Things to be grateful for

At the start of December I attended a Thanksgiving dinner at Beth Uriel (BU). This is a house or rather, a home, where young men who come from difficult backgrounds are offered a place to finish school and/or tersiary studies. A lot of the guys don't like to talk about family or their childhood years, but they are more than willing to chat about their plans for the future. Consequently the guy who I was assigned to - lets call him J - never really answered any questions I posed about his family life. But it didn't matter. Turns out our first lesson at BU, it was me who had to learn something.
It somehow occurred to me that it was up to him whether he wanted to tell me anything at all, and I declined offers from counselors at the house to fill me in on the details. Who was I to dig into his past? I decided to let him be who he wanted to be in front of me, to let him make the decision about whether he wants to tell me anything at all.  It turned out to be a good decision and in fact I don't think he would have had it any other way. He could easily have refused my tuition - there are a stock of other tutors to choose from, all people who show up once the church has directed them to BU.
But J and I have struck up a strange friendship. He stays in his world and I in mine (and I can't decide if this bothers me or not), but he knows if he wants to know something about Afrikaans, he can call me. And I know if I need to be grounded, to be reminded that life is actually much simpler than I tend to make it, there is Beth Uriel and J. He jokes around with me about my work stress, I ask him about his love of rugby and the family life at BU. Sometimes I chat to the other guys (when neither of us feel like studying), or bring him books I think he might like. I save all my Huisgenoot magazines for him, he offers me a cup of tea when we work late. I don't know if I made even a little bit of difference with his Afrikaans marks (though I sincerely hope I have!), but J was the one who invited me to the dinner and I felt really honoured to be remembered.

Little did I know that I would yet again learn something from him, instead of him from me.

The thing that struck me most about the Thanksgiving dinner - perhaps predictably so - was the bright red Wall of Gratitude. Each and every resident of the house had to write down what they were grateful for and stick it on the kitchen wall. Once everyone - guests and residents included - were gathered for dinner (a traditional American meal with turkey and all the bells and whistles, my first ever!) we all had to say what we were grateful for.

People's reactions were mixed - some were shy, some were excited. Everyone got to say something. Some were grateful for family, some were grateful for Beth Uriel. Others were grateful to have friends, a meal. When my turn came, I thanked Beth Uriel (while all the while thinking of J) for allowing me to help and for just being my friend in return. J might not know it, but our tutoring sessions helped me as much as it did him. 

The whole experience also got me thinking about the rest of my year - not just the one with J and Beth Uriel, but also at work, in my friendships and in my personal life. I have a lot to be grateful for. A lot. So now, with this year coming to an end tomorrow night, I've decided to do another list of things to be grateful for. May it inspire you all to do the same! If you can think of just one thing that you would have stuck on the BU wall, I think you have a reason to go into the new year with a smile. Here goes!

1. I got engaged to a wonderful man.
2. I got to help someone out and make a friend in the process.
3. I have a big, wonderful, colourful family (umm... I still have to do a post about Christmas, don't I?)
4. Fiance and I found a place to stay in next year!
5. My mom and I had a good, much needed bonding session on Christmas day.
6. I have been averaging 3 sessions of exercise for the past few weeks. Yay!
7. I did have writers block and a mini-breakdown (sigh, yes! I even went to a psycologist! Will tell all at a later stage, perhaps in the Christmas post..) BUT I'm writing right now and I feel like I'm learning a hell of a lot through all my stressing-outedlness! :) 
8. My lovely friend is here from Pretoria (one of the bridesmaids).
9. I now have 8 bridesmaids. Eight! I know, I know. But just think of the party we're gonna have! :)
10. I will end off the year with (yet another) dinner party in the beautiful Bo-Kaap, with my fiance and our two best friends. Isn't that the loveliest new year's party you can imagine?

Running? Tick. Planning a wedding? Tick (esp now that I've got EIGHT right hands!). Learning something? Tick. Making friends? Definitely tick!! :) :) Happy New Year friends!! I leave you with a pic of me, J and the Gratitude Wall.

 

pulling faces, of couse! :) Thank you, J!

Big poofy dresses and love stories and things...

Sigh. Believe it or not, I am still on the subject of the dress. Laurie-the-fun-journalist once told me and Lesley (the friend who recently got married, where I cried my eyes out) that she still doesn't know if she likes her wedding dress. At first I was puzzled.

"You have this idea in your head," she said over coffee and a generous slice of cake for each of us, "but then you get to the shops and you try things on and it all changes. And before you know it, you've bought a big, poofy wedding dress, like the ones they have in the movies."

But now I know what she means. Yes, I know I told you all I've followed my gut feeling. But is a gut feeling supposed to make you feel all swooney and airy? This is what I wrote to Laurie last week:

"Laurie, I have to share this with you. Remember how you said that you still don’t know if you like your wedding dress, because the industry just confuses you and before you know it you have a princess dress instead of what you had in mind?

It happened to me. I bought a bloody ballgown!

Tell me it’s okay? I thought I was going to be an edgy, modern bride with an unusual dress. One that looked sexy instead of big and poofy. But I am officially now poofy! Big! Poofy! Big! Did I say poofy?

I am already plotting a second outfit. One that is edgy and modern and sexy....

But here’s my problem: what if I just don’t want to take the big white one off? What if I am mesmerized again when I come close to it and I just can’t get it off me on the night? I don’t know how it happens, but whenever I have it on I get this wistful, happy, silly smile on my face. That’s instead of the sexy, shy, cool one I had planned.

I will simply have to get my bridesmaids to drag me kicking and screaming from the hall, remove it by force and make me put on my sexy second outfit. That’s all." 

This is what Laurie wrote back: 

"Do not be afraid.
When the bridal fairies sew up these dresses in the Magical Kingdom of Weddings, far, far away, they sprinkle magic dust on them that, when inhaled, completely intoxicates the young maiden trying on the gown.... do not be afraid. You will be a princess bride. There is something magical about a wedding dress. I firmly believe they choose you, and not the other way around. The dress that wants to be yours will be yours - no matter what. It will hypnotize you and make you fall in love with it. And once you fall in love with it, you will love it forever.


If you insist on your edgy outfit - which I think is a SMASHING idea - then make a pact with your bridesmaids that AFTER the first dance (because you want to be a fairy bride and wear the dress that made you fall in love with it) you can change into Modern Edgy Bride.

Embrace it, because you just can't fight it...."

Sigh. I think I will trust Laurie on this one... not so sure even about the second outfit now. So here is a nice Taylor Swift video to get us all into the swooney, lovey-dovey mood....

Progress

Progress indeed!

Making friends: We have a new housemate (again!)! What a lovely busy house we have. I'll call her the American Journalist. She moved in yesterday and she works as a freelancer for probably the best newspaper in the country. Her focus at the moment is environmental journalism. Very, very inspiring!

Running a marathon: As I said in the last post, I've decided to not allow myself to run a race again before I've run at least three to four times a week for four weeks in a row. So I'm halfway through the second week after the last race, and I've run three times and gone swimming once. Not bad, I think, though I probably could have done more. I'm planning another running session in lunchtime today and a last one tomorrow morning - before I whisk off to Pretoria for the second weekend in a row. 

Planning a wedding: Invitations almost all sent out! I may also have found the perfect shoes for the bridesmaids, at a very good price. So excited. Still don't have a DJ, though, because the one we wanted is already booked. Bleh. Don't know WHAT we're going to do. Dancing is the best part of the party! 

Learning something: So this is probably not exactly what I had in mind when I imagined learning stuff, but I've realized that stres really affects me badly. As I've said, things are better at work since I've got a better idea of what I have to do for the next three issues of our magazine, but the past month - when we went on double deadline - really is showing. I stopped running (as was demonstrated in the bad race two weeks ago), I picked up weight (stres causes an uncontrollable craving for doughnuts, it seems. And it doesn't help that my Muslim colleagues know all the anties who make the best doughnuts in town and keeps bringing us boxes of those evil sugary luxuries almost every week). My skin also breaks out, I can't stop scratching when I'm this stressed and I don't sleep. BUT exercise makes all the difference, so I am even more committed to my running regime after this month. Let's hope the workload doesn't get out of hand before Christmas. I do have a wedding coming up, after all!

Learning something no2: My mom's best friend just published her first book, and reading it on the plane back to Cape Town from Pretoria last weekend brought up some interesting emotions. I have written something about it but I'm still contemplating if I should publish... watch this space.

Happy week

The loveliness of getting married seems to creep up on me slowly, but surely. It's like waves, actually. Every now and then it whacks you dizzy. And this week is dizzily-happy week!

Why?
1. I saw one of my lovely bridesmaids over the weekend and we had a lovely, big, girly chat on a beautiful winefarm.
2. I saw another one last night (cousin Zaria! She is still as mad as a hatter.)
3. Another one is coming to visit for New Years (New Years in Cape Town, whooohoo!!)
4. In a week and a half's time, another, different one is getting married.
5. I have a gazillion bridesmaids!!!! 
6. Tomorrow is Friday.
7. Work is better (I've been a bit negative lately)
8. I went for a run this morning (AND I've been healthy all day. Not a piece of cake or muffin in sight!)
9. We just booked our tickets to go see mom over Christmas (my mom).
10. I have a beautiful new photograph of husband-to-be on my desk at work. He looks dangerously handsome in it. Dangerously, I say. And I'm marrying him!

Also, lovely filmmaker of Butterfly Films screened a new film this week, and has a new website up. Stunning! Film is about a rehabilitation program running in our prisons now and I think it is a very, very worthy cause. Check out filmmaker's new website and film here.



So the happy list above should give you an idea of my progress, but do not be fooled: the run this weekend went horrific. Besides that I started slow and negative, I also went for a katabox class the Monday before with energetic Michael, the instructor, making us do all kinds of kicks and fancy tricks that had my hamstrings screaming bad words at me. I finished the race, but my time was that of a negative hamstring-carrying girl: 2 hours 43 mins (even slower than the previous one, which I called a 'training run'. Yea right). If it wasn't for a new friend that I made on the way, who knows what that time would have been...
But am going to stop the wordiness now and leave you with some pics.

so you can tell how positive I was if I was counting kilometres.....

like I said. Incredibly positive. See that puddle? that was me, not the water

more positive....

It was only when I started focusing on the view that it got a bit better. Shortly after, Vanessa entered the picture...



well done Vanessa! She got her pink number - this was her 10th Winelands marathon!



Eat Pray Love

I saw the movie this week and I think it's a good theme for the past week. For a good life, actually - not just one year of finding yourself. Elizabeth Gilbert and Oprah has this belief in common, something I believe too. Oprah says: "If you want to accomplish the goals of your life, you have to begin with the spirit."

I am so with them on that.

As I said last week, I was struggling with the premarriage course, but decided to reserve judgement until the end. I was right - it turned out better than I thought. Here is the lowdown....

This is what I wrote after the first installment of the course: (putting it in red so you can feel the fury)

Eeeeeeeek. It was damn difficult to spend an entire weekend focusing on our relationship! It left me feeling like our relationship has been put under a huge magnifying glass and taken apart by strict-looking, purist scientists. Some of the discussions went like this: in some homes, people have different cloths for the floor and the dishes, whereas in other homes, people just clean up a mess on the floor with the closest dishcloth. Which one do you usually use and what do you expect your partner to do? Then filling in exercises about the rules (like aforementioned one) that your parents had in their home.
Pause, please.
Rules? RULES??? People have rules in their marriages? AAAAHHHHH!!!!!!

As you can see, I wasn't very positive. I also don't respond very well to structure (as I now know), so the rigid hours - starting at 9am sharp, having only 10 minute coffee breaks and about 3 seconds of lunch - did not go down well. But then a few things occurred to me. A few surprising, important things.

1.) We made two lovely friends on the course. It's another couple who loves blogging, computer games and wedding planning.  (please tick off 'making friends' for this week).
2.) Besides the dishcloth issue, we revealed some serious stuff about ourselves to each other. Necessary stuff, but in a safe environment. (When the dishcloth thing came up, we just gave each other a confused sideways glance: 'nearest cloth okay?' - 'totally')
3.)  The fact that the couples who were presenting doesn't have divorced parents, doesn't make them perfect or naive, it just means they have less trouble believing.
4.) Some of them actually have divorced parents.
5.) Every single couple in that room will be there to pray for us when we someday need it, and I'm sure we will, because most couples do.
6.) God and praying suddenly starts making a lot of sense when you realize that in fact no matter what we promise or do, we can't guarantee anything. We can only trust God.

I gathered some useful info from some of my married colleagues as well:
Maret: "We didn't do a course, we went to the dominee. He said that we must remember there are different things that make a woman and a man feel loved: Men want to know that you trust him with your life, that you respect his opinion. Women want to feel safe and loved. Remember that and you should be fine."

Saafia: "When I went to the molenaar before I got married for my 'coaching', I was very negative. I thought he was going to give me the whole obedient wife spin that muslim women have to know. But it was lovely. He said 'Saafia, don't worry. Just remember if you want to paint the house blue, you can't just paint it blue. You must discuss it with your husband first. And that's true for most of the rest, too.'"

So last night we cooked pasta for our new friends from the course (also made quick emergency trip to get pizza after fiance had an unfortunate run-in with the pasta), ate chocolate, drank wine, and thanked God that we have this wonderful life where we can eat, pray and love all in our very own home.

Amen!

PS: A picture of Oprah for you. Not that I think you don't know what she looks like. But guess what? This picture was taken at the cakemaker's. Oprah's had a cake made at our cakemaker!! AAAHHH! I share a cakemaker with OPRAH!!!! It is very, very cool. Very!!!!!! I must remember to ask Jackie (that's the wife of Charly from Charly's Bakery) the story behind it. Apologies to everyone who thinks this is very superficial. I am sorry, and I promise I did not know this when I chose the cakemaker (and would not choose a cakemaker on this basis), but I am v, v big fan and I .... AAAHHHHH!!!!! .... can't believe it.

  

Fearless - a sneak preview to the next post...

(Isn't she stunning? I love her story)

premarriage courses freak me out and I shouldn't design wedding dresses

Happy Movember! Fiance is growing his moustache and this is in support of him. Whoohoo!

Despite my happy introductory pic, I must admit this week has been quite a rollercoaster ride of emotions. Fiance and I started a premarriage course last weekend, and it has awakened all kinds of fears in me that I am struggling to deal with. However, I have decided to reserve judgement about the course and how I feel about the whole thing until it is finished, which is this weekend, so for now I am just doing a progress report with some pictures of my week...

Making friends: We have a new housemate! I shall call her Housemate 2 for now, until I have a better description. She came at a very opportune time - I was in the process of an emotional cookie-baking week. 



Decorating batch 1



Batch 2 before it went to the oven



The (very rickety, but well-loved) oven



Our lovely kitchen

 Running a marathon: Marathon? What marathon? What with all the cookies and emotions flying around, I haven't been doing much in the line of running. But yesterday I ran 7km, so at least I can't say I've done nothing. I also entered for my next 21km - to be run on 20 November in Stellenbosch. Yay for running! 


Planning a wedding: I have found the dress!!! Friends, I realize you might be confused, because Fifi was supposed to make my dress, right? Well, she did. And she did everything I asked her to do - everything! But the problem is, I am not a designer. Nor am I a dressmaker or awesome wedding planner that have lots of knowledge about fabric and things. My idea of a wedding dress (which she was probably questioning all along) was actually a bit... impractical. Very. So I paid Fifi her fee, took the dress home and then swiftly packed it in my basket of clothes that I won't use soon. Then I walked into a wedding dress shop and bought the only dress of all the hundreds of dresses that I've tried on the past few months that actually made me look twice. It fits well, it doesn't look like a cake instead of a dress, and it made me feel like I could walk down the aisle on my Daddy's arm tomorrow.     



There it is! Safely packed away in its bag, just waiting to be worn.

Learning something: One shouldn't think things through too much. Sometimes going on a gut feeling is enough. Fiance - like this dress - is my gut feeling. And that's what I'm going to hold onto while we do the second installment of the premarriage course this weekend.

a church, a wedding, God, a friend and two dogs.

I am sorry this is late!!! I am guilty as charged, I skipped my Sunday blogging. To my defense, work was crazy (and still is) BUT my loyal best girl fans gave me a kick in the behind and so here, finally, is the promised post. It is a little emotional, a little spiritual, and a lot of happy. Enjoy!

So I was going to write about a lot of stuff that happened the past week, like the fact that I hung out with the lovely artsgang (see pic).......

artsgang members 1 and 2 - the yoga instructor and the german one. These are the people who you MUST know if you ever visit our little town Mtunzini, in Zululand. they are lovely. These and two below are the people who I can read poems and stories with, and they are always producing new stuff. member 2 thought up the name 'artsgang' for us bunch of looneys.  



artsgang members 3 and 4. number 3 is philosophy professor (can you see it?) and his wife is v. cool. She writes and listens and studies psycology and makes best seafood paella I've ever tasted. They also have a grandhild who is the next Barbie. It's adorable!


...and the fact that fiance and I had a visit with the dads (yes, I have two and their dating. Have been for 16 years). I won't say much about them, besides that they live in Zululand and look at the room we slept in...




yes, that is the new SA flag. yes, those pillows are of the old SA flag. Ask no questions, hear no lies. All I'll say is that my dads have an interesting sense of humour.


I was even going to write that I had a hectic week at work and am thinking of stres management classes and all kinds of things. But then I got to my friend Lesley's wedding and I forgot everything.

So this post is dedicated to my fellow journalist friend and her lovely husband, Pieter. You may have noticed that I don't usually use names, but I've decided to use their names for this post because they are so open and honest about their story, and I think it can serve as food for thought for anyone. This is the part where I get a bit emotional and a bit spiritual...

I remember meeting Lesley that first day she walked into the newspaper office in Zululand and thinking: 'mmm... I don't know if we'll get along so well. She's way too churchy...'.
But then Lesley became a friend, and very soon her churchy-ness became a big comfort in a scary newspaper world. We shared chocolate muffins (I'm lying, we each ate our own!), wished Laurie (the other, fun journalist who didn't yet share our office) would come visit to input stories on the system (I don't think she ever got anything done when we were there, we just talked to her all the time), and we complained about deadlines and difficult sources to each other. Lesley  never made me feel like I should be going to church, or was bad for not going, or anything like that - and this is big, because it is not very hard to make me feel guilty. Whenever something bad happened, she would just say that she's praying over it. I didn't think much of it, but times weren't always easy for me and some days I found myself hoping that Lesley was praying. She seemed to be like my grandmother - one of those people with a direct line to God.

During that time a lot of hectic things happened at the paper. I saw a very nasty accident one day, one I couldn't really cope with. I had anxiety attacks, I felt nervous constantly, I couldn't cross a street without thinking that I might be run over or something. One morning the editor walked in to tell me Lesley was going to be late, because she'd been in an accident over the weekend. She had been on duty that weekend, and parking at yet another accident scene, a drunk driver passing the scene smashed into her little brown VW Beetle. Luckily, she was okay. (But Beetle was no more, and after that she had to drive some other fancy white thing).

A few times she invited me to church, once I even went. For some reason (and Lesley doesn't know this), I was fighting back tears in church that morning. Afterwards I just gushed about the chocolate cake they give after service to take attention away from the teary thing. But the thing is, standing there in church with her felt like I was eight years old again and in my grandmother's church. It felt good. Safe, happy and right - even though church and God still didn't make complete sense to me.

Somewhere in the middle of all of this, Lesley met Piet. She'd always been a bit of a head-in-the-clouds person, but now she became like a full on airy-fairy, a goner. Half the time you had to snap your fingers to get her back to reality. And she started learning Afrikaans. Her first word? 'Asemrowend'. It means 'you take my breath away.' Three guesses who said that to her! (well done, Piet!) 

About the same time, I took a break to do a course in Cape Town and ran into - which I didn't know at the time - the man who would be my fiance in the near future. Lesley and I started dreaming together. I told her I was crazy about him, she told me she and Piet went on a date. Then I moved and not long after - ping! Engaged! Both of us! Within a month or two from each other, we both promised our lives to these men.

As fiance and I drove through sugarcane farms to get to the venue this weekend, I basked in being home - Zululand. Smelling the sweet sugarcane and feeling the breeze, spending time with the dads, seeing Laurie the fun journalist.

Lesley did not take her eyes off Piet even once as she walked down the path to him. When she got there, she held his hands like she was holding on to life. The wedding car? A VW Beetle. And when it came time to say the vows (they wrote their own), the very English Lesley said hers to Piet in Afrikaans, while the very Afrikaans Piet said his to Lesley in English.

Me? I bawled my eyes out. Couldn't stop crying. At first I didn't really know why. Laurie the fun journalist said it's 'coz I was there from the very beginning, and someone else says it's because I'm getting married soon. But I've been to weddings before - lots of them. So this is where my own history came in a bit. I realized that Lesley and Piet, who have been so very dedicated to each other and who has not for one second pretended that they have the power to keep their own marriage together but that it is God who will keep it safe, has allowed me to believe in marriage again.

I got engaged in complete happiness, but it was mixed with a large element of surprise. My parents (as you might have noticed) are divorced. My friends's parents are divorced... I barely know a happily married couple and before my amazing fiance, who refused to stop believing in me or in love, came along, I was a bit doubtful whether I would ever get married. But Lesley and Piet, together with fiance's dedication, have shown me that it's okay to suspend your cynical side and believe in marriage. To let it be special, to let it be something meaningful instead of just something people do becuase everyone else is doing it. And to put everything into it.

So this weekend, fiance and I are starting a premarriage course at church, and after the wedding, we prayed for our marriage. I am still grappling with these things - I don't always agree on things they say in church and I once even mailed Lesley in a rage about a sermon - but I have found there is one thing that stays constant: the safety. God is a place, like Lesley and Piet, where it's okay to believe in love, in the fact that somewhere, someone is looking over you and your relationship, and to be okay with the fact that you don't know how to keep a marriage or relationship together, because God does know.

Filmmaker has been the drum I bounce everything off on morning walks and communal breakfast in our beautiful home. She is wonderful free soul, it seems, who despite having her own heartaches, still does not hold back in sharing my joy about getting married.

So, dear friends, I leave you with a pic of the happy couple, as well as a few lovely pics from the filmmaker who has been listening to all my laments each morning as we walk the neigbour's adorable dogs through beautiful Bo-Kaap and into the mountain.

congratulations!



ahh... bliss.

Dog and mountain pics by filmmaker at Butterfly Films.

Dirty dancing

 This week's entry is a picture post. Finally! you can all meet my lovely Filmmaker house mate and see what the view looks like from our awesome stoep (above). So let me talk you through it... but be prepared - it was one crazy week in my life, and it just got crazier as the weekend went on. Some clues: dinner party, dancing with wild abandon, a dressmaker called Fifi, a cakemaker covered in glitter and 21.1 kilometers. Am tired, wired and happy. Goals? I killed them! Hope you enjoy it :)

Friday night: the dinner party.

The Filmmaker! Doesn't she just look like a person you'd like to know? Here she is with a pot from her friend Auntie Patty. There is a pink ceramic cat in the kitchen window that's also from Auntie Pattie, whom I don't know at all but it seems she's got good taste in ceramic/pot-like stuff. 

 

 

Post dinner party: 'Coz I've had the time of my life... 

I've never felt like this before, I swear...

...and I owe it all to YOU! (fiance on other side of camera...)

  All I'll say is I take no responsibility for that which happens under influence of Johnny and Baby magic. After all, 'nobody puts Baby in the corner'!

 By Saturday, I was ready to take on the wedding planning. Stop 1: my dressmaker, Fifi. She is a Zimbabwean woman living in Woodstock. She took my measurements while her husband (clothed in robe) and kids (three beautiful girls - Patricia, Melinda and Gloria) were watching a comedy show in the same room. She says I should send you all a hello. So here it is! 

damn I'm sorry I can't get this pic turned around... 

 Next up cake shopping! From Fifi's I met up with fiance to go to the lovely Charly's Bakery I mentioned in an earlier post. Just look at their goodies... 

Meet Jacky, our cake maker. You can't see it on the pic, but her face is covered in glitter from all the cupcakes on the counter in front of her. 

Aim....

...and scan!!!

Third stop: registries. Enter fiance, the scan king:

Saturday night is when things got really interesting. You can put this part of the entry under 'learning things'. I kind of agreed to go to a two hour full moon dance class with live music while still under influence of Dirty Dancing awesomeness. While under these influences I did not consider what it was that I was letting myself into...
I don't have any pics to tell the tale, but the class was on Saturday night and they play all kinds of ethereal, deep music with drums and hums and things and you just have to move as your body feels like. Much to my disappointment, it's in a school hall and not under the open night sky as I imagined it to be and there is no-one teaching you any steps. You just have to feel the moves... 
Now I could go on to tell you how weird it was, but actually it was one of the most difficult things I had to do this week. I found that to let go and stop caring what other people think (also known as connecting with inner self/being hippy) is in fact not such an easy task, maybe one of my biggest challenges. I stood frozen while people around me flowed, rubbed, twirled and jumped. I was stuck in a big fat cringe.
I realized I had two choices: I could stay freaked out and be judgemental, which would leave me with an hour or two of torture ahead while everyone around me did their swirly moves, or I could get over myself and join in.
I joined in. In the last half an hour, I even found myself jumping up and down and holding hands with strange men. At the end I joined the group in giving thanks to my feet and the earth and the energies around us. I haven't done that since I was in varsity, when I was also into crystals and aromatherapy oils.
Now I must admit the dancing and letting go makes sense, a lot, but even towards the end when I was getting really into it, I kept wishing I was curled up in front of TV with very shallow Hollywood film (like Dirty Dancing), or that they would just stop with the hummy sounds and put Britney on already! (was also worried about the fact that I had to get up just after 5 the next morning for my promised half-marathon).
My final thoughts on the class are important, though: I think it was very necessary. On the way back, Filmmaker and I agreed that sometimes you have to revisit all the people you used to be to know who you are now. And now I know: I still think aromatherapy is useful and crystals can make you feel good, but my days of doing swirly moves was over even before it began. It's just not me.

Lesson of the week: let go, but be yourself. (I DO still like the full moon and I WILL dance like headless chicken on Dirty Dancing songs again, after all).

Then... the run! I leave you with a few pics to tell the tale:

people as crazy as me... who'd have thought there'd be so many?

ah, the bliss of fresh mountain air... 

As Marian Keys would say, Cheerios Amigos!!! 'til next week... 

Breakfast in bo-kaap!

Sent via my BlackBerry from Vodacom - let your email find you!

excitement/drama

That was the theme of the past week. It was so up and down, I need a grid by which I can explain it to you. I don't know WHY in the world I decided to move into a new house for some excitement, because between my wedding, my family and my work, I get enough of that.

Anyways, I will try to do this post through my progress report:

1. Planning a wedding: Does crying your eyes out because there are too many people you have to see that want to see you and thinking your boss hates you because you're always scatterbrained, stressed, underprepared or on your way somewhere, count as part of the planning? Well then I've been planning very hard.

2. Making friends: More like rediscovering existing friends - who are all LOVELY! My kitchen tea was this weekend! It was a tea party with cake, presents, lovely caffe-latte flavoured rooibos tea and one cousin that even drove halfway across the country just to be there. I just want to thank every single person involved for doing so much for me. Life may be crazy, but one thing is sure: I am blessed. See pictures.....



me, cousin (not the one who drove all the way, but she did do a whole lot of organizing), cousin's little girl and ouma in the back. Ouma is 84, doesn't she look great? And look at that smile!



me + good friends

more friends, good ones

some more good friends

3. Running a marathon: can I skip this part? No? Oh shit. Well fine then: I only ran once last week, it wasn't very far, today is Monday and on Sunday I'm supposed to run a 21km. I think I've said enough.


4. Learning something: If a filmmaker likes what she sees, she won't think twice about working right through the night to make the video.The result is one stunning video of my nightingale cousin, Zaria, and all I can say is wow... Let me explain.

I lied when I said I don't know why I moved into the house - I love my new house! I had quite a bad day on Tuesday. Was stressed at work, had a thousand things to do and then cousin had mini drama when her musician ex-boyfriend showed up at her house unexpectedly. So I told her to stop stressing and come spend the night at my house. Only to get there and find oh! it's the German's (one of the house mates) birthday party! And what a lovely bunch of friends he has. They are from all kinds of strange countries, one of which I've never heard of. Lots of wine was consumed, awesome food was eaten, and then Filmmaker appeared from her room (this is the third housemate, whom I haven't introduced properly yet, so keep reading).
Cousin Zaria got hold of guitar and her voice charmed it's way into everyone's hearts. As one of my colleagues accurately puts it: "she's just in her own little world there, you can see it. And if you listen, she takes you right along...". All the while fiance was chopping branches off at my second-floor bedroom window, because the bougainvilla tree has taken quite a fancy to my window and as a result the window can't open.
Filmmaker - us still being at the party downstairs - liked what she heard from Zaria's mouth, got a wave of inspiration and before we knew what we were doing, fiance was dragged away from cutting branches and ordered to rearrange lighting and electrical cables. Filmmaker appointed us makeup artist, creative director and props and lighting all in one. At one point, Filmmaker even had Zaria in an old fashioned bathtub and for that shot I 'stole' electrical cables and a candle from party below.
It was extremely fun, but most of all, very successful. At 4am the next morning (we finished the fiming at about midnight), while we were sleeping soundly, Filmmaker posted the video to Facebook. We are all in amazement. Personally, I just can't believe that someone has finally done my cousin's music justice. Yay!

So BIG thanks to Butterfly Films for this video - Enjoy!

Click here: ZARIA'S VIDEO

First week in the house

Two things happened this week. I started feeling very insecure about myself, thinking I am really boring person and actually unpopular.Couldn't for the life of me figure out why all my friends are still friends with me.

The other thing that happened was that I was suddenly overcome with guilt because my house mates don't know I'm writing about them. Technically I haven't said a lot about them yet, but I had kind of planned to and now I don't want to.

The first problem solved itself automatically – I realized it had all been PMS and hormones and got over it. The second problem I am still grappling with. Don't quite know what to do but have resolved to start off by confessing to them and am feeling a bit stressed about that. Will let you all know how it goes down.

Progress report:

1. Planning the Wedding: I finalized my bouquet and the lighting at the venue! The lighting people are same ppl doing the bouquet and I had to send along the quotes they offered to fiancé without him finding out anything about bouquet, so every time I hit forward I first had to delete pictures and descriptions of the flowers. I don't know if this part of the wedding should also be secret along with the dress, but I've decided to keep my whole look secret and it's fun. Yay.
2. Making Friends: yes! Well, kind of. I made an unexpected one this week – at work! But think I may have scared her off already. I met her in the extremely long trek between the free parking space and the office block and was so eager about the friend making bit that I emailed her immediately once I got to my desk (our company has internal database with everyone's names and contact details on). We promptly made a Friday lunch date, which I had to break before Friday even came. Then, because I believe rule number one about making friends (and keeping them) is to stick to appointments, I made big fuss of meeting on Thursday. But then on Thursday our schedules clashed and it's all a little complicated, but I ended up looking very much like stalker. Showed up at her office (one floor below mine) looking v anxious about not finding her at designated spot and, upon finding that she had already left for lunch, attempted to get her cell phone number from lady at front desk. This is nothing strange, but front desk lady gave me strange look (why?) and instructed assistant to call on my behalf, all the while still giving me the look. Assistant gave me an apologetic smile (or was it a pitiful smile..?) and once she'd gotten new friend on the line, handed the phone to me. I gave front desk lady a nasty look as soon as new friend acknowledged that yes, she knows me and yes, we had a lunch date. But then I stormed off to go meet new friend at the company cafeteria before she had a chance to tell me that there was actually only ten minutes remaining of her lunch hour. So when I finally got to her I watched her eat about three chips, learned that she had some car trouble this week, joined her in the walk to the elevators and then said goodbye, feeling like royal idiot. Have resolved to in future refrain from appearing like person who is starved for company when in fact I have several work colleagues and friends who would love to have lunch with me and does not appreciate being stood up for the sake of a blog.
3. Running a Marathon: Can't believe this, but have actually committed another idiotic act this week. See section on 'Learning Something'. Can at least say that I ran a total of fifteen kilometres and swam 30 laps in gym on Monday.
4. Learning Something: Do not, I repeat, do NOT, forget socks on day you plan on running ten kilometres with colleague. Esp if you are too proud to say your feet are hurting and then proceed to run the whole ten kilometres anyway. This same pride will be the cause of much pain later in week (in fact whole week) when the four blisters burning like hot coals of fire on the back of your feet are not enough to get you to say no when another friend suggests a five kilometre run two days later.
5. Writing this Blog: couldn't even do that right this week. This entry is almost 400 words longer than what I promised each entry would be. I apologise. Must still be the PMS that is making me so wordy.

PS: just remembered that I did do one thing right this week. Followed colleague's advice about a birthday cake for fiancé and went to Charly's Bakery in Roeland street where I bought most awesome chocolate cake ever. It is covered in real, melted chocolate and is solid, heavy and moist right through even though it is only one layer. Think will be looking into Charly's as wedding cake provider...

First weekend!

So, I've moved in. Whoohoo! What a busy house. Have met about seven people already, and that was just in two and a half days, excluding all the people that showed up for the movie screening on Friday. Movie screening? Yes! this house is the best.
Don't have pictures yet, but promise to post. Think I've already found my favourite spot, too: the dining table. More on that later...

Details on two of the people I met:
1. The artist. It's his room that I took over. He let me in on Friday night, handed over the keys and gave me a 'quick' run-through of the house. (the alarm system is v complicated, esp because the setting all depends on where the cats - queen Manon and William - are.) Artist seems shy. He draws with charcoal and he is TALL. He nearly knocked his head against the (very high) doorway on his way out ("ah! that happens often but-" he ended his sentence as soon as he realized he was looking down on me and I would, in fact, not be needing advice on how to avoid high doorways). My feet turned pitch black within taking one step into the new room - all the dust from his charcoal pencils has settled on the floor, making its way between the floorboards and forever marking the room as that of an artist. I don't know why, but I am quite chuffed by this.

2. The german. Lives in the big room downstairs. Not sure if he is filmmaker, photographer or sociologist, but he takes a keen interest in the ppl around him and is a quiet soul. Has dark, beardy look. He organized the movie screening and the movie (from what I've heard) consists of scenes he shot in and around Bo-Kaap. He welcomed me to the neighborhood by saying there are all kinds of lovely sounds in this neigborhood.
"But good sounds, you know? Children playing, people talking. The people here live out of their houses and onto the street." 

I didn't join them for the screening, because I was dog tired and worried about finding space for all my stuff. But I fell asleep with a smile on my face as the sounds of clinking wine glasses and laughing children wafted up the stairs. A Cape Town wind pushed through the window. 

Progress report:
- Running a marathon: ran 7km on Saturday and another 7km on Sunday. Going swimming today and thinking of joining the Distance 4 Difference charity. More on that later, still recovering from the runs so not really lus for thinking up my next challenge quite yet.
- Making friends: see above and to be continued.
- Planning wedding: went to venue, chose menu and looked at lighting options. Cards to be printed at end of month. 5 Months to go!
- Learning something: You need to either feed the cats before you go to bed, or close your door when you go to bed. Else they will wake you with tiny, sqeaky miaaw-like sounds, poke you with their wet little cat noses so you open your eyes to find life size whiskers and bright, hungry eyes mere millimeters from your face at exaclty 4am. 

Interesting facts and some progress

Excitement for my first night in the new place is mounting.  

A few interesting facts I’ve discovered about Bo-Kaap:

- some people think it is dangerous. Others (mostly foreign photographers) think it is quaint. I'm just glad it's close to work. 

- According to someone at work, there are several anties in Bo-Kaap who are known for their amazing cookies and koeksisters (a traditionally Afrikaans treat resembling a doughnut. These are different from white Afrikaans people's koeksisters, though, because they aren't crispy and in the shape of plaits. These ones are unique to the Cape because they are fat, spungy things. Has the consistensy of a doughnut, the syrup and shape of a koeksister, but coated in sugar and coconut). It's apparently a tradition in the Muslim (and surrounding) communities there to go and fetch hot koeksisters for breakfast from the antie every Sunday morning. I can't freakin wait. Yum!  

- According to one of my cousins, we have very distant family that is buried in one of the mosques in Bo-Kaap. I have yet to find the mosque and because of our country’s not-so-race-friendly history, we’ve long ago lost contact with that side of the family, but I do think it would be incredibly cool if I could find the grave/mosque. 

- Apparently Kaapse Klopse (a Cape cultural dancing event) does not just happen around New Year's. In Bo-Kaap, they are practicing all the time and soon after I move in, I should start hearing the bands at all hours of the day.

- I might not sleep well the first few nights. Besides the Klopse, I will have to get used to the chanting/praying from the mosques. 

Progress made with other goals:

- entered for my first half marathon. It is to be on Sunday, 25 October. Called the Constantia Valley Grape half marathon. That leaves me with four weeks to train.

- Managed to buy the beautiful little desk that’s currently in the room I’m moving into. Very chuffed about it, because the artist who I’m taking over the room from used it as his drawing desk. Am hoping his creative juices will be transferred to me when I sit down to write. Will post pic when I’ve moved in..

- fiance and I met with the illustrator doing our wedding invites on Friday. We love it! But will save the invites as a surprise... Check out her site here - Whimsy

Less than a week to go before I move in. Better start packing...  

Finding a room

One week and one day to go! You're probably wondering how and why I chose this room I'm moving into...

The ad said something in the line of 'I'm a filmmaker with two rooms available in my house, one is big, one is small, email me if you're interested.'
Fiancé went with to see the place. 
'Hello?' I called at the dilapidated stoep as my ever supportive fiancé parked the car in the cobbled street, against the extremely steep hill on which the house is perched. The house is squashed  between two other identical homes. In spots the plaster peels from the walls. On the balcony upstairs a bright hammock swung easily in the wind.
'Hello!'a young, friendly voice called from somewhere upstairs. I peered through the trellidoor of the open front door. Wooden floors. Bicycles. Surfboards. The faint smell of cat litter. A sunburnt nose and blonde head appeared around the corner of the stairs.
'Come to look at the room?' she asked with a friendly smile. Turns out the filmmaker is a young woman, not much older than me. I smiled back.
'That's me.'

Maybe it was the wooden floor, the African prints that hung in front of the windows and the way the place reminds me of my seaside home town, Mtunzini. Maybe it was the fact that I would be taking over the room from an artist, who'd created a little corner full of his drawings - a corner I knew would be just perfect for writing - and that the other, third housemate is a photographer. Or maybe it was the fact that the filmmaker had pictures of Rwandan dancers up in her room and told us that her mentor had advised her to stop making all her films for charity and actually start charging. Maybe it was just the fact that these people recycle. But everything just felt right.

Bo-Kaap, here I come. I can't wait :)

The plan

A few minutes after we got engaged

About six months after I got engaged, my fellow journalist and flatmate announced she was moving. She'd found an amazing job in Joburg, where her boyfriend is. I could take over the lease and continue to stay with our other flatmate, or I could move. 

Fiancé and I considered moving in together earlier than planned, but we didn't want to. I am still relatively new in this city of artists, drug addicts and dreamers and I want to make sure that I also have my own roots here before I settle down with him.

So in a few days’ time, on October 1, 2010, I will be moving to a new place. It is a room in a carefully selected house, for reasons that are yet to unfold.

Exactly five months and five days after that, on the 5th of March 2011, I will be getting married to my favourite person in the whole world. 

This is my last single adventure and I plan to track it. I have five goals: 

1. Make at least three new friends. That is exactly one person more than the amount of people I am going to be sharing a house with. 

2. Get back into long distance running. By the time I walk down the isle, I want to be able to run a full marathon - exactly 42.2km. 

3. Learn something. Whether it be about myself, our relationship, or planning a wedding, none of this will be in vain. 

4. Write this blog. From now on until I get married, I must write at least one blog entry per week.

5. Plan a wedding. So far I have seven bridesmaids, five bridesmaids dresses, a wedding venue and one awesome wedding photographer. There is still a s***load of work to do.

To whomever will be reading this, I promise to:

•           Never write more than 500 words per entry (I hate wordy blogs)
•           Always be truthful
•           Post as many pictures of my journey as possible. 

Enjoy! ;)