Weekend Update!

Sorry this is a little late all I've been feelin real lazy the last couple of days and needed a bit of a rest after the weekend!

I will be posting an entire blog this afternoon allll about my placement so be looking forward to that. I am feeling much better about it and have a REAL Community Organizing project that I will be pretty much in charge of so I am beyond excited. We have a program today on Child Protection and Child Rights in South Africa since it is Child Protection week here.

So Friday night we went as a pretty large group to this chic little restaurant, yet still quite inexpensive, and had dinner and drinks. It was tapas style but the cuisine was Indian/Mediterranean mixed. I had butter chicken (traditional Indian Cuisine) and Vietnamese Salad Rolls. For my first drink I had a Madagascar martini, that I know my mother would have loved, which had vanilla vodka, pineapple puree, and smashed ginger. Sounds strange but was real good. For my second drink I had a Mantra which was lemon juice, vanilla vodka, sugar, and limoncello, just for Andy. Also delish :) The restaurant was called asoka with a flat line over the first a! haha

Saturday was a perfect day all around. We woke up at about 8:30 and were off on the road by 9. We started on the West Coast of lower South Africa and went past Seal Island and took tons of picture along the coast by Fish Hoek. The roads are amazing, almost like the PCH in Cali, but less scary! Then we headed east and went to see the Penguins again at Simon's Town for those people who didn't go on our trip last time. We ate at a restaurant right on the waterfront which was pretty nice. After the penguins we went South to Cape Point and Cape of Good Hope. To get there you had to travel through a Nature Reserve and it was gorgeous. The nature here is just beyond anything I have ever experienced and Cape Point was really unique. There were stone walkways all the way up and colorful greenery and flowers and the views were breathtaking. Then we traveled a bit farther to Cape of Good Hope (these were the southern most points in Africa) and the beach was perfect weather for walking around and taking pictures and we stayed til Sunset and it was sooo pretty. I just sat on a rock and enjoyed :)

Sunday we got up at 4:00am! We had to travel to get to the coast in Gainsbaai for the Shark Cage Diving. We got there around 6:30 and had a nice breakfast and watched a documentary about what we would be doing and the sharks in Cape Town. It was quite interesting. I also took pictures with pictures of Brad Pitt, Leonardo Dicaprio, Matt Damon, and Anderson Cooper who have all also dove with the sharks with the same company. I felt special ;) We got onto the boat with all our gear and headed out to our spot. Along the way we spotted a whale, which I guess is relatively rare for this time of the year, so that was great. Once we got to our spot and saw the actual cage (it had been left there with bait to attract the sharks) my stomach got a little queasy! It was WAY smaller and dinkier than I expected it to be! haha. The queasiness may have also been from the horrendous stench coming from the seal island right next to us!

We put on our wetsuits, with MUCH struggle, and I jumped into the water to be part of the first dive. It was awesome! They came right up to our cage and we could see them so well. Then the other people went (there were 6 divers each dive) and we got to watch all the sharks from the boat. We saw some seals pass us frolicking in the waves and were taking pictures. Then about 2 minutes later we saw commotion about 100 feet away and the seal was eaten by the shark and the water turned alllll red and I started crying. of course :(

After that I had to wait a bit to get brave enough to get back in the water, and for my stomach to settle, and I got back into the cage. This dive was the best of them all! The shark came riiiight in front of my face and I was screaming with another girl here, Annie, under the water and near hyperventilating! Then another shark came by and charged at our cage and its tail whipped it and shook the whole thing! It was awesome!!! Then we packed up and went back to shore and had a nice warm meal. We stopped at the beach on the way home and also for some Gelato and the day was over and I was exhausted.

I will write later today all about my placement, hope you enjoyed more of my touristy updates :)

peace & love,
alyssa