Lily on the contrasts that are Cape Town

We're definitely getting the hang of the slow paced but action packed adventures of Cape Town! In the last 11 days, we've learned that dinner can take up to 6 hours, zebras like to hang out by the highway, baboons get really mean if people feed them, and we've become pros at dividing by 16.

We got to experience South African wine and took a tour of the beautiful Altydgedacht vineyard, learning about the history of the vineyard and how the wine is made. The vineyard has been in the owners family for four generations and he talked about how it was one of the first run by a woman when his great grandmother took over. It was really interesting getting to know the history of land ownership of the vineyards and how the mountains and sun affect the growth of different types of grapes. I never knew that much information about wine could be condensed into one tour. We enjoyed wine tasting and then had lunch on a hill that had a beautiful view of the surrounding vineyards! We are definitely getting used to the extreme variety of foods and have come to expect anything when we walk into a restaurant. This one had a lot of stewed meat over rice and vegetables, similar to the Malay restaurant we previously ate at. We continued on to visit and walk around Spier wine estate and enjoyed the lovely weather by the pond and the smell of the grapes. It was an incredibly relaxing day but was definitely a huge contrast to the previous day where we visited the townships, which many of the previous posts have discussed. Being here is definitely bittersweet; there are amazing jazz clubs, beautiful views and fantastic food, but there is also extreme inequality, suffering and poverty that can never override the moments of relaxation.

Along with all of the fun we've been having, we have also seen and done so much that has been a huge learning experience. It has been really nice having time to see all the tourist attractions we think of when we picture main stream Cape Town, but we also were given the opportunity to see the struggles that many people have to live with in post-apartheid South Africa. The contrast between our neighborhood and the townships is enough to remind us every day of how fortunate we are and drive us to do our best to help those who need it.

 In the past couple days, we experienced a church service in Xhosa and went to see the different internships that our co-educators will be at and want to experience all of them!

We went to visit a church service in Gugulethu that was in Xhosa and it was definitely an experience for all of us. They were so welcoming and made sure that we felt at home, even though we couldn't understand the sermon. It was absolutely inspiring to see how spiritual the connection was between the people and the church. During all of the hymns, everyone would be singing loudly and dancing to the music, feeling every second of the hymn. It was so great to be a part of this experience. We stayed for about two hours, but we were told that it could last closer to four hours!

Visiting internship placements is definitely a long and exhausting day, but it was inspiring to see how many NGOs are out there trying to help all different groups of people. It was an early day leaving the house at 7:30 but when we arrived at Eros school, we met 5 year old children with cerebral palsy that stood up to greet us, and were instantly wanting to spend the entire day interacting with them. We went from internship to internship and met so many fascinating people who work towards amazing goals; at Molo Songololo they work to teach children their rights and protect youth from human trafficking and sexual abuse, while the Sarah Fox hospital takes care of youth who are trying to recover or have lifelong illnesses and need constant care. We ended the day at Right2Know, which emphasized educating people on their rights to assemble and protest in the correct way, and bringing different issues of importance to light. Each internship was very different but they all have the common goal of improving the lives of others through their work.

Today, we went to another group of amazing organizations. We started the day at Christel house, which is a school that sponsors youth who are incredibly poverty stricken and educates and teaches them skills to break the cycle of poverty that they were born into. We also saw the Two Oceans aquarium, where they help to rescue different fish and marine life, as well as maintain the tanks and care for the animals. They don't keep mammals in the aquarium because they believe it is unfair to contain them in a tank like many other organizations do.

Visiting Maitland Cottage, where I will be interning, made me so excited for the semester! It's a pediatric orthopedic surgery and recovery center and most of the children come from areas of poverty. While walking through, we saw the children had everything from infections to amputations. They were so excited to have visitors and seeing them that excited made me want to stay and start the internship early! There really is so much that we can do to help this incredible organization and I'm thrilled to start next week!

There are so many amazing things being done across the city by a variety of organizations, but there is still so much to do and we are reminded of this everywhere we go. The huge contrast between the beauty and the poverty continues to amaze me; it's surreal to see the conditions of the townships with beautiful table mountain as a background, towering over the informal shacks surrounded by trash. It really makes you want to spend all of your time working to change how things are currently, especially when you see this contrast everywhere you drive until downtown.

Eric, Isabel, Lily, Collette, Meg, Eric, Kayla