the update will look like after the weekend, so I’m biting the bullet as they say.

I can’t believe I left it this long, but two weeks ago I spent the majority of the week planning for my friend’s baby shower. It was all very domestic as another friend and I spent the whole week baking cupcakes and cookies for the aforementioned English tea themed baby shower. The shower itself was on Saturday, July 11th. It was so much fun to meet all of Prego’s friends and play silly baby shower games. On a related note, store bought baby food is pretty disgusting and I vow to make any future children I may have homemade baby food…aka my dinner in a blender.

I don’t remember much of what I did the week after the baby shower because I’m lazy and it’s been so so long since I updated this. The weekend after that though, I went to SonB’s house for a braai and then we all went out on the town on Friday. EB has been doing field work, so he was able to use the van they rented for that purpose for his own desires on the weekend. So, on Saturday we went to explore Franschoek. Apparently there was not much to explore, besides chocolate tasting at a Belgian chocolate factory and even that was done for the day. But it was fun to drive around and we went wine tasting at Solms Delta. Then on Sunday I went to the aquarium with the same work friend I planned the baby shower with, her sister and little nephew. We watched the sharks being fed and laughed as her nephew alternated between asking where we were going and telling my friend to go faster.

Classes started up again on the 20th, so overnight Stellies went from completely deserted to much too overpopulated. This also meant that my new roommate moved back from being home for the winter holidays. I got to meet a bunch of his friends and went out with them to facilitate roommate bonding. They seem nice enough, but maybe not the kind of people I would normally hang out with. Then last weekend I had my medal test, which I already told you about and am still smiling when I think of. Sunday I just hung out with friends and went to see The Hangover, which is hilarious and I highly recommend it…for the strong of stomach at least. Overall a pretty chill weekend.

This week everything started back up. It was the first trivia night I went to in a while. I think my team is a little rusty. We started off well, but got progressively worse as the night went on. Next time though…I’m thinking we’ll win something! Then on Wednesday, I went sparkling wine and nougat tasting at JC le Roux (is it just me or does that sound like a stripper name?), which was so very delicious! Then we went to Prego (who is going to hate me calling her this)’s house for dinner and watched a movie. Finally, Tuesday was EB’s birthday, but since he just got back to the field yesterday, we went out for 363 days early birthday party, which was lovely.

The End!

Blue Suade Sneakers

I didn’t fail!!!!! I had my medal test for dance today. The medal test, if you don’t remember, is where you dance in front of judges and they determine what level you dance at and give you a certificate accordingly. I did the Social 1 level, which means I danced rhythm foxtrot, cha cha and boogie. As most of you know I don’t have a partner for dance and spend much of the time dancing with my invisible partner, Ramone. Unfortunately, if you want to do intervarsity (compete against other schools), you need a partner. As I wish to do this, I’ve been trying to get a partner for a while, to no avail. But today, in addition to not failing, I got a partner to not fail with! He is lovely and shall be referred to from this point on as DP (dance partner…how original). [Side note: please let me know if these acronyms are useful or just irritating] Despite only having about 20 minutes to get used to dancing with each other, we both got a "highly commendable" on our little report cards. That is we scored one below "honours", which is the highest you can score. I’m thinking that once we get used to each other we may not fail at intervarsity as well :-)

I’ll update the rest of my past two weeks a bit later on, but I just wanted to share the happy news with you all! Now I must get read to watch the rugby and go to the Robbie Wessels concert tonight. Ciao for now!

Home Sweet New Home

Remember when I said that I was about to run out of electricity any day. Well I haven’t yet. You’d be surprised how little electricity you use when you’re only at home to sleep…well maybe you wouldn’t. Anyway after knocking on the doors of various neighbours to no avail, I finally found someone to help me. And by help me I mean she asked me if I had a card and when I said no, she came over and showed me that I did and it was right in front of me. Sometimes you just need other people to point out your idiocy, you know, just for fun. But long story short: now I have electricity and the ability to get even more if necessary!

I finally went back to the residence I was staying in for the first half of my SA experience to get my back. As I was riding it back to my new flat, it seemed strangely hard to ride. Following a random hunch I stood up on the bike and jumped up and down. Yup, both tires were extremely flat. Well, I suppose that’s what happens when a bike doesn’t get ridden for 5 months plus. So my mission for today is to re-inflate tires and get oil in an attempt to de-rust the now completely rusted chain. I kinda feel bad. It’s like looking at your child all grown up and realizing the effects of accumulated neglect over the years.