Pictured Above: Me and my three other fellow students here in Cape Town this month for CFHI, posing during our decent from the top of Lion's Head (other photos from the hike will be posted later!). The city bowl descending from signal hill and the bay is visible to the right.
Clockwise from top: Kelsey, Christie, myself, and Lindsey.
Sorry for the delay between posts, I had written this in the McDonalds last night but lost my 1hr connection before I could post. Still, the first couple days here in Cape Town have been great!
The journey was quite a ride, which included no less than an hour flight to DC (with a 6 hour layover), a 17 hour flight to Johannesburg (with a stop in Dakar, Senegal) and a final 2 hour leg to Cape Town, overall, about 29 hours of travel. I met a few interesting people during the flights including a young woman who was half-Senegalese, half Italian, and spoke French and worked in a French school in the Ivory Coast teaching biology. Plus she could talk to me, so that's a total of four languages. Pretty impressive! Needless to say, I'm glad I made it.
The weather has been wonderful, Mediterranean-esque, with strictly sunny days so far. Yet of course here in the Southern Hemisphere we approach the winter months, which really means rain and temperatures dipping to around 15-20C (50s and 60s F).
I am living in a middle-class suburb with a host family of retired teachers and their youngest son who is 24 years old. They have been friendly and show a good knack for cooking, though I haven't tried anything too exotic yet.
I have also met a few of the program coordinators, who have been able to discuss with us the history, demographics, and health care system of South Africa and the Cape Town region. Instead of jumping right into our clinical rotations we spent the day riding in the car of a social worker friendly with CFHI who was an expert on the history, neighborhoods and people of Cape Town. It was fascinating listening to her endless accounts and stories. Already having a significant portion of my 10th grade history class devoted to studying exclusively South Africa, I was already familiar with much of the history (snaps to you, Dr. Greenspan), but it was certainly interesting to hear it again. Most of the neighborhoods we toured were exclusive to one of the main ethnic groups: black african, cape coloured (a mixed race of asian, indian, black, and white), and white. Nineteen years after the end of apartheid, the racial divisions in Cape Town remain strong, a division that wasn't as evident when the world's eyes were turned to South Africa for the previous World Cup.
By the end we were exhausted. After a good night's sleep, we set off today for the University of Western Cape to be registered as students, enabling us to do the tours and rotations we will be experiencing. We then succeeded in transporting ourselves to the other end of town to climb the Lion's Head peak. A bit of a challenge, about the same-more rugged than the ladders in Acadia.
Other highlights to look forward to include the Garden Route from Friday through Sunday, which transitions straight into our rural encounter the following week. Sadly, no posts may come during (expect no McDonalds restaurants), but there will be plenty of stories after!
Hope all are well, miss you and thinking about you!
Totsiens,
David
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