My arrival
I’m here!! Been here a week already!
My arrival here was a classical one. Therefore I’d like to describe it.
We arrived at the airport at 8 in the morning. Some students welcomed us straight away and put us on a bus that took us to the university. The drive took us through the city. We passed gorgeous landscape, great buildings and billboards of the upcoming world cup in 2010. The traffic went smoothly, the sun was shining and the city seemed flawless. Suddenly Eline said “ oh, look at that!” and we turned around and could suddenly see what seemed like thousands of sheds behind the highway fence. A huge slum area visualized itself on the left while on the right hand side of the road the houses looked like those you have to pay 3 millions NOK for back home. The obvious contrast made me feel a bitter aftertaste of the excitement I just had felt. My heart sank and then I felt stupid; of course it is like this! I had known it but just forgotten about it in a few seconds of excitement. But my new discovery of this made me think of how sad this situation in a society really is. Later I learned that the correct term for these slums is Informal settlements. I’ll write more about this in later blog essays.
My new neighborhood
I feel like a true writer here I sit in my new room in a house that is unnecessary nice for a bunch of students (we have a pool in the garden!). My desk is right in front of a window. I live on the 1st floor (2nd in Norwegian) and I have a good view of our drive in. A couple of tipsy party guests yesterday described my room as a prison cell from a Shakespeare novel (...) It has windows with lattice (for obvious security reasons) covering 3 walls. It has purple floor carpet (no, I didn't spill red wine over it, it has that color) and a nice old fashion bed. The roof is not so high (fine by me) and a all in all the room has very cozy feeling.
The neighborhood is called Rondebosch and seems very pleasant. That is before you have a talk with the police. “Never walk alone, no matter which time of the day!” is their unmistakable message. Help!! I’ve never lived in a dangerous city before. I guess they try to scare us because you can never be too careful. But it takes sometime to get used to always looking over your shoulder but at the same time look like you’re not scared, but a confidant local.
Today I was having a drink with two people from the “ghetto” as they expressed it themselves (meaning black townships outside the city) and one of them is a graffiti artist. He almost choked on his cola when I told him that we were told by the police to never walk alone in this neighborhood. To them this area is like coming to a quiet place full of trees. I guess you can compare it to what we Norwegian feel when we walk around in Frogner in Oslo. So maybe I don’t need to be so scared.
The best Sunday ever
Let me tell you about my great great first Sunday here. The South African’s way of emphasize something is to repeat the word. So “great great” means “really great”. Cool, eh? I can get used to that. So on Sunday we went on a bus tour with approx. 500 other foreign exchange students around the peninsula south for Cape Town around Cape of good hope. We stopped to have lunch in a township called Ocean View were 25 000 black people who were relocated in the 60s lives. Ocean View has become a ghetto full of problems. It’s not a hard to understand why; Imagine newly made homeless people, all with different backgrounds squeezed into a new place to live. The term relocated is the political correct term, but it’s really more like the military term “moved with force”. If you’re interested in reading more about the moving of black people to make room for white people in South Africa I advice you to read
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/District_Six,_Cape_Town It’s about the most famous district in Cape Town. But keep in mind: In Cape Town alone this happened in 42 districts!
The houses in Ocean View reminded me of "the project" you see in the TV series "the wire". It is full of drug abuse and crime. But we got to meet a man, who I first thought was a woman, who has worked with local kids for over 20 years. He is teaching them how to sing, dance and act. His pupils preformed for us in a gymnastic hall at the local school. We got to watch astonishing, neck breaking hip hop dancing.
I gotta buy a CD.
The "Ich hasse Berlin" syndrome
This is a big change of topic. Nuvel.
A big worry for me personally when I am here is all the organizing. Registration at the university is a fascinating long process. But the professors here are making us look at it on the bright side. Instead of just deciding which course to take by simple online clicking, we have to use our legs, walk to the different professor’s offices and get their signature for “yes, you can attend my class”. Does this seem unnecessary? Yes, definitely, but as they point out here; it makes it more personal and down-to-earth-like! (…) I’m sure this is a very good argument, but when you try to squeeze all this into your timetable between the English test, the welcoming workshops etc. you feel like they don’t make it easy for you. I’d like to call this “Ich hasse Berlin” syndrome. Siri, if you are reading this, you know what I’m talking about. Siri and I love Berlin, but during a cold January morning in Berlin a couple of years back we found ourselves in a situation where all things seemed to be against our well-being. And so, to make us feel better about this we started to say “ich hasse Berlin!” just to get our frustration out. Hasse means hate in German and nothing’s like expressing anger in German, it makes you feel much better! Works every time. So my point is; even a city that you love love, like Cape Town in my case, can make you wanna tear your hair out and scratch all your face pimples out and just kick a light pole.
The many opportunities
But I cannot complain about the paper mill and all the things I need to organize. According to the professors we get a special treatment compared to the 21 000 other African students at the university. They have to stand in queues for like days… and again I get reminded how lucky I am. I get to be here, live and experience this great city (did I mention they serve huge glasses of excellent red wine in bars for 20 NOK?) and study whatever I like in one of the best university in Africa. I am thrilled and terrified.
Big big hug to whoever reads this.
PS: If you want to know more and see some pictures I encourage you to have a look at Ingrid's blog (she has a much better camera than me). You'll find the link in the column to the right on this page.
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