Cape Town

Hi everyone!

We've had a whirlwind of an ending to our trip in Africa (well, ending for Jyo, just beginning for Neeti and Didi, and sort of ending and sort of beginning for me!). Jyo left yesterday, so I am somewhat blue (I am indeed wearing blue HUP scrubs as I type) but there's so much exciting stuff to talk about hopefully you'll get excited too, by proxy.

We left Gaborone and PMH a day early; Fri 10/12 in the AM. It was difficult but nice to say goodbye to all the new friends we made: Shruti the immunology PhD who's attempting to do something amazing by setting up basic science research at the U of Bots; Marisa (who knows all about Edgemont from her partner!), an Ob-Gyn doing a year of epidemiology research in maternal mortality; Adam and Shira, a researcher and a comedy writer (who really are hilarious) who had to get married to retain visas to stay in the country; Paul, another premed researcher who got me really excited for my upcoming trip to Durban; etc. Facebook is such an excellent invention, and hopefully we'll be able to keep in touch for a long while yet. Not to mention Mmuluki and Felecia - the Bots MOs, and Nadia/Tonusha/Evange, the trio of Australian Med Students. We all enjoyed a lovely last night's dinner at Bull & Bush before we left.

When we got to Cape Town it was, to use my favorite catch phrase of the weekend, "ridiculously windy." We almost got blown away just standing there! Our grand plan was to hike Table Mountain that evening to watch the sun set -- but we never made it up there, seeing as how the cable car was closed due to inclement weather. We decided to walk around instead, and had a wonderful time exploring the little neighborhoods of Cape Town. We strolled in Company's Gardens, and found a cool Indian fast food place (reminds me of Galaxy foods in Edison; before it burned down, that is!) where we got a bataka paratha and palak paneer and dhai puri made from scratch by a Gujarati chef who kept talking to Jyoti in Gujarati (she kept her own, let it be known).

We stayed at Daddy Long Legs hotel, which is a really cute, extremely central, and overall fantastic place to stay. The people were so friendly; calling the cable car at Table Mountain, directing us to the best spots to walk around, etc. I'm really glad we chose it; it was perfect. The room we had was lined with records (oh, if only the record player worked!) and books of poetry(Tony, the perfect place for you and Julia should you ever come to Cape Town!).

On Sat 11 Dec we took an all day Cape Peninsula tour that hit the highlights of the city and surroundings. We were joined on our tour by a New Orleans couple (Bryant and George), Libyan tourists, and an Oregon/Florida couple (Fletcher and Kristen). Here's a picture at Cape Point:

Bryant and George are lawyers who do nonprofit work for people with HIV/AIDS. The Libyan tourists were a mechanical engineer (who has traveled very very extensively, very impressive knowledge of the world; only lacks a trip to the US!) and his friend. Fletcher and Kristen are ex-military types who do defense contracting in Afghanistan, and have also traveled a lot. Very cool group, we enjoyed hanging out with them.

We were tired, but in an exhilirated/excited way by the time we got back. We showered/cleaned up and then went for a long-ish walk up to the Victoria & Albert waterfront, and saw the sunset on the Atlantic for the first time! It was quite a site; similar what I'd imagine the Oregon/Washington coast line to be (alas, we never made it to Olympia when we were in Seattle; we'll have to go back to make a fair comparison). We had a really tasty thin crust pizza on the waterfront before heading back for an early night.

On Sunday morning we had the ambitious plan of hiking Table Mountain (3 km of straight uphill, 1 km elevation!) before lunching before Jyoti's flight at 4p. We made it! despite our poor planning, relative dehydration, lack of breakfast, late start, lack of sun protection (oh, helioplex, where were you when we needed you?!) we did the Plattyklip Gorge route in just under 2 hours (well done, Jyo!). We had only one wrong turn along the way, but had some pretty spectacular views. We met all sorts of interesting people, including a dog named Marty who first climbed Table Mountain at 4 months of age; a 5 year old French boy hiking with his dad (very brave!); a group of extremely fit English who lapped us on the way up; and a black South African nonchalantly walking up with only flip flops (he also lapped us...). Too many pictures/memories to put down here, but here's a video Jyo took.

(Again, videos don't seem to be uploading from Daddy Long Legs, so here's a picture of us from the top. Doesn't do it justice, but to really appreciate it, you'll have to come visit Table Mountain yourself!)

We made it back, had lunch at a cool Caribbean Restaurant, and then it was time to say goodbye to Jyo :(.

After Jyo left I decided to explore the city by foot. I walked around to the Castle, saw an outdoor high school jazz band concert, walked through the gardens again, read a book, saw the Parliament House and the National Gallery (small, but nice), read some more, and caught the last part of a football match at Dubliner's, an Irish Pub. I had dinner at the Indian place again, and then came back home to read some more before turning in for the night. I slept so peacefully; the hike in the morning and evening walk was tiring, but well worth it of course.

Today Didi and Neeti come! I'm very excited. I'll pick up the apt keys and meet them there in just a few hours; hopefully everything has gone smoothly since the original delay at JFK.

More adventures: shark cages, more tours, white sand beaches, drives to the western countryside, and of course a whimsical trip to Durban -- yet to come!

Cheers,

Parin