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!