January 21, 2008

Last night, after I wrote my journal entry for the day, we went out to La Med which is a club at Camp’s Bay. It is actually more of a bar than a club but it was a pretty strange scene. Half was outdoor and half was indoor but I guess that is the way things go when you have a club right on the beach and it is 70 degrees out at 9:00 at night. In reality, I did not want to go to the club because I knew that everybody else wanted to get wasted which is not my idea of a good time. Surprisingly, I started out having a very good time. Amanda, my roommate, and I went to the dance floor. Dancing at this place was very different than dancing at an American club. Back home, when you are at a club with friends, you need to keep a watchful eye out because guys love to come up behind random girls and “bump and grind”, as they say. Here, no guy tried to do that and the guys danced in their own groups. I was very intimidated by how good some of the people were on the dance floor but I still had fun. They also played a lot of American songs that you don’t hear in clubs back in the U.S. such as Build Me Up Buttercup (I was totally pumped about that one) and Summer of ’69. All of us American girls got so excited to hear songs that we knew and loved.

After a while, dancing got to be boring, nevermind the fact that we were all sweaty and gross. I went to find the guys that were with us and wound up talking to these really nice Africans. One was from Guguletu and his friends were from other townships, including Khayelitsha. They are bartenders at La Med and decided to stay and have a few drinks after work. Out of all of the people that I met there last night, they were the nicest. We also met a lot of Afrikaaners, the white inhabitants of South Africa, most of whom are rich. They were what made the night go from good to bad. Yes, to all of the girls out there, they are very very good looking but once you get past the outer exterior, they are pigs. First of all, they believed that all Americans are porn stars, complete partiers, and made all of these other assumptions that disgusted me. Then, according to some other people in the group, they asked whether or not we sided with the Africans in South Africa (about the whole apartheid thing and how the blacks want to be equal with the whites) but they did not call the Africans “Africans”. Instead, they called them a much worse word which also made me angry. The club used to be exclusively for whites during the apartheid days and now is mixed colors but mostly whites inhabit it and it seemed that most of them were the rich Afrikaaners or British boys out for a good time while on break. They were the snobbiest, most pompous people I have ever met and in saying that, I am being kind to their true nature. All they could talk about is how their parents sent them away to school in England but it did not work out so they are just living off of their parents money and are partying every night. I did not buy into their little “poor rich white boy” story but unfortunately, a lot of those in my company did. To make a long story short, by the end of the night, I was tired, pissed off, and slightly ashamed by how some of the groups of us were acting. It was a fun experience but once is enough for me. Although everybody else wants La Med to become a frequent place for us to go, I think I will opt to being the “party pooper” and staying at home by myself.

Last night just made me realize how different I am from everybody here, save for a couple few. Yes this is an honors program but most of the people here are like me, not in the honors program but have a decent enough GPA to be eligible for the program. Unlike me though, everybody else is an English major, a women’s studies major, other majors that do not require a lot of work. I am not trying to diss other majors but am just trying to say that my major, in order to maintain the GPA that I do, requires a lot more work and commitment. What I am trying to say is that once more, I feel like an outcast. The only people I feel slightly comfortable with are two of the guys but even they go off and do their own thing. Don’t get me wrong, I love it here but sometimes, it is a bit lonely and the company can be discouraging.

Today we had a day off and decided to relax. To all the Uconn kids, hope you had fun moving in today! I walked with a bunch of people to the store to get groceries. Apparently, the communal food thing that we had decided upon only about a week ago is no longer happening. Now each person buys their own food, labels it and there is no communalness going on at all. That is kind of annoying. Also, we originally agreed that of the community money that we all pitch in, we would buy toilet paper, laundry detergent and other cleaning supplies but I guess that plan went down the drain too. I feel like everybody is so petty and possessive. So far, living with 12 other girls is very exhausting and I feel as if I am the least liked out of them all. Oh well, what can you do right? Anyways, I need to get ready for our “family” braai. I love and miss you all!