My Time in Nam

It may have occurred to you that I am doing everything in my power to avoid writing in this blog. You see this is what happens when I leave it too long; I feel there’s a ton to write about and then when I reread what I’ve written it bores me because I’m just listing off things that I’ve done. However the only way to get past this is to get it over with, so I can go back to the fun blogs where I meet strangers in book stores et cetera. So here goes…

Namibia was fantastic, but as one of the least densely populated countries in the world there was a hell of a lot of driving in between all the fantastic. We left on Friday afternoon and drove through the night, so we could start our Fish River Canyon hike the next morning. Driving through the night meant we arrived at the SA/Namibia border at 3am. Everything was going fine until we got to the customs office to find everyone asleep. Now granted, it was 3 in the morning and maybe I’m being too “North American”, but I would expect that border control would at the very least be awake to do their job. Not only that, but when the polite tourists wake you up because they wish to uphold the laws of your country (laws that you are put in place to enforce), you wouldn’t give them the same look you give your mother when she wakes you up at 7am Monday morning to get ready for school.

Once through the border, we turn off the main road and onto a gravel one. At this point the only thing lighting our path is the high beams of our Citi Golf. Unfortunately this was not enough to reveal the massive pothole right in our path, resulting in a little surprise as the car is miraculously taken from its standard stance of four wheels on the road to a more precarious position of two wheels on the road and the other two momentarily leaving them to demonstrate a 45 degree angle to the various rock dassies passing by.

After arriving at Ai-Ais where we intended to leave the car before getting a ride to the start of the hike, we slept for 3 hours until morning and started the hike shortly there after. After taking a 5 km or so detour the minute we got down into the canyon because I was unable to print off a map before we left, we found some footsteps in the sand we assumed to be the trail and continued on…for the next three days. I’m not going to go into detail on this, but there was a lot of hiking, sand, heat and Germans.

Leaving the canyon, we spent the night in Keetmanshoop where we sadly left the Americans to wait for a bus that was 12 hours later than we thought after intimately witnessing an early morning brawl and sat in silence for an hour mourning their safety. The next day we went to Sossusvlei where they have some of the highest sand dunes in the world. They were really beautiful and we even got to climb up one of them, which EB rolled down while I filmed it running along beside him.

The next stop was Swakopmund, where I had originally intended to go sky diving and EB had intended to go dune boarding. Unfortunately we were so tired from driving all day and running up dunes that we just went for dinner then passed out and didn’t plan our adventures for the next day. This resulted in us only being able to walk around looking at markets and museums, which was still fun although less so than jumping out of a plan. And once again, we were on the road to Windhoek. I believe it was around this time that the cd player stopped working, having never been the same after the aforementioned surprise. From this point on we were forced to listen to Botswana radio when we could get reception or sit in silence.

After consulting with a friendly taxi driver we met at the backpacker’s, we learn that there really isn’t much to do in Windhoek. He’s main suggestion was to go look at a view of the city from behind the parliament buildings, but to be careful because tourists usually get robbed up there. Deciding it must be better than driving in circles around town, we head over only to be stopped by security and forced to look at a less spectacular view in front of the parliament buildings. At this point we decide to leave Windhoek and go to a reserve just outside of town, where we proceeded to chase and photograph giraffes before taking two days driving back to Stellenbosch.

May I just rant for a minute?

I received an email this morning from the forestry mailing list about a topic irrelevant to the telling of this story. About an hour later I receive another email from the forestry mailing list by some idiot who is asking to be taken of said mailing list. Annoying, but yes it happens and he can be forgiven. The thing that drives me up the wall is what happened next. Obviously unfamiliar with the concept of mailing lists or common sense, somebody else decides to join in the conversation by replying to the first idiot along with the entire faculty of forestry and asking why the first idiot emailed him with this request.

I mean honestly!

words to live by

I went out for lunch today in an attempt to slow my reading of Spud (by John van de Ruit). On my way home I decided to stop in at the bookstore and see if there was anything new and exciting in there. While I was browsing around this guy and his wife came in, only to reveal to me some of the best advice a stranger has given me...

Guy: opens some reference book on famous authors to F. Scott Fitzgerald's entry and a picture not unlike the one to follow, bursts out laughing and shows his wife before enlightening myself


Me: laughing That's fantastic! And to think he was the playboy of his time.

Guy: nodding knowingly Yea, never trust a guy with a center part.

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!