Beauty Beyond Words

As you can all tell from the pictures (that my dear brother took the time to post for me), I have been busy exploring the beauty that Cape Town has to offer. Last week, I climbed Lionshead, which is a mountain peak that is part of the Table Mountain range, but that kind of sits off by itself. It was supposed to be a "light walk" up, but I don't consider having to use my hands to scramble up rock faces to be a light walk by any means. The view was incredible though - we were climbing as the sun was setting and there were some incredible views of paragliders against the backdrop of the sunset.

Friday was my first AIDS seminar and it made me cry, it was so amazing. It really made me realize the value of coming here to study something like that because the lectures are presented in a context that has a lot of emotional background to it. These people have lived and are living through a crisis and you can't replace that with what you may read in a textbook in a classroom in North America. For example, one of the "coloured" women in my class (they can't decide on the politically correct terms to use here), was a schoolgirl during the infamous Soweto school incident. We were learning about that incident as part of our South African history lecture here and she was able to tell us from a firsthand perspective what it was like to be a coloured girl and be pulled out of class by young white male soldiers and hosed down. Many of her friends were murdered during that time. As well, many "African South African" (again, a stupid attempt at PC terms here) women in my class experienced the horrors of apartheid and are experiencing the horrors of AIDS in their own communities. Therefore, there is an opportunity to learn about the AIDS crisis in South Africa in a more connected way by being here. It's amazing and it's inspiring and on Friday it brought me to tears cuz I could actually FEEL the problems of this country.

Last week I also visited an adult education centre in a poor township with the Rotary Club of Hout Bay. It was the age-old story of how one man with little resources but a lot of heart was able to inspire the creation of an entire adult education centre in a township that desperately needed it. Very cool.

On the weekend, my roommates were all at a conference, but I hung out with a Canadian guy for the day. We drove down the cape coast to the most southwesterly point in Africa, which is called Cape Point. We saw African penguins waddling around on the beach, we saw baboons run down a cliff face and attack people's cars, we saw ostriches, we saw gorgeous empty white sand beaches, we saw so much beauty. I have tried to show pictures, but they just don't do the place justice. Beauty is all around here and people need to come here to understand what I am talking about.

More adventures to come so stay tuned!!