MZOLI'S

Every Sunday in Cape Town, Mzoli’s is the place to be.  This is a meat butchery in the Gugulethu township outside of Cape Town where tourists, college students and young professionals gather for the live music, a party atmosphere and of course the meat! Out of all the meat I have eaten since being in Cape Town, this is by far the best. Sunday was the third time I have been at Mzoli’s and we had a group of about 12 people with us.

To order the meat you have to go in and pick out the raw meet from the window at the front.  Once the meat is chosen (options include steak, pork, chicken, beef, and my favorite Boerewors, which is an Italian sausage), you take your huge tub of meat to the back where they braii it on the massive grill they have.  The timing for food to come out is completely unknown to the customer, but once it does, the drunken people dig into the meat as if they have not eat for days.  Everybody uses their hands and there are no napkins or plates.  This may seem unsanitary to some people, but everybody is in the moment of eating all the meat their stomach can hold and do not care about the germs from the people around them.

Once the bucket of meat is devoured, the partying in the streets becomes close to overwhelming.  By 5pm, the streets surrounding Mzoli’s is packed and everybody is socializing.  People are drinking, having a good time, and going hard one last time before the workweek begins.




The interesting thing about the concept of Mzoli’s is the lack benefits the town receives from it.  Mzoli’s makes great profits, but the town never sees any of this.  They have to deal with the drunken people who roam their streets and the mess to clean up when the day is over.  Mzoli’s only have a few locals working for them, which also seems unfair to many of the locals. 

Living the Simple Life

This past weekend, I had the pleasure of staying with a family in the Oceanview Township.  When I first heard that we were doing a home-stay, I was excited, but had my concerns.  At first I wasn’t sure if I wanted to give up a weekend in Cape Town to stay with a family I did not know.  Second, there were rumors that we would get bed bugs from staying in the Township.  I am so happy I let these concerns past me, because this weekend was one of the best one’s since I have been in South Africa and it was amazing to see how much love a family can give a complete stranger.

The Family

The family I stayed with was wonderful.  Margret, who also goes by Maddy or Ouma (Afrikaans for grandma), is an adorable 52-year-old woman who came up to my chest! Ouma made the weekend.  She was constantly checking on Magoo and I seeing if we needed anything.  She was also cooking for almost the entire time we were there! She made chocolate chip muffins, chicken, pork, potatoes, rice, beans, and cake! Everything was amazing; it was so great to have a home-cooked meal in Africa. 

Wilma is a 24-year-old mother of two.  Her oldest s a 6 year-old by named, Molto. Her newest addition is baby Tabo.  He is 2 months old and was born one month early and weighs no more than 5 pounds.  The love that Wilma gives to her baby is an amazing sight to see.   She nurtures him and I was able to see all the struggles the baby had to overcome by the gentle and loving touch the family had for this miracle baby. 

Mila is 9 years old and will be a star one day! She is a great singer and has sexy dance moves as well! I spent a lot of time with Mia and her friends; playing games and watching them sing and dance. You would never guess who their favorite singer was…Justin Bieber! Preteens love him all around the world! 

Ouma’s husband is named Nicolas or Opa (Afrikaans for grandpa), he is a former pastor and seemed very shy in front of us Americans.  I think part of this fact was that he did not speak a world of English. 

Morgan is 21 years-old.  The family took him in their home about a year ago.  He plays Rugby, loves to joke around, and dresses like a stud.  I think he had small crush on both Magoo and myself.

The Neighborhood

The weekend as a whole was extremely relaxing and it was great to see the interactions between the people in this township.  During the day, all the families kept their doors open, and neighbors often came in to say hi and have a quick conversation.   When we would walk around the town with Morgan or Amy, they seemed to know a majority of the people who were sitting outside enjoying the beautiful day.  The children in Oceanview made the best of their situation and would come up with fun games to play, even though they did not have any fancy toys.

Watching this reminds me of my childhood. Growing up on Chidester Avenue, I was always running around with the other kids coming up with games that would give us hours of entertainment.  My neighborhood was extremely friendly and opening as Oceanview was.  We would jump from house to house and the doors would always be open and the adults welcoming. It is very sad to me that many people in America do not even know their next-door neighbors names.

The Cape Town Cycle Tour

On Sunday morning we woke up bright and early to watch the Cape Town Cycle Tour.  This cycle race is 109km long, and with around 31,000 cyclist taking part, it is the world’s largest individually timed cycle race. The atmosphere of the race consisted of the Oceanview residents Braiing.(American barbecue/ grilling), along the street where the bikers’ rode past, drinking, and kids running around.  Watching this race inspired me to participate in an endurance race.  I am setting a goal today that within 5 years I will have either completed a marathon or triathlon.  My brother Brad, has the job of ensuring that I complete this goal!

In 3 days I became accepted and loved by this amazing family.  They invited us to come back to their home anytime we wanted and Ouma even said she loved us when we left.  All the children I made friends with walked us to the buses and gave me probably ten hugs before I got on the bus. It was Mia’s friend McKayla, who really touched my heart before I left.  Her birthday was on Sunday and I was playing silly games with her.  When we were walking back to the bus she was holding my hand and she said to me, “Thank you Emily for making this birthday my best ever”.

I am so glad that giving her attention and being around her on her birthday made it the best one to date.  This just shows how the little things make all these people so happy.  It wasn’t a present that made her day, it was me. I will always remember this weekend and am so happy that I got to experience how this family lives their everyday life.

Cricket Update

Good news! I learned a few more rules of cricket this weekend! On Saturday South Africa had a match against India and we were watching the game on and off throughout the day.  In the beginning of the match, a coin is flipped in order to determine who bats first. India won the tossed first and chose to bat.  India will bat until South Africa gets all of the batters out.  The person up to bat will stay at the plate until they get out. (It is much harder to get a cricket batter out than it is a baseball batter, for example, one player on India scored 111 runs during his time at bat).   After the bowler (pitcher) and fielders’ get all of India’s batter out then they switch spots. 

If a batter hits the ball over the fence they score 6 runs, 4 runs if the ball rolls and hits the fence, 1 run if the ball is hit to the fielders.  If a ball is caught then there is an out. 

I still have a lot to learn about cricket, but after this weekend I am able to follow the games! I can not wait to go to the gym next week and watch the World Cup while I run, I will finally be able to understand it!

SPORTS

My one issue with Cape Town has been viewing sports.  When I go to the gym, the thing that is always TV is cricket.  What I have learned thus far about this sport is that currently the World Cup is happening, the pitchers can bounce the ball to the batter, and the team up to bat stays there for an extremely long time.  Soon I will look up the actual rules.  The second sport that is huge with South Africa and UCT is rugby.  I actually have been enjoying the sport; it takes a real man to play this game.  Finally soccer.  All the bars in Cape Town play soccer.  The other night, the big game was Arsenal vs. Barcelona.  The bar in town was packed due to this fact.  While all these new sports are great to watch and learn about, I miss my American sports.

First off I dodged I bullet that the Bears did not make the Super Bowl.  If they did, I would have been walking around the streets at 2am trying to find a bar playing the game. Second, I have been going through SportCenter withdraw.  Everyday this Christmas break my routine would be to watch SportsCenter in the morning and see the Top Ten plays and stay up to date on the current news.  While here I have to relay on ESPN.com, which isn’t terrible, but just and adjustment.

The most frustrating thing however, has to be the fact that I have not been able to watch a Bulls game since I have been here!  Over Christmas break I got really into basketball because I would watch all the games with my ex-boyfriend and now I can’t watch any ☹. American Basketball is one sport they never play at the bars, and with the Bulls being second in the Eastern Conference and just having a huge win over the Heat, I want to watch them more than ever!  The first good news I have heard in regard to sports was that there has been talk with the local bars in getting them to show the NBA playoffs. I would be forever grateful if this happens, and would stop complaining about the lack of American sports in Cape Town!

Catch Up!

After weeks of debating, I have finally decided to make a blog for my time in Cape Town.  Since I have been here for over a month I wanted to give everybody a brief catch up on all the great things I have been doing since arriving in Cape Town. I live in a house, called Roxy, with 16 other Americans’ from all around the country and have one RA named Hope, who is a student at UCT.  The first 3 weeks in Cape Town was basically a party.  When we first arrived we stayed in the dorms at UCT.  For the four days I was there, I got to meet a lot of CIEE students and began to explore Rondebosch (a suburb of Cape Town where I live), and downtown Cape Town.  Rondebosch is a cute little town that consists of two stores, many “fast food” restaurants a few higher scale restaurants, and two bars.


My diet since being in South Africa has been very interesting.  It has consisted of hummus, tatziki sauce, tomatoes, and Pita.  Occasionally I will stop being lazy and make some chicken and salad to go along with that as well.  I also have been enjoying the pizza that Cape Town has to offer.  First off, I will go on the record saying that it does not compare to my beloved Chicago style pizza, but after a few drinks it hits the stop.  My favorite pizza I have had to this point was at Babbo in Claremont.  The pizza I got had bacon, feta, avocado, and I believe tomato. So good! And the best part was that it was 2 for 1! I was in heaven.

After two weeks of exploring Cape Town, my friends and I went rented a car and went on the Garden Route.  This is a beautiful drive from Cape Town to Port Elizabeth.  My car consisted of Jacqui, a diva from LA, Maddy, Jacqui’s best friend from school, Magoo, a future politician from Columbia, and Dan Hughes, a boy originally from GLEN ELLYN, who moved to London during elementary school.  What a small world. The highlights of this trip was going to see elephants, petting cheetahs, relaxing on beautiful beaches, having a crazy night in Jeffery’s Bay, and best of all going off Bloukrans Bungee jump!

Once returning home from our trip, reality hit and classes began on the following Monday.  Classes have been a challenge getting used to. In the beginning it was very difficult to sign up and drop classes because everything had to be done in person.  Now the struggles are the workload.  At IU I had a lot of tests and got used to that form of testing students knowledge.  Here I have to write a total of 6 essays, each being over 1500 words! The last time I had to write an essay over 6 pages was freshman year of college.  But I have competed one! Yeah, only 5 more to go!