New Friend

When we met at orientation, I hated you. I deemed you bossy, bitchy, irritating... only to discover later that it is because you have the same strong, dominant personality as I do.

I cannot get involved with you - do you understand that?

You remind me of a friend I once had. It's uncanny how much you are like her. Both swimmers (though you are the better one), both achievers in cultural and academic activities as well. The two of you have the same mannerisms, the same way of speaking, the same loud, outgoing personality.

Both supposedly insecure inside, but both super confident and intimidating on the outside.

Yet it is also uncanny how alike you and I are. We have been through so much of the same. We have the same relationship-life at the moment. The same sense of ambition and DRIVE. We enjoy the same activities, people, events, music, thoughts.

But I cannot get involved with you - do you understand that?

I know that we would be great friends. I know how well we would get along.

But I have these hooks that need to be attached to people, this neediness to make me feel good enough... and you have these holes in your life, and I will attach myself to you, and you might not be wanting that.

You do not realise it, but you are the stronger of the two of us. I can see myself lying to you, just to seem worthy to you, just to prove that I have been through enough pain and suffering to merit your acceptance.

I can see myself feeling inferior to you, I can see myself forgetting what I have achieved and done and what I am worth.

I can see our friendship being unhealthy, because I have been this way before. You see, that friend I had once, she really was so much like you. And I know, I know that the same thing that happened between me and her, is likely to happen betweeen us. Because, really, both of us are so needy.

And I am unsure that 7 years of healing has been enough to prepare me for another deep friendship, I am unsure if I have matured enough to be different, this time.

First Day in Cape Town

So today was the big day... This Eaglet spread her wings and started a solo flight.

I'd been packing for days, it's been very emotionally draining... and saying goodbye was heart wrenching. Pappa cried, Mamma cried, my sister and brother cried... and Chris was there too to see me off, and he cried too. We all cried. He kissed me in front of my family, which wa the first time ever. It was a nice kiss though, not an all-over-the-floor-PDA-kiss.

I cried. I cried a lot during the 90-minute flight, eating the chocolate Chris bought me. The ladies next to me didn't say anything, maybe it's good. Maybe they didn't notice.

I think a lot now. Did I make the right choice? Will I enjoy the Western Cape? Is Stellenbosch where I belong?

It was a pretty good day though, apart from the accute sadness. The people i'm spending the night with are good friends of Pappa's and the food is great too.

And they took me to the Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens! You don't understand how beautiful it is... I'll have to post pictures soon! It's not something you can describe... realizing that this country has so many wow plant species! And it's a lovely place to have a romantic picnic, or to just relax and clean your mind.

I think... I think i will enjoy it here.
But I do miss my family and love so very much.

Rant on State Inefficiency

Today I went to the very centre of the city.

I spent four hours on foot, dodging bad taxi drivers and trying to maintain a 360° view so as to prevent becoming a snatch and run victim. I also spent those 4 hours being one of only two white South Africans in, say, a 1km radius.

Now, I know I've been living in South Africa my whole life, but... I was scared. Scared because I could see the shapes of revolvers in some men's pockets. Scared because I didn't like the way the young boys tried rubbing up on me. Scared because, I guess, I wasn't quite used to the kind of streets I was now traipsing through.

I think I started getting used to it though.

What I couldn't get used to, though, was the complete inefficiency.

It took the lady at the court half an hour to make a photocopy of someone's ID in the room next door. Home affairs, Social Service Agencies and the courthouse: they all have ridiculously long queues, buildings that are in such a state that they should be deemed inhabitable and employees who have close to no clue what they are doing.

And they seem to take tea breaks every half-hour.

I understand fully that with our economy, things are not always available as they should be, and people don't always have the education they should have. Fine.

But is it that difficult to send a clerk or any other employee to a course to teach them to look at people when they talk to you? BECAUSE I CAN'T HEAR YOU WHEN YOU ARE TALKING TO THE FLOOR!

At home affairs, the lady taking my details almost declared me MALE! Which must mean she was obviously paying no attention to my decisively female voice or the fact that I was wearing pretty earrings and a shiny hairband and makeup for pete's sake. It's not that difficult.

And at social services nobody had any idea what we were talking to and when we asked someone if his name was so-and-so, he gave us an ugly look, said, "yes, so?" and walked on.

Yes, verrrry professional.

Now, dear government, if I am expected to go on a course with my domestic helper so that we can understand each other's language better, why can you not send your employees on courses to make them more efficient.

It's not rocket science!

After today I am fed up and just about hopeless. I am actually surprised that anything gets done in this country.

Because even if I one day figured out a way of solving some of our country's problems, there would probably be too much beaurocracy and inefficiency to put it in place.