Garden Route!

Molweniiii everyone!

This past weekend I went on the Garden Route which is basically a road that goes across the bottom coastline of Africa. There are a million things to do on it so it was jam packed! It was about a 6 hour drive to Knysna, which was our first destination. There, we got to walk with elephants which was incredible! Here are pictures.

The next stop was in Plettenburg for the big attraction- Bungy Jumping!!! I can't believe I did it! It is the biggest bungy jump in the world, 216 meters. It was absolutely mindblowing and terrifying and I NEVER want to do it again, but I'm very glad to have done it. Here are pictures:

If you want to see a video, here is the link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gyU8fuwgJ2Q

After recovering from that, we went to the beach. It was stunning! And I got to put my feet in the Indian Ocean. Note the weird rainbow nail polish I have going on. That was from Rocking the Daisies, still haven't gotten around to taking that off.. oh well (I secretly like it). Here are pictures:

We cooked dinner that night at our hostel and got to bed early so we could get started early the next day. Here's the view from our hostile:

Our last stop was an Ostrich farm, which I've been wanting to go to this whole trip. It was absolutely hilarious. Ostriches are literally the stupidest animals ever, and every time I looked at them I cracked up. They just look so dumb. Anyway, here are pictures. We got to see them in each stage.

Cracking out of the egg:

Babies!

Adults:

Me being attacked by ostriches:

The best part by far, though, was riding the Ostriches. It was just ridiculous. I don't have pictures, but I do have videos. Too bad I can't post them....

We drove home a different route that was further inland, which means more mountains. Here is a picture of the road and mountains.

I think I will leave you with a picture of us on halloween... Happy Halloween!

Cliff Jumping and Chundering

Yooo readers!

Sorry it's been awhile since my last posting. And sorry to disappoint you again, but I didn't take any pictures at Rockin' the Daisies because one of my friend's camera got stolen and I didn't want to risk it. However, the festival was really fun, musicians from all over the world were there. It was kind of like Coachella, but more worldly and African. I'll see if I can get pictures from some of my friends to post so you can see the decorations and art and stuff.

As for my adventures recently, I've had a few. First I would like to share with you this event I went to called Trolly Races. Basically, a bunch of UCT students organize themselves in teams and use grocery carts to build "trollies." They then race down this very, very steep hill (which was littered with broken glass) wearing ridiculous costumes and acting rather drunk. It was pretty ridiculous. What I didn't know when we got there, but found out rather quickly, is that there is an added component to this: vomit. Or rather, "chunder," which is what South Africans call it. A big part of the competition, teams must vomit on each other and other team mates. They drink food coloring so as to have colorful vomit and "mark their territory." As a self-proclamed "vomit-a-phobe" this was pretty not fun and disgusting for me. Anyway, I didn't take pictures of the puke cause that's gross, but I did take pictures of people racing and my friend who participated as a member of the American team. Take a look.

Onto more important things.... This weekend a bunch of my friends and I went on an awesome hike to this place called crystal pools. Basically, there a bunch of beautiful "pools" with huge waterfalls and cliffs to jump off of. The mountains are right by the beach (only in South Africa), so we went down to the beach to explore first. Here are some pictures of the beach

Next we went on about an hour hike to the first pool, which is were I jumped. Here is a picture:

And THAT little dot in the picture below, about 1/4 of the way down from the top is ME! I still can't believe I jumped. It was about a 30 foot jump and most definitely the scariest thing I have ever experienced. It was totally safe (not to worry readers; ahem, mom), but still... there's something about jumping off of a 30 foot cliff into water that goes against every bodily instinct.

After recovering from my jump (which consisted of a lot of screaming and shaking), we got dressed and walked to the second pool. This one was much bigger and there was NO way I was going to jump again. A lot of my friends did jump though, despite the fact that they were advised not to.

Instead of jumping, a bunch of us just swam around the pool, went to the waterfall and goofed around there, caught some rays and just enjoyed how beautiful it was. I even found some wild lilies, which I don't think I've seen in the wild before, but have decided they are my favorite flower. Here is a picture:

That's all I have for you now. It is officially the last week of classes here which is so weird! I still have about a month here, but it's surreal that it's almost coming to an end. We have a break after classes until finals start and I will be traveling to Namibia so check back later for cool updates.

Tosiens (bye in Africaans),

Julia

Lion's Head, Clifton, and CHOSA kids!

Molweni readers!

I guess it's sort of been awhile since my last post, sorry about that. Not too much has been going on over here, but we have some fun big plans for the weekend. We're going to a music festival called Rockin' The Daisies, so keep an eye out for a post soon. This weekend was one of the best so far! The weather is all of a sudden taking a turn for the best... it's been STUNNING in Cape Town. I took advantage of this by going to climb Lion's Head on Friday afternoon. Here are some pictures from the view up top:

On the way up..

From the top....

We stayed until just about sunset and then headed back. We saw someone paragliding right near the mountain and it was INCREDIBLE looking. Don't worry parents, I have no plans to do that (yet). After our climb we got some delicious milkshakes at this cute place called Mr. Pickwicks that is famous for them... they were yummy. We spent the rest of the weekend at the beach. Instead of Muizenburg, the beach we have been going to, we decided to explore Camps Bay and went to Clifton Beach. This area is probably my favorite of Cape Town so far... to the point that I can almost see myself living there. There are super cute restaurants with amazing sunset views, fantastic beaches, and a great feeling all together. Here are pictures from the beach/Camps Bay area.

We swam in the water, which was bone-chillingly cold, and climbed some rocks and some people even did some rock jumping. Being out in the sun all day, naturally we got a little bit toasted at the beach this weekend, and to soothe our pain we got drinks at this place called The Grand and watched the sunset. Unfortunately, I forgot my camera but I will try to get you all a picture at some point from one of my friends.

And finally, I will post some pictures of the kids from CHOSA. I'm going to skip out on names and details, but if you're interested in some stories about the kids let me know.

Here are a bunch of pictures of the little kids, the ones who are not in my class but end up flocking to me for entertainment before class begins.

This is a picture of my class, busy at work with some poetry collaging:

Here are pictures of the property itself and kids flocking all over the place. The babies are all kept in a separate room, that's why they are behind bars.

Our project is to come up with a way of educationally and productively engaging our groups of kids. Me and my co-teacher came up with the idea to make a magazine. We've been teaching our kids how to write poetry, short stories, comic strips, draw self portraits, family crests, etc and are about to start compiling them. I will bring back plenty for you all to see! That's all I have for you now, I'm currently at a coffee shop on Long Street called Mugged (clever, huh?), doing some Dickens reading (On p. 168 of 800...). Keep a lookout for updates next week.

Byyyyee,

Julia