I havn't been to Cape Town since I was ten. And as you may know, it's a big gap between ten and eighteen. Maybe not in years, but at least in interests and experiences. I hear about Cape Town all the time, and had to make it a priority to visit it this (Northern Hemisphere) summer.
Day One
I arrived in Cape Town (off the plane) from Johannesburg at about 23.30. Why so late? It was cheaper that way. My host (the daughter of family friends who works for Cosmopolitan Magazine, SA edition) asked if I was tired. I answered a negatory, and was then whisked off to Long Street to go out and play. Long Street is the liveliest thing I've seen in the way of night life since I've been to SA. It was very much alive. Like a whole street of people out to have a good time, and as the name implies it was a long street. First stop was a backpackers (SA version of a youth hostel) which had a bar (or lounge?). We ended up on a balcony with Christmas lights, that for some reason didn't look tacky, even though it was the middle of July. Just when I thought I was dying of boredom (I didn't know anyone there) someone started playing some unbelievable jazz and we moved inside. It was such that I cant even describe it, and it was just a guitar, a bass guitar and drums. I guess it also had to do with it being such an intimate setting too, they were on floor level. As the music continued, one of my host's friends decided it would be a good idea to have Jaegermeister shots. In Vienna (I know because I had to buy someone one once in exchange for street sign which I never recieved and is still at large some where, god knows where) they are tiny. A third of a shot glass. The clown bartender, however, filled champagne glasses two-thirds full of Jaegermeister. I mean isn't that stuff expensive? It is imported. But maybe he was excited, as I doubt they get many orders for Austrian medicinal alchohol. After that, it started to wind down, some of my host's friends left, and we went on to Lola's across the street. I really wanted to go to Lola's, but her guys friends vetoed it, citing "wierd people", which I think may have been a euphemism for too many stoners or something. Next stop was a place I never got the name of, but it was part bar, part lounge, and part club. The bar had run out of juice (just my luck) so rather thristily I moved down to the club. The music was good for like 10 mins, then something bad happened to it, which I can't described. But it was just bad. The dance area it self was pretty cool, and would have been very cool had it been full. You had to go downstairs to the dancefloor, and the only light was provided by a candle that the DJ was using to see what he was doing as he scracthed his disks (three) and also light from a pool area. Once again I was bored, as of my hosts two male escorts she was dancing with one, and the other one seemed to be trying to figure out how he could cut in. So after growing bored of watching some wierd pagan-circle dance some people had started trying to find a way to enjoy the bad house music, I nominated to go find the Falafel stand that had been alluded to (I hadn't eaten in several hours, and the kitchens of most places on long street had closed while I was still at the airport). The guy who'd been dancing said he'd come with me, and the other guy finally got his chance to dance. The Falafel line was on it's own a mini adventure. We waited for about an hour or more (the only food available on a long street full of party goers, half of which probably had the muchies). In line I met someone from where my mom is from, and chatted to them in attempt to stop them fighting with my escort, a group of guys who claimed to be from India (they had SA accents) who denounced the caste system (they claimed to be from the highest caste) and wanted to know where they could find a place still happening at that time, as well as a very very wack MC (lame wanna be rapper) who dissed me in his rhyme and still expected me to pay for food for him? Give me a break. Anyway, when I eventually got my Falafel, we went back to the club. The bouncer at the door tried to stop us, but we just ignored him, then the bouncer downstairs made us turn back. We stood in the cold enjoying our Falafels and waiting for the other to come out. On the way home, we drove through amazingly thick fog, and got stuck on the side of the road because we ran out of petrol. Fortunately we called someone who brought us 4 litres of petrol at about 3 in the morning. It was all pretty funny, and I wasn't even scared because at least there was a guy in the car in case some passing motorist felt the need to casually harass us.
Day 2:
I woke up, and my host hadn't slept in her side of the bed. I met her room mate, and wandered around the apartment snooping their book shelf and taking pictures of the amazing view. I was also suprised to find my Falafel buddy wandering around the apartment in just a towel, but glad also because I was hoping he could break into my suitcase for me as I couldn't find my key. Needless to say after my suitcase had been broken into for me, I found the key. But I hope they had fun at least doing it. Eventually my host returned, and in concern for her sudden dissapearence I sort of had let slip who I thought she might have been with, which resulted in massive teasing from her room mate, and all the other friends who chose to crawl into the restaraunt owned by her room mate with hang overs (I was the only one not hung over).
After breakfast at my hosts's roomie's restaraunt (the food was awesome), I went to UCT to visit with a kidyhood family friend. I've seen him once in the past 5 yrs, but it was a nice visit. I met his girl friend (who was nice and from my mom's home town), and I was shown several dorms, and he drove me around the campus which was gorgeous. One of my kiddyhood freind's friends didn't come home the night before. A young man by the name of Jerry who has a propencity for these sort of things. So we wandered the streets all afternoon looking for him which was quite interesting. We stopped to ask a lady where the police statio nwas in our search for Jerry, and she knew where it was as her daughter had been arrested for fraud. After promising to say hi to her daughter for her, we made our way to the ploce station. When we got to the station, after waiting for 30 mins the cops deigned to get up from their hang out session to attend to querries. They refused to check the holding cell, claiming it was too full. "You could just stand there and call out Jerry" we insisted, but we met with a no, come back tomorrow to file him missing if he's not back yet. I still don't know if Jerry ever got back home, and thinking about it I hope her did. One guy who also wanted to have the holding cell checked, an insisted he needed to know, so he could check the morgue, as his brother had been in a serious fight. Basically that Friday night had been jumping, virtually everyone I met was hung over, but was the cost too high? I hope he found his brother.
After UCT I went to join my host who was getting her hair braided. Getting one's hair braided is an all day, sometimes even two day, event. We went home with the braider who had a three week old baby she was anxious to get home to, so my host could finish her braids. I have never been to any townships really, other than Soweto (and even then I visited someone's mansion there), and Umlazi where my mom's family lives. I'd never been in a shack before. However the shack in Khayelitsha where the lady who braided lived in was quite nice, in so far as shacks. She had furniture, and rooms, and it looked pretty sturdy. It looked pretty much like a four room house, in so far as I could see. Drunk people kept trying to come in. We watched TV with her family, and this one inebriated fellow, who for some reason wasn't kicked out tried to chat up my host, and prove I know Xhosa (which I know only very a little of, and pretended not to know any). I was also almost crushed on the couch where I was sitting as someone annoying tried to regale me about his travels. People seemed to want to tell me about where they'd been, and lived in Johannesburg, but I didn't really care. Cape Town is cooler then Johannesburg I must say, not matter how disloyal it may sound.
We then went back to Long Stree to eat dinner at this awesome place called Royale, across the street from Lola's. I paid R100 that night for us to get in to this club where DJ Fresh was supposed to be playing, but we must have gotten there late because there was no fresh, not to mention my friend who had said he'd be there. After scoping out the club (Pata Pata) which had seperate house and Hip hop/ R&B floors, we left.
Day 3
My last day in Cape Town I took it easy, we had breakfast at the Olympic Cafe at Kalk Bay, and shopped along that area. Then we stopped at the restaurant so I could make my good byes, and we hit a mall on the way to the airport.
Over all, a pretty good trip. I would definately recomend a visit to Cape Town.
