saying goodbye

Beginning this last week has been tough. I realized that this exchange was almost over and that I would soon be forced to say goodbye to everyone. It was very difficult to leave everyone behind on Thursday. Goodbyes have never been this hard for me, I’ve become so close to especially the exchange girls and my host family means so much to me. They have made this exchange as amazing as it is now.  The thought of leaving was making me sad but I had to try to enjoy my last week, make it as good as possible, unforgettable. We started our week by spending the Monday at Bishops. We had to attend to all the classes to experience what it is like to go to Bishops.We had to be there at 7:30 to meet with Mr Court and go to chapel. For the people who read my blog, you already know this was not our first chapel at Bishops. After assembly we were paired up with a boy from grade 11 who we had to follow around all day. This meant that all the exchange girls were separated and couldn’t go the classes together seeing that we then would be too much of a distraction. I was paired up with a boy called Joe who took me to tutor. Tutor at Bishops is quite different than tutor at Herschel because at Herschel you are in a class with only your grade but at Bishops, your tutor class consists of boys from different grades.  After that I had Afrikaans where the boys had to give an oral about animal testing. Pipa was in the same class as me now so we went to the next class together, science. During the first break, I saw my neighbour Shaun, and he showed me around his house (Grey House) and the rest of the school. I really like the fact that Bishops has actual physical houses whereas Herschel only has imaginary houses. I had lost my partner so I ended up following two other guys. We went to maths and economics and had a lunch break after that where I went to School House (one of the boarding houses) to have lunch. It was quite an experience. All the guys had to line up and wait for the head of the house to give them permission to go in. In the lunch room there are 3 long tables to sit at. Before the boys can go and fetch their food, they have to pray; only then they can eat. After lunch we had English lesson and Lotte, Loic and I had to make our biology test from Holland. School ended at 3 ‘o clock and afterwards we went to Cavendish with all the exchange students to have our last dinner together and celebrate loic’s birthday seeing that he was turning 16 on Tuesday.

The next day we had to go back to our own school, Herschel. It was basically a normal day and we didn’t do anything special in particular. After school, Lauren had to stay at school for English Olympiads so I ended up being picked up alone.  My neighbor came over again to help me bake a cake. At night, Lauren and I were invited to go to Loic’s birthday party. On Wednesday morning, I took the rest of the cake to bring to school. When I arrived at school, everyone was either staring at my cake or just asking for a piece so no wonder that we finished all of it before first break. Instead of prefect assembly, we had a formal assembly. There was a special guest, Andre Devillias, who sang for us. Throughout his performance he told us his life story which was truly touching. We didn’t have any classes so we spend most of our time outside on the grass and in the library. We let everyone write their goodbyes on our flags.

On Thursday, our last day, I woke up feeling a bit depressed. It was hard thinking about leaving at night. I could see my bag lying at the other side of the room, half packed and I knew I had to finish packing soon. At school everyone was surprised at the fact that we were leaving so soon. We didn’t go to any classes to spend as much time with each other as possible. The entire day, people came to us to write on our flags and say goodbye. It was quite a dull and sad day but at least we had some cake because Lotte and Loren had baked this amazing oreo cake to bring to school. At the end of the day, it was time to say goodbye to everyone. Not only the girls at Herschel but also the exchange girls who I’ve become such good friends with. Lauren took me to Jump Hi which is basically teaching less-privileged children maths.  It was a really good experience and really nice to interact with them. At 4 ‘o clock, we were picked up by Lauren’s mom. My neighbor visited me for the last time but he had to leave quite early unfortunately because my host family wanted to take out for dinner. We went to a pizza restaurant we hadn’t been to before. The food was really nice and we went home satisfied. I still had one hour left to pack my bags and surprisingly I managed to be on time to leave at half past 9. When we arrived at the airport, the others were there already, we dropped off our bags and said our last goodbyes. It was really hard to say goodbye and I realized this was a definite end to  an amazing exchange. Even though I can keep the memories forever, the exchange was ‘physically’ over. I’ve had an unforgettable two months in South Africa and I now realize how fortunate and privileged I was to be chosen for this exchange. I am looking forward to making the third graders enthusiastic because I don’t want anyone to regret not signing in.

Cederberg Camp

Day One: Monday the 27^th of February

Last week we went on our last trip, the mini epic, or better known as Cederberg camp. There is no way people can say this trip was last and least, it was one of the best trips of this exchange. We had to meet at bishops again on Monday. From there we left with the post matrics in two separate vans. We drove for about two hours and when we arrived, we had to get on our mountain bikes and prepare ourselves for almost 30 km of cycling. It was a very hot day and the bike ride was really tiring but I after about one and a half hours of cycling I arrived as the first girl at the camping place. When almost everyone had arrived we went straight to the river to swim in our clothes. We went back to the camp, soaking wet, and set up our tents while drying in the sun. After everyone had arrived, we went to Maalgat which is a place 5 minutes away from the camp site. Maalgat is well known for its high cliffs. The highest cliff is almost 20 m high. I decided to jump from the big cliff and when I was standing on top, I looked down and relived the moment of the bungee jump. Even though it wasn’t as high, it felt almost the same, the same feeling of falling and liberation, a pure addiction.

At night the teachers had planned out for us to do Dutch Oven Cooking. Everyone was asked to peel onions, cut potatoes or cut butternut. We were all standing along this long table, some people crying from the onions and other struggling to cut the hard butternut. I had the task of peeling the butternut which was quite a challenge with the blunt knives everyone was asked to take from home. After everything was cut, we made the chicken with all the veggies in the pot. Even though we ate in darkness and I could barely see what I was eating, it was extremely good. After dinner we were gathered around the fire and spilt up in tow groups for the next day. I was in group A which meant I was doing the abseiling, looking at bushman paintings and having a solo sleeping night the next day.

Day Two: Tuesday the 28^th of February

I woke up, feeling a little cold and looking to my left and right and seeing Lotte and Yiyo still sleeping next to me. My back was sore and I was already looking forward to my double bed at home. I stepped out of my sleeping bed and went straight to the showers. After breakfast we had to back our bag for the day and we went for a hike in out group to go to the cliff for the abseiling. It was another hot day and when we finally managed to get up, I could feel the sun burning on my shoulders. The gear was set up and we had to get into our harness and put on a helmet and gloves. The teacher asked us who wanted to be the first one to go down and seeing that there was no one else willing to go first, I decided to go first. It was my first time and I when I was standing on the edge I got a little nervous because I had absolutely no idea what it was going on, how I was meant to go down and if I would even make it down safely. He attached me to the rope and then asked me to lean backwards and spread my arms to take a picture!! My life was literally hanging by a thread. Then he told me I had to feed the rope to go down. My hands were a little shaky and my feet were taking tiny steps along the side of the mountain. Very slowly I could see the faces fade away as I was going down. After about two meters I got more confident and I was going down more steadily and quicker now. I was actually enjoying it. I bounced off the wall and found my way down jumping like a professional. I personally thought the way down was way too short and wanted to do more once I was down but unfortunately couldn’t. Mr Court was standing there waiting for me with an apple and unattached me once my feet were back on the ground. After the rope was pulled up again, the next person was coming already. Once everyone was down, we went back to the camp to have lunch and look at the Bushman paintings after that. The Bushman paintings were not that exciting and most of them had faded away quite a lot already so there was not much to see. They were all basically about elongated people and animals like elands and elephants. Afterwards we went to the camp to prepare ourselves for the solo sleeping night. We packed our sleeping bags and our food stash for the night. Everyone was having supper at the camping place except for Loic, Agustine (Argentina) and me. We took a pot and pasta to make our own food. I was one of the first three to be dropped off and I had an absolutely beautiful spot. There was a bit of sand where I was planning to sleep on and a big tree hanging over the river. I could literally step into the river from my spot. I put on my bikini and went straight into the river. The water was very shallow and the sun hadn’t set yet but was giving this reflection onto the water. I walked through the water a bit and walked back when there was nothing left to see. There were stones lying in a circle on the sand and I took some bricks and my matchers to make a fire. Once the fire was burning nicely I took out my pot and pasta to make supper. I filled the pot with some water from the river and waited till it was boiling. I put the pasta in and after 10 minutes it was ready and I could enjoy my meal but unfortunately ‘enjoying’ wasn’t really the right word. They had given me some sauce to put over but the sauce was absolutely disgusting. I hate half of it and then dug a hole to put the rest in. I decided to go for a walk and explore the surroundings and see if there were any other people close by to keep me company. I had to find my way through bushes and dead trees but finally made it out into the open where I saw one of the post matrics walking. He showed me his spot and decided to spend the night there together. The solo sleeping night turned out to be a duo sleeping night. We watched the stars but sleeping became quite difficult seeing that there were mosquitoes flying around our heads the entire time. We literally tried everything to scare them away. We used anti-bug cream and spray. We tried to kill them but that is quite a challenge outside and more will come anyways. We were desperately looking for a way to make them go leave so then we turned on this app on my phone which is supposed to scare them away by making this high pitchy sound which was absolutely painful to my own ears so then we just gave up and fell asleep eventually.  

Day Three: Wednesday the 29th of February

The next morning the sunrise woke me up but I didn’t want to get out of my sleeping back seeing that it was still early and really cold. My sleeping bag was filled with sand and my face was wet from the dew. We went back to the camp together and had a nice breakfast. At Half past 9 we left to go a school nearby where we would be playing games and making butterflies with the children. The children were all smiling when we arrived and they were enjoying it so much. We had to pair up with one of the children and help them with making the butterflies. I was helping this girl called Nicole and even though she could barely speak English, we could still get along quite well. Not only the girls were making butterflies, the boys were making ones of their own too. While the butterflies were drying in the sun, we were playing games outside. We played games like hide-and-seek, soccer and jumping over the rope. The girls were doing our hair and they were smiling all the time, having the time of their lives. We gave them some cookies and something to drink and they sang us songs afterwards. They were giving us this private concert of dancing and singing songs by Justin Bieber which was absolutely adorable. It was so hard to leave them behind because them were hugging you and pulling these sad faces. I was such a nice experience though, to see them smile. When we came back we had quite a lot of time for ourselves to go swimming or just relaxing. Later that day we went to the Leopard Trust fund where we went on a hike to look for tracks and footprints and see the traps. Unfortunately we didn’t see any leopards but seeing one is very unlikely in the first place. The man who studies these leopards has worked there for over 9 years and has only seen seven leopards in the wild without a collar. I wasn’t very exciting to be honest but it was quite interesting to see how dedicated someone can be to help these leopards. I wouldn’t be able to spend my life saving these leopards if you barely see any. At night we just sat at the fire and roasted marshmallows while listening to music and everyone’s stories of the solo sleeping night.

Day Four: Thursday the 1^st of March

Thursday was basically our last day. We went on this big hike which would take us 8 hours. We had to take as much water as possible seeing that we could only refill it once on our way up the mountain. It was again a really hot day and I had the feeling I was going to get a sun burn at the end of the day. The boys had to walk all the way to the mountain but as girls we needed a head of start and therefore we were driven to the foot of the mountain. We arrived there earlier and started walking up. The guys caught up with us quickly but most of us ended up going up the mountain together. Some boys however went up like they were doing a race. We went through caves, tunnels and cracks with the weirdest names. Cracks called The Birth Canal and passages called the coffin where you had to lie on your back and make your way underneath this big rock hanging above you. It was quite tiring all of this but Mr Court told us that once we were on top of the mountain we would be walking on flat paths. Once we were up the mountain, we realized that Mr Court wasn’t entirely right. He made us walk all the way to this arch which looked like it was at least 2 hours away of where we were standing but luckily we stayed there for about an hour to have lunch in the shade and enjoy the view. Some of us decided to go up the arch. In order to get on the arch we had to climb through cracks and push ourselves through this tiny crack which almost impossible to get through. One of the post matrics, who was known as “big Fred” decided he wanted to go up the arch too but in order to do that he had to pass through this crack. He managed to get into the crack but his leg was still sticking out which he used the push himself through. He was kicking around and I seriously thought he was stuck but miraculously, he got through.  We went down the arch again after the picture was taken of us standing on top and we thought we could finally go back to the camp but the Mr Court thought it would be nice to go up another hill, the highest peak of the mountain to be precise. On top of the peak there was a flag and there were kittle pots with pen and paper to write our names on. You could see the names of the exchange students and post matrics of last year and I actually recognized some of them.  We went back to the camp again; my legs full of scratches, a dry throat, an exploding bladder but luckily only a single bruise.  We went for another swim at Maalgat to cool down and at night we had our last supper. Big Fred was roasting chicken and Boerewors which was delicious. We emptied all the bags of marshmallows and around 11 ‘o clock I went for a night swim in the river. The water was surprisingly warm but once I got out, I got quite cold and I ran straight to the bathrooms to take a hot shower. I took my sleeping bag and lay down on the grass with the others to watch the stars. We talked and played games for hours but I fell asleep eventually around 4 in the morning.

Day Five: Friday the 2^nd of March

 Friday was our last day. We didn’t do that much actually. We basically packed all our bags and tents and cleared out the camping place. We drove off in the tow separate vans again around half past nine and after an hour or so, we stopped at a Spur to have lunch together. A spur is a South African restaurant where you can have burgers, meat, chips etc. We had our order ready which made it much easier. We left an hour later and drove straight to Bishops where our trip ended.

Township

Wednesday the 22^nd of February.

On Wednesday the 22^nd of February we went to the township called Vrijgrond. We didn’t go with all the exchange students, only the girls, because the boys had spent their day there on Tuesday. We left at about 9:30 so we still had classes before that. We took some apples and cookies to give to the children in the township. It took us only half an hour to drive to the township, and in only half an hour you could see the enormous difference in wealth. When I saw the township I realized how privileged I was. How blessed I am with the fact that I have a proper house and don’t have to worry about leaking rooms or a lack of food. I take everything for granted and you can’t imagine living without all the luxuries you have at home.                                                                                         After half an hour we arrived in the township where we were greeted by a woman working for the program to get the children from the street. We went into the kindergarten where the children were having breakfast. All of them were either coloured or black and between the age of 5 to 8. The children were all smiling when they saw us coming in. They all reached for you when you passed them and they wanted to hug you and hold you. They were looking for love and attention. We left after the woman from the beginning had given us some back ground information about the program and we headed off to the ‘Computer Room’ where we would meet some people who would join us in our walk through the township. The ‘Computer Room’ is being used to teach them how to use a computer to get a proper job. From here, we were taken on a tour through Vrijgrond. The sky was cloudy and grey and it even started raining. The clouds and the rain made the township look dull, even though most of the shacks were brightly coloured. There were dogs walking through the muddy streets and the township was littered with trash. Old shoes, plastic bags and tins of coke covered the streets. Along our way we passed many hairdressers and we even went into a greenhouse where they tried to encourage the people to grow their own plants and food. I talked to some of the people in the group who actually lived in the township and heard their side of the story. It was quite fascinating to hear that most of them didn’t even want to leave the township. They were happy about their lives, mainly because they liked the people in the township and the fact that everyone is friendly with each other. After the tour we went back to the children where we gave them the cookies. The moment when we walked in they were screaming and ran to us to hug us and adore us. They were seeking for our attention and we had to stop them from climbing on our backs and pulling our hair. We sat on the floor and they were hanging on us like little koala bears. They were absolutely adorable and I just loved the fact that we made them smile. That was the best moment of the day for me, making them smile. It was an amazing and especially interesting experience.

A Weekend in a Tent

On Friday the 24^th of February, Lotte’s host family had invited me to go camping with them for the weekend. It was a normal day at school except for the fact that there were three human individuals of the opposite sex joining us at school... The exchange guys from Holland and Yiyo (from Chilli). When I stepped out of the car in the morning, not only my jaw almost dropped my school bag, camping bag and sleeping bag  too because I was just absolutely amazed by the fact that all the girls were staring at the guys and standing around them like they were these Greek gods. Throughout the day, girls asked me if I knew them and asked me to take them to my classes because they wanted to meet them. They were having the time of their lives. Unfortunately for them, Fridays end at 10 past 2 and they had to leave early. After school, Lotte and I were picked up to drive to Slangenhoek, the camping place where we would be spending our weekend. We drove for about 2 hours and when we arrived, Loren’s dad had already set up our tents and was preparing dinner. We walked around the camping place and planned what we would be doing the next day. After dinner we played some card games but we were soon interrupted by this enormous moth flying around our heads, attracted by the light of the lamp. I’ve never seen a moth that big, I am not exaggerating; it had a diameter of 7 centimetres. We quickly took the lamp and went into the tent to continue our game. We closed the top and side of the tent but forgot to zip the bottom so after about 5 minutes, we heard the moth trying to sneak through the tiny ... we had left open. I’ve never heard Lotte scream that much in her life. We opened the tent and chased it away. When we thought it was out we quickly closed it again. We were making jokes about the moth now and Lotte said it would be so funny if she was sitting on it, and you can call it karma, because at that moment, she felt something hard underneath her. She stood up and pulled up her sleeping bag. The moth flew from underneath and I can tell you, the entire camping lot could have probably heard us screaming. We stopped our game, took the lamp out of the tent and went to bed, but Lotte got such a fright, she wanted me to kill every single bug in the tent.

The next day it was really hot. We didn’t really feel like doing something very active so we just spent the day at the swimming pool, tanning or lying in the shade playing games. Loren’s dad prepared fish for lunch which was really nice but it attracted the flies. You couldn’t eat without having at least 5 flies on your arms and legs and 3 flies around your food so we switched turns waving our arms and scaring them away.  There were two boys from the neighbourhood who brought a guitar and we asked them if we could borrow it. Loren is very good at playing the guitar and she can sing extremely well so she gave us a private concert. We played some more card games with the boys and sat around the fire for supper. At night, we sat on the trampoline and watched the stars in our sleeping bags. We talked for hours and only went to bed around 1 ‘o clock. The next morning we had to leave at 10 ‘o clock so we got up early and had took a shower. We left straight after our freshly baked pancake breakfast. They dropped me off at home at around 12 ‘o clock and half an hour later, my host family took me to Stellenbosh where we would be having dinner with Nicole. We ate at this vineyard called Tokara. Later that day, my neighbour across the road decided to visit me again before I left to go on the Cederberg camp. Overall it was a really nice weekend.

A weekend at the Beach House

Last weekend, my host family decided to go to their beach house in Hermanus, the town we went to on the last day of the garden route. Janette (my host mom) told me I could invite some friends and I immediately asked Lotte, Loren Pipa and Sofia to come with. On Saturday morning they came to my house around 9 ‘o clock so we could leave early. It took us almost one and a half hours to drive there but we stopped at a wimpy to have brunch. A wimpy is a typical South African road restaurant. It was my first time to go one and it was actually really nice food. I shared a wrap and a club sandwich with Lotte seeing that we couldn’t decide which one to take. When we arrived, we went upstairs to prepare our beds and put on our swimming costume. We decided to go to the beach immediately to go sand boarding and it took us only 3 minutes to walk there. It was incredibly windy and the sand blew up in our eyes all the time which hurt a lot but we enjoyed the sand boarding too much to leave. We went back home and watched The Hangover which was probably everyone’s 20^th time of watching it. We had lunch and decided to go to the beach further away and rent a movie afterwards. In the movie rent shop we didn’t only see DVDs but we saw actual videos too. We started laughing really hard and wondered who would still watch a video. We ended up taking, “Something Borrowed” which was a romantic comedy. At night we went onto the balcony in our sleeping bags and lay down, watched the stars and talked. The stars were incredible. There were millions of them and I know they are always there but in Holland you don’t really get to see that many stars. Hermanus is a small town with mostly beach houses and doesn’t really have street lights, there is almost no light and that’s what makes the stars appear so bright.

The next day we woke up, put on our bikinis and lay on the balcony again, not for watching stars but for tanning. It must’ve looked ridiculous, four girls side to side on the balcony at 9 AM. We had breakfast and went straight to town where we went shopping for a bit and went to a café where we had something to drink. We didn’t stay there for long and we got picked up after an hour. It wasn’t as windy as the day before so we went to the beach again, for some tanning and swimming this time. When we went to the beach for the last time for some extra tanning and swimming. The sea wasn’t as cold as at for example Camps Bay where it is freezing.

I wouldn’t mind having a beach house here, it’s quiet and the beach is so close, spending your weekends here would be amazing. Just getting out of the city area and relaxing. Normally when you want to go to the beach you have to stay for quite a while to make it worthy to drive all the way to the beach but seeing that you can walk to the beach in less than three minutes you can just come and go.  We left Hermanus around 3 ‘o clock and dropped everyone off at home having a tan as a reminder for a nice weekend.

Garden Route day five

day five

Friday the 17^th of February. This was not only the last day of the Garden Route but it was also the last day of Julia’s and Kadi’s stay here in South Africa unfortunately. We decided to go running around 8 ‘o clock. It was really nice, it wasn’t too hot and the view was beautiful. We were surrounded by mountains and grazing cows. Afterwards, we had breakfast, scrambled eggs with bacon and toast again. We packed our bags, cleared out the lodges and left to go to Hermanus. At Hermanus we had 2 hours and 45 minutes to walk around. Hermanus is known for whale watching but unfortunately there are not many whales around this time of the year. We actually didn’t see any whales, the best time to go is around September. We went to an African market where we bought souvenirs for ourselves and our friends and family. 2 hours and 45 minutes is way too long and we just ended up sitting on the rocks at the sea. It was very windy and unsurprisingly, Yiyo’s (from Chili) blew off, into the sea. It was his favourite hat and was very upset. He walked down to the see and stood on the rocks, the waves crashing on the sides and splashing up to him. Even though he was very perseverant and stood there for fifteen minutes, he didn’t manage to get his cap back. It was almost time and we decided to walk back to the van. In the van, everyone finished their sweets and snacks and wrote some notes for Kadi and Julia. We arrived at bishops at 5 ‘o clock and the Garden Route was over.

It had been an amazing five days and it was a really good way to get to know each other better. Even though we spend most of the time in the bus, I really enjoyed myself and did some great things like the bungee jump. Luckily this is not our last trip and I am looking forward to the Cederberg Camp!