hard work

It seems from my blog that I've been spending way more time frolicking in the summer sun than writing my dissertation. However, that is not true, I've been working very hard on my thesis, it just so happens that photos of the beach are in higher demand than photos of me in the library typing on my laptop. That said, here are more photos of sun fun!: 

Bongani at his humble home in Newlands. 

The next several pics were taken by a friend of ours, Thaheer Mullins, who happened to have his camera on him when we discovered a trampoline at a pool party in Hout Bay - such rad photos.  
The background is absolutely magical.
Once a cheerleader always a cheerleader, I guess. This is my friend Karen. I met her at the beginning of this year when we took Public Culture in Africa together. Her work revolves around issues of public memory. More specifically, how public spaces like memorials and museums remember past events. 15 years out of Apartheid, South Africa is obsessed with questions of how to appropriately remember a painful yet complex history. Karen's work will be in high demand in the memory industry. She moved to Jo'burg last week and I was fortunate enough to spend quality time with her before she left. She's good peoples. 

Nava at the pool party. 

We also found baby goats! SO sweet and good for Bongani's image. 
A colleague of ours in the African Studies department is housesitting in Seapoint and invited us over for a dip in the awesome pool. 

Now, back to work! I have a first draft completed and am currently working on revisions. The final work is due January 29th!

yet another beach tale

My friend Sakina is a native Captonian and indulged us in one of her favorite pastimes with a Sunday trip to Boulder Beach (below). 

Boulder Beach is made special not only by the giant boulders that break up the beach and give it character, but also by these little guys: African Penguins. 



Boulder is on the warm Indian Ocean. I was thinking, this is probably the first time in more than a decade that I've gone swimming in the ocean. 

As Nava took this picture, I remember thinking, "I'm never leaving South Africa"... but alas, it's almost time to book that ticket home. 

Ballot's Bay

In November Tabitha graciously invited a group of us to Ballot's Bay (5 hours east of Cape Town on the coast) to spend the weekend at her father's vacation home. He is an architect who designed this home, which sits on a private nature reserve on the coast. We drove up Friday and were meant to leave Tuesday but Tabitha's car blew a gasket and we were 'stuck' there for a whole week. I use the word 'stuck' loosely because this place was magnificently beautiful and we were all too happy to stay awhile longer (albeit we did have to ration food because we were miles from town without a car). 

Within half a mile of our destination, we had to stop to let the car cool down (this was before we realized it had a serious problem). Check out the horses though! There was also a beautiful peacock that I captured with my polaroid - I wish I had a scanner. 

The house we stayed in is on the right. The house to the left of us was vacant for the week - almost completely secluded. 

View from the deck.

Nava, Tabitha and Sakina on the deck.

Searching for cell phone service and jumping around to avoid the vicious fire ants!

Allow me to explain my outfit: we went on a nature walk and some of nature's most annoying creatures would not leave us alone. I had to take off my shirt and wrap it around my head so that the bugs would stop flying into my ears. Also, I needed to tuck my pants inside my socks Girl Scouts-style to keep the tics out. It is a miracle that none of us came back with tics because they were on just about every blade of grass; I have never seen so many in my entire life. On a positive note, look at this giant tortoise! We also saw dolphins, zebras and ostriches! 

Our last dinner with the little supplies we had left: cheese, potatoes, and lentils - vegetarian shepherd's pie. Because of the date, this meal was also effectively my Thanksgiving dinner. 

November throw back

notice the make-up and sparkly Dawson's Creek tank top.




Tabs, Nava and I attended a 90's themed party on the last Saturday of November. We were instructed to come dressed in 90's attire - whatever that meant to us. It was fun to swap memories of what it was like "growing up" in the 90's. Even though we were from different continents, a lot of the music, clothing and hair styles were the same (The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air and Full House were a hit world wide). 

Tabitha's is dressed as Louise from Thelma and Louise. She went around all night with a gun made out of painted toilet paper rolls saying, "I'm gonna splatter your ugly face all over this nice car" - it was a hit with partygoers. 

My look is inspired by the gangster girl in school that you don't want to mess with. 

My Tutlings!

The semester is wrapping up! I finished my last courses and am officially done with 50% of my degree! The next three months will be devoted to my dissertation, then I will be home shortly after that.
My tutoring sessions also ended a couple of weeks ago. All of the undergrad students are now going into "final examinations" (thank goodness for Columbia College Chicago, I didn't take one exam). The photo above is my Friday tutorial of first-year engineering students. This particular group was my favorite. Even though the course was compulsory for them and most had not written a single essay in their University careers, they still cared about the course and for that I am very thankful for them.
The course I tutored for was called, "Africa: culture, identity and globalization"
We discussed a lot of issues including race, gender, ethnicity, culture, and politics as they related to contemporary African (mostly South African) societies. A lot of time, our discussions would lead to a critique of the neo-liberal economic policies of globalization that force many African countries to remain at the bottom of the proverbial "world dogpile".

I tutored two first year engineering student courses and one second year course filled with American study-abroad students. 

rife with racism

On Friday nights my roommate Tabitha and I - both white (this will be important later) usually head to a Tapas bar within walking distance from our apartment to unwind and talk about anything that isn't school work. Last night, we invited two of our friends to join us, Bongani and Patrick - both black. We were sitting at the table discussing films when Bongani asked us if we've heard of a new Hollywood-type film coming out about Thabo Mbeki (president of SA after Mandela). Bongani proceeds to tell us that he thinks the film looks pretty bad, etc. etc. 

This woman sitting alone at the next table turns around and introduces herself to Bongani as Mac Maharaj's niece. Maharaj was a major figure in the anti-apartheid struggle in South Africa. I blogged about him in June because Prexy was taking his student group to meet him. He's kind of a big deal not only because he spent time in Robben Island prison with other freedom fighters, but he also smuggled Mandela's autobiography off of the island. 

Back to the story... I'm thinking in my head, "this woman must know Bongani, or is hitting on him" , but it soon occurred to me that she was scolding him for talking "bad" about Mbeki to two white foreign girls (me and Tabitha , one foreign, one South African). What followed was a blur because once I realized what was happening, my heart started racing and my adrenaline surged (and you know how memory disappears with adrenaline). There were some words exchanged and she eventually got up and moved to another table. 

This drunk woman who is a family member of someone that myself and many other South Africans deeply respect called one of my closest friends "disgusting" for sitting at a table with me. As it turned out, what she thought she heard us say about Mbeki was just her introductory remark - her core issue was with the fact that two white girls were sitting with two black guys in what appeared to be a double date. She took our conversation out of context to suit her anguish which was more fundamentally about her views on race relations. 

To varying degrees, we're all racist, but someone who's willing to blatantly take it out on strangers suggests that not only does she have a lot of hate in her heart, but she probably also suffers from emotional trauma/issues. 

Last night's incident was the last piece in a puzzle of racism I've been witness to since arriving here 9 months ago. I have heard every "group" in the country make racially charged verbal perpetrations against each other (white, black, colored, Indian, etc.). This sort of injustice is not specific to South Africa but is rife in any highly racialized society; the United States and Brazil come to mind. I try to remain sensitive to the histories of people here, that this woman and her family suffered under the rule of a racist white regime during apartheid. I try to understand where the sickness comes from while at the same time working to manage my own anger in the face of ongoing hate. 

I'm not sure exactly what I wanted to say about this incident because I'm still having thoughts about it. Basically, no one is immune to racism and it's pathetic. 

Halloween in Cape Town

Halloween in Cape Town is almost a complete non-event. There are no spooky cobwebs in the shops or candy on the shelves. The only place that signifies the Halloween holiday is in the night life of the young people. The night of Halloween reminded me a lot of Chicago as there were groups of people dressed in costume on the streets surrounding the University ready to party - and this made me truly happy. 

Halloween falls right in the middle of final exams so it was a mission to find anyone to go out with me. Alas, I was able to convince Tabitha and her friend Sakina (below) to go with me to a house party, albeit only for an hour. These are our last-minute costumes: goth chic, Alice in Wonderland, and a peacock-ish costume. 

Baby Tiago!

This is a shout out to Steve's new nephew! Tiago was born Oct. 27 at 4:11 p.m. at Rush Hospital! He weighs 6 lbs, 13 oz, and is 20" long. Congratulations to Steve, his sister Nathaly and their family. I am excited to meet the new baby!

opening day: Beach Season 2009!

Camps Bay Beach on Thursday afternoon with my friend Hannah - nothing better! Let summer begin!

mountain view

This is the view from my office* at school

*it's a big office that I share with two other grad students

Not "Xhosa" with a "K"

South Africa has 11 official languages. English is the language spoken predominantly in professional and commercial settings, whites of Dutch decent and most colored populations (South African colored, not American “colored people”) generally speak Afrikaans, and Zulu is the predominant indigenous language. However, in the Western Cape province where I live in Cape Town, Xhosa is the predominant indigenous language and can be overheard quite a lot on a daily basis.

Xhosa is distinguishable by its clicks of which there are three (originally, there were five clicks but two were washed out through the processes of colonization – the dominance and control of colonization results in the mother tongue being stolen out of the mouths of the colonized). Some of the other “official” South African languages incorporate some amount of popping and clicking, but Nava is taking a Xhosa class at the moment and is teaching me, so it’s the one I know the most about. (on a side note, most African Studies PhD programs in the states require that their students know an indigenous African language so I’m scouting languages in preparation - kind of).

The first most difficult thing about Xhosa is actually learning how to say “Xhosa” correctly. The majority of non-Xhosa speaking people pronounce Xhosa the lazy way (the way I’ve been saying it for years), which is to say it like “Kho-sa”, however, most X’s in Xhosa are pronounced with a click as follows:

 X = sucking the side of the tongue to the side teeth and palate and pulling it away quickly

       “Xhosa”

 C = This click is produced by pressing the front of the tongue where the front palate and the front teeth meet and pulling away 

        “Cela” (to ask for)

 Q = sucking the front of the tongue to the front of the palate and pulling it away rapidly to produce a popping sound

          “Qala” (start)

the Law Ball and others

Because I loaded the pictures to blogspot incorrectly, this blog entry should actually be viewed from the bottom to the top (if you're interested in getting an accurate chronology of events).

Text I got from Tabs around 8pm: "Ppl r friendly i'm trying to be elegant very drunk"

"Elegant" was her mantra for the night and I think she pulled it off.

Tabs kept calling us her "moms" because we wouldn't let her get out the door before posing for pictures.

Because this is Tabitha's last year of law, her law class hosted a "law ball". Tabs is unconventional by every means of the word, so in this picture, Nava is using her Indian expertise to dress Tabs in this beautiful sari. The Sunday night before, Nava drew henna on my feet and Tab's hands to match her Indian look. 

Also, it must be mentioned that at one point Nava had forgotten a step in the sari application, so we referred to an episode of The Office called "Diwali" to refresh her memory. This may have been the only instance in my life when my favorite TV show has been of practical use :)

This is my friend Bongani, he's also in my masters program. 

UCT sponsored an Earth Week and on this night there was a bar offering half-price admission to patrons wearing green. We thought this green flower might work for him, but Bongani ultimately did not agree to wear this thing in public. He did however wear Nava's green bracelet and got in half-price. I should probably tell him that I have a blog, and that he's made an appearance...