so little time and so much to say

about to embark on my long journey home- and i do so wish i could stay longer. i read that africa gets into your blood like malaria and you can't get rid of it, you want to stay even though you'll always be an outsider and never understand it. i don't think i've pick up malaria (the g&t option was foiled as the only gin in africa is gordon's, and it's undrinkable...) since it was quite cold the skeeters were scarce.
quick highlights from safari & jo'berg:
saw the big 5, and sooo many more. i was a couple meters from a lioness.
our guide was named elvis. he was a good luck charm. he caught a bird that flew into our truck with his bare hands. this significantly impressed me.
bugs are big. really big.
chimps are cute when they are little (actually all forms of monkeys are cute when they are small)but grown ups are scary. one threw a rock at us. a big rock.
toured a township in joberg- soweto, where desmond tutu and nelson mandela live/d. took a walk and were immediately swarmed by children. all little boys. i love love love little boys.
i have yet to eat any african food. everything is italian when we eat out. how is this possible?

i have another list of what i've learned to post, but all my things are in a cage here at the 'ritz backpackers' (don't let the name fool you) so i will have to post when i return. something to look forward to, no?

back in cape town

after an early start we headed to franshoek, another wine town for a cellar tour of cabriere-famous for its sparkling wines and sabering of the bottles. sabering is essentially slicing off the cork & top portion of the glass with the back side of a saber. apparently i to can try this at home, using many assorted devices ( a coffee spoon, a butcher knife, another glass....really?! i'm considering an attempt at my birthday....) it was very informative, but certainly the best part was the sabering. krista held the bottle while he loped the top off ans it shot off like a rocket. we were then treated to our first of 5 glasses. at the other places we could sip and spit or pour out what we didn't want. here our only option was to finish the glass before you could refill with the next one. all this before noon. and before lunch. krista abstained, as designated/only driver on our trip...i encouraged at least one tiny sip a few times. certainly after the third i was beyond giggly. the bubbles really do go straight to my head. and its sooo delightful. i do have to admit the tour improved greatly by that point. only the finer things in life for me my friends. we bought two bottles of the blancs de blancs (@ 80 rand each, a little over ten dollars) which i am looking forward to uncorking tonight at our fancy pants hotel. quite the step up from last night.
a small tragedy i have to report- we hoped to make it back in time to visit the vintage stores today but both were very much closed. i am retuning with out having set foot in one. i will try not to dwell on this matter. it was a great loss, but on the positive it is helpful for the budget. but budgets be damned! also no spelling check here so bear with me.

wine country

we made it to stellenbosch. this is the worst hostel yet....loud, smoking, trance listening hippie employees. oy. i managed to sleep through the night. somehow.
we toured four?five? wineries today on a tour called 'vine hoppers' whose logo is a grasshopper. funny. our guide, his name is long forgotten-maybe toff? was great. i coached him into a head stand at one of the last wineries and that really cemented my desire to become a yoga teacher....he was a bit of a hippie. refused to wear shoes. i liked it. we visited the cheetahs. i rubbed the side/belly of one. i hate to say it but i was disappointed. too built up, too commercialized, just not there. yes, it was great, i'm glad i did it. but next time i'd go for the babies.
again the landscape is incredible. pictures will come when i return as there is no way to upload them here...another item for the things i've learned- winery farmers collect vintage jaguars. i could totally be a wine farmer- i've always wanted a 1970's jag- if i believed in adding to my carbon footprint that much. we have great shots from the farms-one with the cars. i am still eating like never before, and loving every minute.
also yesterday we stopped at the hot springs in 'waterbath burg' fan f-ing tastic. the highlight of the trip. 'manky' green water 46 degrees centigrade celsius...in the cold cold rain, greeted by a peacock, my life is amazing.

things i've learned in south africa

• the landscape looks like everywhere i've been and nowhere else i've ever seen. our drive from cape town to wilderness (or wildernis) established that, the drive from knysna to outdshoorn cemented that.
• baby ostriches are cuter than you could ever imagine. we saw a group being herded to the barn at the end of the day and they are very excitable. a few had a collision and fell down. we have it recorded. also the adults are bony to sit ontop of. which i did. a little boy (maybe 10?) and german, rode one and he was quite excited at first but as soon as they let it run he held on for dear life and cried out "ahhhh....maman! maman!" it was impossible for us not to laugh uncontrollably. also our guide's name was runsley titus.
• caves are the same in every country.
• kinder joy is like kinder surprise times 1000. the best candy ever. also american candy falls flat in any country comparison. here there is: cadbury chocolates, kinder (my fave), and these funny candy bars called 'p.s.' with messages like friends forever or you can make it. also fortune telling candy bars. every time we go i buy 5 candy treats.
• i eat much more past the international date line. it happened in paris, and really happened here. i have to have snacks all the time and i still eat full meals. likely three times what i eat back in ny.
• krista is a good left side of the road driver. i am a good navigator.
• it is hard to convert rand to dollar in my head.
• ostrich eggs have 25xs the cholesterol chicken eggs do. one egg feeds 12 people. it tastes lighter than a regular egg.
• wine is cheap.

tomorrow we leave for the wine country and stellenbosch. we plan to stop at a hot springs along the way to soothe our aching car traveled, not enough yoga bodies. and more incredible mountain passes along the way.

fly by the seat of your pants

this is how we have decided to experiecnce s.a. cape town was a bit of a whirlwind,we rented a car- krista is driver, i'm naviagator a switch from the norm) only one minor incident involving a hubcab and the curve... then off to the pennisula and table mountain reserve (cape of good hope!) stunning, haven't seen views so amazing since the carribean... but this was way better. someday i'll post pics. we stopped by for a brief penguin visit (terribly cute) and then spent the rest of the day driving to wilderness. that's the town. it took maybe 5-6 hrs, through the most incredible shifting scenery. i haven't found the words to describe it yet. but i will soon. we spent the night at a hostel in the mountains by the beach and awoke for a lovely breakfast (we eat the same thing every day, lovingly prepared by krista -oatmeal & fruit, i only have instant coffee here, sans the occasional latte break- the boys who work there are a trip, today they called me princess, i mean how did they know?!) we drove to knysa for a 4 hour adventure (more later) then on to outdshoorn- through more mountains, like i've never seen. i am very thrilled about this place. our hostel is lovely, there are however rolling brownouts that add to the adventure here and lots of wine (from woolworth's, where we do most grocery shopping....odd) help pass the dark moments. tomorrow we're off to the caves here and possibly petting cheetahs, maybe a waterfall, and ostrich farms. we're staying here another night and then off to stellenbosch for two nights instead of one.
we couldn't ask for better weather, or scenery, people have been divine as well.
this is brief but i have to dash. love to all. happy thanksgiving- i forget its this week, right?

cape town

i made it. 22 hours or so on a plane, 80% sleeping... i had to make a mad dash to catch my connection in jo-burg, and krista and i made a small scene with our excited hellos, but i am beyond delighted to be here. already i have consumed a few anti-malarial g&t's danced to a ska band in a club where i thought the floor would collapse,awoken to church bells, visited the waterfront, a craft/flea market, walked through the gardens where the museums & parliament are (as well as a small aviary...), taken a mini-bus, gone to table mountain,was brutally stung by sand on a windy beach and enjoyed 'sundowners' at cape bay while watching the sun go down in the company of my dearest friend. i am beyond thrilled.

next stop south africa!

i leave in a couple days...it's still very much a figment of my imagination at this point. it will be such a welcome departure from new york and its current routines, not to mention my absolute delight at spending two weeks with krista after a prolonged absence.
our planned itinerary:
nov 17 &18 - cape town
nov 19 &20- rent car, drive 5ish hours to knysa, stay at 'southern comfort western style horse ranch' (!)
nov 21- drive to dijembe (maybe?) and spend the night
nov 22- drive to outshoorn -- i look most forward to this place, its the home of the ostrich farms from the great feather boom of the late 1800's and subsequent crash in 1914. its very interesting (see link above...)
nov 23- drive to stellenbosch, home of many a winery.
nov 24- back in cape town, where we are staying in an 'art hotel' called daddy long legs in the 'protea' room (our first choice was the freshroom- we have a history of polka dot motel rooms, i'll try to put up a pic for reference)
nov 25- fly to johannesburg and on to kruger safari
nov 26-30 - safari @ kruger
nov 30- fly home
its going to be a doozy of a trip. can't wait.

what it's about

beauty. its all about beauty.

last night i was able to have the supreme pleasure of seeing sufjan steven's BQE at BAM. i had no set expectations really, wasn't too sure what exactly to expect, and wound up with my second best musical experience ever. i'm attempting to make that happen more in my life: no expectations. lately i've been learning it leads to greatness.



but last night. sigh. the man has a gift for making music. watching the movie, seeing this hideous roadway de-constructed visually and reconstructed bit by bit into something aesthetically pleasing, pulsating with this collective swell of music that was unmistakably sufjan. i sat there in this giant space completely full of people and i truly think every single one was at rapt attention. giving. maybe this is part of why it was so amazing? that much energy collectively presented to one thing- there's power in that, and love. it flowed and jerked and screeched and flowed again. there was pure noise. at those moments i considered the unusually high levels of dopamine that surely must have been coursing through my brain attempting to ascertain the pattern, decipher the musical language. (thank you radio lab)i caught a shot of my local hardware store in the midst of the clips. i wondered how long he's been filming these clips. how one shot of the dividing line in the road leads to a rhythm or a tempo perhaps. it makes a person want to create all over again and again. i want that music set to my life. and hula hoops that are lit like the tail/headlights- hilarious. i gotta work my hula-hooping skills.
i wanted it to last longer than it did, which is always a sign of success, and then lo and behold apres intermission was 'sufjan sings the hits'. ha ha score! how often does a performer play all the things you want to hear? i was shuddering with delight. his lyrics create lovely stories. the stories i love most- little bits of a day that somehow left a mark on you forever. i attach alot to songs, to periods and people in my life. i get to relive that memory when i hear a song- and there are certain performers that when heard live make it all the more real. its why music makes me ache so badly. its makes all your body give over to it, release things you tucked away.
its just pure beauty.