The rest of last week saw the last few days in my Cato Manor homestay. Mama, ever the South African, continued to take offense at my foreign eating habits while I looked on at her corn-meal porridge mixed with a stick of butter, cup of sugar, cup of full cream milk and salt with disgust. We had sufficiently fostered the relationship of an old, married couple and cohabited very nicely. One thing we did agree on when it came to cooking was our mutual affinity for chocolate chunk muffins (they still do not have chocolate chips in this country, I’m getting seriously concerned that no one will discover them before the World Cup, and then what?!). We set aside our food/ taste differences to work together to make chocolate chip muffins one last time on my last evening in the homestay. Mama told me that she will be calling them Judy’s Muffin’s from now on! The muffins came out wonderful, and were a lovely end to my meal of another delicious salad (this time I got to pour my own dressing). Mama still can’t wrap her head around my ability to eat vegetables that crunch, leaving her to make the comment that you see as the headline of this blog entry.
Another notable aspect of last week was our attendance at some of the matches of the Street Children’s World Cup. A South African corporation sponsored a competition between about 8 international teams of street children, held in an indoor soccer stadium in Durban. We went along with the program, to support the team from the Philippines (there was no USA team and one of the students on our program is from the Philippines). It was pretty incredible to watch these children play, and all were between 14 and 16 years of age. What I found most astounding is that when in their soccer uniforms, you really forgot that you were watching a bunch of homeless children who had been through all sorts of drug addictions and rehab at this early point in their lives. All the players were very dignified and respectful of one another, and were thoroughly enjoying their first experiences outside of their country. What an event. Another remarkable thing about the World Cup is that many of the children were sponsored to come play by private donors. Their team uniforms, rather than representing just one corporation, were littered with patches from all over, the way that NASCAR cars sometimes are. Also, and most significantly, in my opinion, each team had at least two female players on the field for the entirety of the game.
Moving out of homestay was met with mixed emotions on my part. On one hand, I am very excited to have more freedom and live on my own (soon enough) but on the other, it’s very hard to just remove yourself from a situation you are so closely invested in. I get the opportunity to just walk away from poverty very fluidly while the family I am leaving behind does not. Today, we are moving into a homestay in Newlands West, which is a mostly Indian neighborhood, about 20 minutes outside the city center. This homestay will be our home for all of 8 days when we will move on to Splashy Fen music festival in the Drakensburg Mountains. That is a weekend-long affair and promises to be a great time (this promise is made partly by the necessity of buying and wearing wellies or rain boots, given the amount of mud that usually forms b/c of dancing and all the people). So I mean yah, I’m excited.
This past weekend, we spent our time in one of the safer, more Western/ European districts in Durban living in a backpackers. We were told upon arriving, that if we were caught using our phones inside the building, they would be taken away because “no one wants to hear us talking to mommy asking how the dog is.” So much for being more free/ treated as an adult. What I have come to realize, however, is that I have yet to really feel like an adult in this country/ be treated as such, so why start now? Florida Road, the main restaurant/bar strip by where we were staying, provided us finally with a chance to experience the Durban nightlife and club scene given that it was walking distance from our hostel. My only complaint here is that the DJ was playing house music only (very popular here) and refused to play Party in the USA, claiming he did not have it. But seriously, what DJ doesn’t have it? You can see the contrast in the area we stayed in this weekend to any of the other pictures because the way that buildings are situated/ streets are laid out is much more western. In this area I actually saw a BMW, Jaguar and Audi all parked right next to each other… looks like I’m not in Kansas anymore. Also, just a note for one of the photos, apparently if you drive a bright red Audi, you can park wherever you want, sidewalk included.
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