A Week of Firsts

This week I had my first class at UWC, first African rain storm, first Braai first weekend trip outside of Cape Town, and first wine tour! My first class Monday afternoon was a women's and gender studies class called gender and development. I am taking the class with quite a few other international students, a few of whom are girls in my program. We got dropped off at 1, and had just found the building and lecture room when class started an hour later. The campus is quite large--probably comparable to the University of Washington--and being from a relatively small school I found it extremely difficult to navigate, plus we had no map. Even without a map we found the room, but nothing could have prepared me for that hour of my life. The class was uncommonly rowdy and the students did not stop talking the entire time. They were not discouraged in the slightest by the professor, who spoke so quietly that we could barely hear her. Adding insult to injury was the male student who sat behind us and muttered homophobic comments under his breath during our conversation about alternative sexualities. From what I can tell our experience with that class was not typical of most UWC classes--it is possible that everyone was just excited to be back to school after break and couldn't contain their excitement. Though we didn't get too in depth into the course description, the course outline seems very interesting so I know I will gain something from the class academically. As for my fellow students, it has been a struggle to be acknowledged as anything more than a white American international student, but I am still optimistic that I'll be able to make friends here despite my experience at school this first week. Also, you have to bring your own toilet paper because they don't have any in the bathrooms...I learned that the hard way the first day so I'll be packing a roll in my backpack from now on.

On Friday we went to both of our required classes that we all take as a group. One is through the UWC master’s program, the Institute of Social Development. I am actually taking two classes through that program, one on Theories of Social Transformation and one on Leaders in Grassroots Organizations. Our second Friday class is Theology of Forgiveness, which I think will provide us with a platform for reflection on this whole experience, and some of the things our professor Chris touched on made me think a lot about my life and how me and many people I know tend to get so caught up in business. He stressed the importance of being, not just doing, because as he said we are after all human beings, not human doings. The pressure to be busy and productive can be overwhelming, and I think often turns into a sort of prideful competition in America. That concept is one I will be thinking more about in these upcoming weeks, and I hope to focus on fully being here and enjoying this experience to its full potential. Friday evening our house hosted a Braai (aka BBQ) as a sort of neighborhood block party. We invited some of our neighbors, our landlord, our program director and driver, and some of the friends we have made since we've been here. We cooked tons of different food, ranging from Kraft macaroni and cheese to a traditional South African meat called Boererwors, which wasn't nearly as traumatizing as the tripe. We had a blast eating and talking with the few people who actually showed up, and it felt very similar to a traditional American BBQ.

On Saturday a few other girls and I packed a backpack and took the 40 minute train ride to Stellenbosch, South Africa’s wine country. We booked a wine tour that started at 10:30am, took us to four different vineyards and one restaurant for lunch, and dropped us off at our hostel around 5pm. It was a lot of wine and a lot of fun. We started with Simonsig, the first SA vineyard to make champagne and to establish Stellenbosch as a tourist destination for wine routes. Then we headed to Fairview, where we also were able to do a short cheese tasting—YUM! After lunch, the last two vineyards were Dieu Donne and Boschendal. Each winery was great in its own right, but my favorite was Dieu Donne because it was located at the top of a hill and offered the most amazing view of the countryside. We were absolutely stunned by how beautiful the area was, since it was much more rural than Cape Town. I had no idea that such a different landscape existed such a short distance away from the house in Obz. Sunday we saw a little bit of the town of Stellenbosch, including a public botanical garden which was very relaxing after drinking pretty much all day on Saturday. Overall, the weekend was amazing. It was good to get out of Cape Town and explore a different part of South Africa, not to mention all the fun we had wining and dining (literally) our way through Stellenbosch.



The view outside of my favorite vineyard, Dieu Donne



My favorite wine at Fairview, called "Chakalaka"