That is hello (to more than one person) in the Xhosa language, which is one of my classes in school. You actually pronounce Xhosa like Cosa, but “C” has a click attached to it.
I am having the BEST time in South Africa. I am really surprised to say that I have barely been homesick the entire time I’ve been here. Maybe it’s because I’ve been super busy lately!
The other day my roommate Brenna (shown in the picture above) and I got to go to the beach for a bit and watch the sunset. The beach we went to is called Camps Bay. I think I have mentioned that beach before but basically its a very touristy beach and is incredibly beautiful.
The first place we went to is called the District 6 museum. I’ll go into some history about district 6, but if you don’t want to read about it feel free to keep scrolling down!
District 6 is the name of a former residential area in Cape Town where over 60,000 people were forcibly removed during the apartheid regime. During its prime, it was home to a tenth of Cape Town’s entire population and was home to former slaves, artisans, merchants and other immigrants. The government gave many reasons for the removal, but the biggest reason is they didn’t allow interracial interaction and wanted separation of the races. The houses were bulldozed and the only things lefts were places of worship. Today some of the land has been rebuilt, but much of the land still remains empty. This is a shame, because District 6 is in a prime location in Cape Town. It is in close distance to almost everything. So even though apartheid is abolished in South Africa, there is still tons of evidence of it.
The day after my roommate and I went to what is called Clifton beach after we had to do some registration things for school. Clifton is divided into 4 beaches and they all look pretty different and have different rules. We went to Clifton beach 4. We have also gone to Clifton beach 3 another day, so I’ll just include those pictures below here too. One of the days we watched a commercial being filmed on the beach, and another day we stayed or a benefit concert for lost children.
Friday I went to a concert called Ultra. It was a music festival for electronic music on an ostrich farm. I swear that’s probably the only time thousands of people would gather together on an ostrich farm. Ultra is a very well known festival that travels around the world. So, there is one in Miami too but I’m pretty proud to say I went to the one in South Africa.
Last week was pretty uneventful because school has started. School here is very different though. I have the same class every day just about and you have what’s known as “tuts” for every class in addition to lectures. My classes are also quite big. My sociology and astronomy class have probably around 300-400 people in them. So, overall, school has been the most shocking thing I’ve experienced so far while in South Africa.
We have had the opportunity to go to some bars during the week as well. One called friction and one called Boogie. Boogie is one of my favorite bars to go to here because they play all 90s music and so I know all the songs.
Last weekend was one of the best weekends I've had while I was here. Saturday in the morning we went to what is called Biscuit Mill. If you ever visit South Africa, it would be one of the places I would definitely recommend to go to. It is a market with amazing food, music, and shopping. The food is out of this world and they offer a lot of variety of it. I even bought a Africa necklace with a little heart around Cape Town <3. Then around 4, a bunch of people from my program and I got to go to a local township. Like the Langa township, this township is full of people who have little to nothing but have a strong community bond. We paired up and stayed at a "Mama's" house. My friend Abbie and I's Mama was Mama Titi. While there, I got to talk to her two daughters about their lives and how it was different from mine in America. They were the sweetest people I have ever had the chance to meet. They made us chicken (although I didn't eat it), potatoes, spinach, pop (like mashed up corn), and butternut squash.Traditionally they eat with their hands, so thats what they had us do for that meal. We ate everything with our hands and I felt like a little kid again. After that, we cleaned up and sat around and talked for a while. Unfortunately load shedding happened in the middle of the night. Load shedding is something that doesn't happen in America but happens frequently in Africa. It is when there is too many people compared to the amount of electricity available in the city, so at some points of the week you are left with no electricity to account for the thousands of other people that need it at that time. So, we since their entire house was dark we had to light candles. We danced a little and I read to the little girl who was trying to learn English. Finally, the lights came back on and we watched a movie and went to bed. The next day, we got up and went to their church. It was a two hour service that included a lot of singing and dancing. They talked to us in both Xhosa and in English. When we were finished at church, we went to Mozzolis. Mozzolis is what South Africans call a Braai. It is sort of like there version of a barbeque. You sit at a table and people just bring you a big bucket of meat and everyone digs in, however, being a vegetarian, I didn't eat any of it. It was super fun though!
Ubenemini emnandi! Sala kakuhle!
(Have a nice day! Stay well!)