juice factory? juice factory!

first of all, i would just like to point out that this is the view from my window circa 6:30 a.m. on day one in cape town.

unsuccessfully tried to open bank accounts (which still hasn't happened) and then ended up at cavendish mall in claremont where we aimlessly stood and walked around and then got lunch.day one: i woke up mad early, which explains why that picture is from 6:30 a.m. and cleaned and unpacked until we had house meetings and orientation stuff. we went to shoprite to get stuff for our apartments and then later that night went to a braai (afrikaans for barbecue, byob and byof, so consequently i had a bottle of wine for dinner, oops?) for this girl alex's 21st birthday, followed by a disastrously long walk to observatory, which is a neighborhood with a ton of bars and restaurants that is IMPOSSIBLE to get to in general and especially when drunk and ESPECIALLY when no one who's there knows how they got there. anyways, we went to armchair and saw a local cape town band play accompanied by too many tequila shots and then eventually took a cab home, only to discover that two of us (me included) were locked out of our apartments due to various reasons, i.e. my roommate deadbolted our door because she thought i was already home. so that was pretty sweet, and in my drunkenness i forgot that deadbolts are designed to prevent someone from reaching in and undoing them, so naturally i spent about ten minutes attempting that before deciding to find somewhere else to crash.

day two: woke up at like 8, walked home, had about two seconds to shower and get ready before walking to the uct campus for more orientation stuff re: class registration, internet, traveling, blah blah blah. wasn't hungover but was EXHAUSTED, luckily the HIV/AIDS discussion was cancelled so i didn't have to contend with that on top of no sleep and no food. finished orientation, went on a tour of uct (lower campus, middle campus, upper campus, confusing as shit, i have no idea where i'm going) and then went to another braai (apparently they love them here) before shoprite round two. picture = the uct campus.

one of the interstudy people (agith or jeff, i forget) got us all on the guest list for this crazy club on the 31st floor of the ABSA (big bank in south africa) building so we took cabs there, but christine, sophie, fran, evan, bart, matt, my new roommate brittany and i decided to bail and went to an awesome kurdish restaurant/hookah bar on long street called mesopotamia where we ended up staying for like three hours. then we went to a bar called stones with a balcony and a bunch of pool tables and hung out for a little before going home, where i proceeded to CRASH and sleep more deeply than i think ever before in my life.

pictures: the indian ocean (left) and houses on the foothills in kalk bay (right).


sophie called me at 10 the next morning and woke me up to go to the beach. we attempted to go to go to the bank again and failed miserably, then got on the train to muizenberg. jumped off of our moving train at the muizenberg stop before they stopped it and yelled at us with megaphones, then got to the beach where it was hella windy. we ended up walking like two miles along the beach/railroad tracks until we got to st. james beach in table mountain national park in kalk bay which is absolutely beautiful. we're going to clifton 4 today, apparently one of the best beaches in cape town and since i'm half dressed and my beach towel blew away off of our balcony (side note: cape town is HELLA WINDY all the time) i have to go. p.s. i am so sunburned. stupid.