As of right now our team has officially been in Cape Town for two days. It also simultaneously seems like we've been here forever since the Rotary members and their fellow Cape Town residents have made us feel so welcome! Yesterday myself, Randy and Jenny were taken by Gavin (my host) on a short drive to Hout Bay along a beautiful mountain road (that is presently closed to traffic due to boulder falls) - little did we know that we would be right back in the area tonight to give our first presentation about ourselves and Arizona, to the Hout Bay Rotary club who were also great!
Gavin has been quite gracious, staying up late chatting with me and letting me use the computer to keep in touch with my family each night. I think we are both staying up far too late for our own good, but I am glad to have the opportunity to get his perspective and also to be able to keep in touch with those whom I love and miss very much! His hospitality and that of other Rotarians makes this trip so much easier
The first day we also took a trip to Robben Island as a team, to see where Nelson Mandela had been incarcerated as a political prisoner for nearly 20 years. While the jail cell he was in was bigger than I had imagined, certainly it was a very thought-provoking scene to see Cape Town off in the distance (9 miles or so) and yet to be inside and near a prison that is a symbol of all that was wrong with a country; it is also now very much a place of healing. The tours of the island are given by individuals who were themselves imprisoned there. The mood was lightened by the fact that I also saw little penguins on the island, a whale in the ocean, and a sea lion and otter back at the harbor. A very eventful first day.
I also have fallen in love with Biltong, which is the South African version of beef jerky. I think I purchased and ate a half kilo of it on my own, after Sarah gave me a small sample of it. For those of you who know my love of all foods containing salt, this is it, except so much easier to eat than regular beef jerky!
On the second day, Barb and I met with officials from the City of Cape Town who work on development planning, the World Cup soccer stadium building, habitat conservation, managing and improving the conditions in settlements and townships (basically, shantytowns on the outskirts of town and in various other places). It is a land of contrasts, and still a certain level of inequality but there is also so much good being done and particularly through Rotary to try to make conditions better. What a land of contrasts, with wealth and poverty right next to each other...
Tomorrow we will be visiting the Nonceba child rape crisis center (please take the time to Google this, and watch the 20 minute long video; I am sad to say that such a place has to exist here but it shows the dire situation that needs to be reversed before literally millions of Africans can lead what anyone who is reading this would consider a lower-economic class life beyond just managing to survive until the next day. That's all for now, I'm sure plenty more adventures and thought-provoking images to come.
Please take care all, and remember to help someone who is less fortunate than you. Every day. "Each one teach one". In other words, pay it forward!
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