Fight for your right

Tuesday March 20

We were moved into our beautiful balcony view hostel room, much better than the half-Willard sized double we started in.

We met our lovely reporter friend from The Cape Times for a coffee date. He was inspiring. From janitor during apartheid to journalist today, he had so much energy and passion. Too bad we're missing it. Afterwards, we decided to explore the nightlife of Longstreet, supposedly the hotspot of all of Africa where our hostel happens to be (according to our ADD-ridden bartender). We were sipping on 'naughty by nature' mango drinks (4.5 % alc, just enough to get Steph drunk) and chatting with ADD-ridden bartender when walks in a dozen obnoxious, toolerific...KELLOGG STUDENTS. Ugh. Why? In all of Cape Town, we find all 57 of them on the first night they were there. We hope their obviously poor reputation won't reflect badly on us, since everyone will assume we too are Kellogg tools.

After ditching the tools (the girls were particularly bitchy) we went back to our hostel where we met two nice German men (as opposed to other unpleasant German neighbor who wouldn't give us charger back and didn't think we were from "America") who are stationed in Johannesburg doing computer-nerd stuff. They got us REALLY scared for our upcoming stay in Joburg. To cut things short, one of them has three doors to get into his house and says he shuts each one right away. One German's going back to his motherland Berlin, but luckily the other Elmar promises to hang with us in Joburg, despite thinking we're retarded for not driving stick.

Then, having an early day the next morning to go to a Human Rights Day event, we called it an early night a little after midnight. Unfortunately, for the rest of Long Street, Human Rights Day eve, transformed Long Street into Bourbon Street of Mardi Gras or Times Square on New Years Eve. Although Stephanie fell asleep right away (drunk and red-faced on one drink) her snoring was almost blissful for Diana, who was kept awake by the honking and screaming outside the window. Three hours later, and one break to watch music videos with Africans, she fell asleep.

Wednesday, March 21

Today was perfection!

We knew the day was of to a good start when our key actually worked AND we had hot showers. Life is good.

At 8 a.m. R (ethnicity tbd), Steph's contact who is taking her to South African prisons, rolled up in his Nissan with a large toothy black man named Bafana. We drove through the beautiful Cape Town scenery, and despite being on the wrong side of the road and R's crazy driving, it was a magnificent experience. One stop later to pick up a self-appointed African connoisseur from the U.S who worked for a U.S. NGO, we went to Khalyelitsha, an impoverished township 40 minutes outside of the city. R and B's organization was working to promote gender equality and HIV awareness, and this march was in honor of Human Rights Day.

We had wanted to take a township tour, though Diana was ambivalent of the "misery chic" of it all. However, this was a billion times better. We immediately hit it off with the South African teenagers (better than the NGO ladies who acted like they were on a safari, snapping photos from their car). We talked, marched and sang with the South African teenagers and little children. Tina (who will hopefully be joining this blog shortly!) is right: African children made our heart melt. Hundreds joined us as we marched through the shantytown, agreeing with our cries for an end to violence. We were struck by the drama performance at the end about a woman being raped and shocked, as three year olds watched the show. Although we realize this is nothing compared to what they've seen in their lives.

We particularly became bff with four teenage girls native to Khalyelitsha, and were amazed how much we had in common, yet how different they were. Both things we'd want in our lives, like that they spoke four languages and had very high tech cell phones. And things we were saddened by, like that it is so violent and dangerous, they can't leave their homes after 6pm. There are no after school activities and they don't see friends other than school.

While we peppered the girls with questions, they only had one for us: Do black girls in the U.S have real hair?, as our favorite, the chubby bubbly one, pointed at her short hair. Yes, sometimes, we told her, and cited Tyra Banks. We all agreed Oprah is much better than Tyra. They watch both talk shows. These girls are tough, but confirmed we should be scared when we go to Joburg. Steph and Diana, being quite aloof always, are considering themselves fucked.

Afterwards, we went to the Camps Bay beach. It was beautiful of course. Steph describes it as South Beach-esque without the trashy hoes. The breathtaking landscape of table mountain makes everything even better. We walked along the shops (as always, Diana checking out food and Steph eyeing dresses) and were approached for the millionth time by a small child. This happens often in Cape Town, and Diana was struck with how this never happens in the U.S. Steph noted that Child Services wouldn't let this fly. We didn't give money, though Steph kindly give one poor child a South Beach Diet protein bar. Thanks Steph!

We had a great sushi dinner with a beach view (again, we're rolling with the money makers in Cape Town), where they played Kelly Clarkson and had gelato at Sinfull (Steph said it's better then the stuff in Italy).

We are now back and will hopefully continuously keep you updated on our amazing adventures. Steph will be going back to prison tomorrow at 7am (hopefully playing more "Vagina, Penis, Safe Sex" with inmates) so should have stories to report.