Hello From Malaysia

Hello All,
Things are fine here. The friends and roommate situations still aren't great but traveling is amazing so it balances out. I have two more days of classes and then arrive in Viet Nam! I can't wait for Viet Nam and Cambodia. It's so surreal to think I'll be there.

Malaysia was a nice rest after India. The ship docked in Penang, which is a colonial city right off the mainland. It was a nice break after the chaotic experience in India. Parts of it reminded me of LA mixed with parts of Honolulu with SF’s Chinatown and then added in an Indian and Muslim influence. There's Indian, Malay, British and Chinese populations here. On a single street you can see an Anglican church, a Hindu temple, a Confucian clan house, a Buddhist temple, a mosque and probably a 7-11 or Starbucks! Many people speak English and a lot of German, Chinese, Saudi Arabians and British tourists come here for the shopping, cuisine and the beaches. There are tons of restaurants, religious sites and shopping malls.

The first day I went on basically a required field trip with my professor to a tropical orchard where I got to try some crazy fruits and juices like nutmeg juice (it didn’t really taste like the spice though) and a spice garden. That night I went into town and ate at a really good Japanese restaurant. You can find almost any Asian food stall or restaurant you want here. It felt so safe and calm compared to India and Brazil.

I admit though I did go to Starbucks, which tasted amazing. It looked identical to American ones but there were fewer young professionals milling around and I didn’t see any young women by themselves or in groups without a parent or husband. The food was more formal desserts instead of muffins and cookies. There was no non-fat milk or sugar-free syrups and only regular sugar and sugar syrup to sweeten drinks. Equal sweetener was available only if you asked for it. The Europeans (there weren’t many Americans) and some of the Arabs were the only fat people there.

I went to Langkawi Island, which is an island off the north coast near Thailand for a few days where I didn't exactly have a life altering cultural experience. I mainly went swimming, ate, slept, and walked on the beach. Honestly though it felt amazing just recouping for a few days. It looked a lot like an Asian Hawaii with more Chinese, Indian and Thai food and a lot of Arab tourists. I lost count of the number of families I saw in which the husband and children were completely westernized in jeans, baseball caps, tight logo t-shirts and sneakers while the woman was completely covered in black. I don’t know if they use the term burqa but so many young women had only the eye slit or maybe the face visible. It was sort of a strange sight because it was a modern tropical hotel so when we were in bathing suits at the pool and next to me on a lounge chair would be a really pale British couple on honeymoon then a heavy Germany family then Arab Muslim woman with only her face or eyes visible watching her family in the pool. The other strange part was that often the women had designer sunglasses, purses and sandals with them in addition to eye-liner and mascara on. Also, the black robes sometimes had embroidery or beads on them. One of the days it rained so I had a wonderful day of doing nothing. I did watch a couple random American movies. So much of the language and content was censored out though. The usual words were silenced- instead dubbing or bleeping them it just went mute over any swear word or sexual reference, even the word “hooker”was muted.





On the last night I went to a night market, which was really fun. I’m trying unsuccessfully to do Christmas shopping but I never seem to have the time and I would have loved to spend more time at the night market. They have tons of good knock-off bags, shoes, wallets, clothes, perfume and dvd’s, souvenirs, food and random stuff set up in rolls of stalls a bit like a really crowded farmers or craft market but less “local”or “traditional”stuff.

Penang is an island with a big hills filled with dense jungle-like fauna on the backside of the city. I went to the top of Penang Hill, which is a bit cooler than the very hot and humid city. When the British controlled the island they built hidden mansions up on the hill to get away from the heat so in between dense trees and ferns are crumbing mansions some of which people still live in though it is seriously curvy and steep to get up there (especially since the funicular is broken). We had tea at an English teahouse at the top overlooking the city, which was a relaxing and an interesting dichotomy. Afterwards I went to the Botanical Gardens, which actually a huge state park rather than formal flower gardens. It was pretty though the faculty I was with wanted to analyze and take pictures of every fern, leaf and blade. Since it’s not really my interest after awhile I would have rather eaten every fern we’d already seen than spend another 5 minutes staring at another tree root. I realize that if we were at an art museum it would have probably been the reverse. The Gardens have tons of macaque monkeys and huge iguanas, which for me were best viewed from a distance.

The ship wasn’t actually docked at the port. Instead we used a “tendering”process in which the lifeboats took us from the ship to the port it was sort of fun one time but it was really hot and the set schedule often conflicted and limited our plans. Ironically enough one of the people sitting next to me on the boat was from Medhem, NJ and Uncle Kevin had been her basketball coach! It’s amazing how often that happens on the ship or in port.


I do miss parts of the US (other than my family and friends obviously), especially the organization and efficiency of the government, restaurants, transportation, businesses, etc. which I took for granted. It's certainly worth giving up in exchange for this amazing trip and it's interesting to see how the majority of the world lives. The outsider perspective on the US, especially since it's an election year, is also very interesting. I love traveling though by December I suspect I'll be ready to be back in the US. I hope you're having a lovely fall and gearing up for election day. I'll try to write later but surprisingly enough I actually have class (shocker - I actually have class in between drinks by the pool, shuffle board, bingo and skeet shooting) :)

Taj Mahal, New Delhi and Chennai

Oct. 16
In the morning I woke up to the sound of the Muslim call to prayer, which was certainly a first. We woke up early for a sunrise tour of the Taj Mahal, which was absolutely beautiful. The Taj is a series of buildings built in the early 17th century by a Mughal emperor as a testament to his dead wife. Oddly enough it’s sort of down a random street in Afra- there’s no gift shop, parking lot, restroom complex… It’s a fairly big complex with fountains, gardens, the Taj mausoleum, a mosque, and a prayer area built to balance out the mosque on the other side of the Taj. The Taj itself is the same on all three sides though there’s a river on the backside. It’s made of a special Indian marble that is translucent to light so at sunrise and sunset it picks up the colors of the sky. Unfortunately the pollution is incredibly bad so the affect was some what muted. By far the majority of tourists are Indian and I saw a surprisingly large number of Muslim women (the Taj is obviously a Muslim mausoleum) in the complete black burka for lack of a better word. The security lines here as in the airports are segregated by sex actually.



In the afternoon we went out further into the countryside to an abandoned palace complex called Fatehpur Sikri. It’s a silent and petrified sandstone city where time has stood still for the last 400 years. According to legend, Emperor Akbar (the emperor who built the Taj’s grandfather) was without a male heir and made a pilgrimage to a saint who foretold the birth of a son. After the birth of the heir he transfer the capital to the site of the pilgrimage. He built a new and splendid city with for example three separate palaces for his three wives (his Hindu wife, his Muslim wife and his Christian or Buddhist wife), an artificial lake, halls, a bazaar, a mosque, etc. In his palace though he had one huge bed that could accommodate him and his wives at the same time, which I supposed cut down on scheduling concerns over his three wives and concubines. In one of the courtyards was a life-size board game similar to Parcheesi but they used concubines as pieces so the winner would win the other player’s women at the end. There was a big courtyard for public grievances in which the people could come to the emperor with problems and inside it was a huge elephant tied to a stone. If the emperor condemned someone to death he was immediate brought to the elephant which the drugged who promptly stomped the prisoner to death in front of the whole court- supposedly crime rates were pretty low back then. The city was abandoned not long after because of difficulties with water supply so it’s still remarkably preserved. Like the other monuments in India nothing is off limits. Basically, you can walk anywhere, touch anything, and take any pictures. It’s much different than say Revolutionary area sites in the U.S. where everywhere has a parking garage, gift shop, registered guides, areas for trash and restrooms, designated areas for visitors and absolutely no touching let alone the glass and ropes around everything. In the U.S. there’s glass and ropes around an chair in an now air-conditioned room where George Washington may have once sat.

Later that day we went to the Agra Fort, which is actually a perfectly preserved Mughal city built at the height of the empire’s splendor. It’s a fort but also a city within a city for the emperor, nobles and government officials. Shah Jahan who built the Taj was the 5th Mughal emperor and spent huge sums of the treasury to built the Taj and was eventually imprisoned here by his son. He was imprisoned in the very palace he built for his favorite wife Mumtaz Mahal for eight years until his death. The palace had views of the Taj so he ended his days imprisoned in the palace he built for the love of his life staring at the monument he built after her death. Mumtaz Mahal was a commoner whom the Shah met in the palace bazaar where she was basically a shop girl. The British used the former emperor’s bazaar for ladies’ tea parties. The complex is huge with gardens, offices, courtyards, white marbled palaces, gold leafed buildings, fountains, etc.

At sunset we went back to the Taj to see the changing colors. You can’t take pictures inside the actual tomb part where the coffins of Shah Jahan and Mumtaz Mahal are and you have to take off your shoes or wear shoes covers as a sign of respect. They don’t have lights so after sunset the Taj closes since you can’t see anything. The vast majority of tourists were Indians from all over then there were a fair number of British and American tourists. Again so many people wanted to take pictures of us which was fine because we wanted pictures of them.



Oct. 17
Luckily we took a nicer train back to Delhi and spent the next day in Delhi. We took a bus tour of Delhi and New Delhi (the British built section of Delhi) though honestly I was so tired and hot I basically passed out and don’t remember seeing half the stuff. I did get a chance to stop at on of Mother Theresa’s orphanages. We got to look round and interact a bit with the children who have mental and mainly extreme physical disabilities. Most are between 1 and 13 and have too many physical problems to go to a regular school. It was certainly a humbling experience and served as a stark contrast to the lovely hotels and restaurants we went to.

On the other side of the spectrum, we stayed at an amazing hotel in Delhi. Ironically in the hotel bar we ran into more Cisco employees. India has a strictly enforced drinking age of 21 and alcohol is only available in government stores and Western hotels/bars where it's taxed 70-80%! Apparently the beer isn't refrigerated well so when they manufacture it in order to preserve it they put low-level amounts of formaldehyde in it! It was one of my friend’s 21st birthday so she got to celebrate in India. The hotel I think accidentally upgrade one of my other friend’s suites (on SAS trips we are assigned one roommate though we can switch) to an amazing corner suite complete with a chocolate cake, apples, nuts, wine… so we had a great celebration first in the hotel then down in the hotel bar which stayed open later for the Americans and by later I mean 2am. They had a dance floor and DJ who played mainly techno but the bar was on the first floor and look out onto the street. At one point I was dancing an looked out the window and made eye contact with a Muslim woman waiting for her husband/chaperon covered from head to toe with only an eye slit to see out of which must have made for an interesting contrast if someone looked at both of us. The next day we flew back to Chennai.

The last night in India we decided to go out in Chennai and went to one of the Taj hotels. We wanted to go dancing but they were doing last call for drinks before closing- at 11pm! Instead we just went out to dinner but we couldn’t believe how early everything closed especially after spending so much time in Cape Town. In general the food was pretty good though I didn’t eat the really spicy food and ate in a lot of hotels which provided silver wear (as opposed to using rice or naan to eat with). The food was a mix of flavors and textures with a wide use of spices and vegetables in the cooking. While it was good and filling, I don’t think I could eat like that every day. By the end of the trip I really wanted a nice salad or lighter fare like Thai or Vietnamese food. Almost everything was cooked and there was very little meat (chicken or mutton if anything). I saw almost no seafood (which is a bit odd considering there’s water on three sides) and I never saw beef or pork on the menu. There’s no ice and we could only drink bottled water.

On the last day in India I went shopping with some other students in Chennai. Everyone basically gets around on buses (which are incredibly packed and generally sketchy to my American sensibilities) or rickshaws that are either with motors are peddled which can be a fun, cheap, dirty and occasionally nerve-wracking way to get around. Everything even in stores in the mall is open for bargaining. I absolutely hate bargaining for things and generally don’t really care that much, which the salespeople probably catch onto and jip me for prices but I suppose the extra 50 cents or dollar is my contribution to the Indian economy. On the streets the haggling is insane though even in the mall the salespeople wait outside the shops and are incredibly aggressive, which I found to be very uncomfortable though some find the experience fun. I used to think the salespeople in shoe department at Nordstrom’s were aggressive but now I realize that they are more like a gnat in your face compared to a swarm of mosquitoes and wasps. In the shops and the mall at first I couldn’t get over the number of times I saw women completely covered in black with only there face or eyes visible shopping like it was Black Friday and chatting on really nice cell phones.

I definitely could never live in India and if I had a choice between Paris and India I would chose France. To me, there’s was nothing soothing about the country. After a while I needed a break from the constant attention and stimulation and made me appreciate why many would turn to meditation and yoga in order to mentally regroup. I’m certainly had a good time and I’m glad I’ve seen it though it was overwhelming to all my senses.

Chennai

Oct. 14:
The ship has docked in Chennai (formerly Madras), which is the in south east and part of the technology triangle. It’s the forth largest city in India with 13 million people. India has three times the population as the U.S. but is a third of the size so basically there are 9 times as many people in each square mile so it’s crowded especially in the urban areas to put it mildly.

Today was my first day in India. I met the diplomats from the Consulate this morning and gave them a tour of the ship. We got to talking about living abroad and they gave me some good tips about it. One of the diplomats is here on his first post and I asked what he did before this. We narrowed it down and ironically not only was he from Palo Alto but he lived on California Ave and worked at Cisco like my mom! It was one of those "of all the gin joints in the world" sort of moment. I’ve gone half way around the world and basically run into my neighbor.

India is definitely a whole new world. It's like having all your sense on overdrive. The streets and everything are soooo dirty and the smell is pretty strong. Imagine the dirtiest alley in inner city New York in the middle of summer and you were standing next to a dumpster and you can get a feeling for the smell. People use horns as a means of communication and lanes and sidewalks are just a suggestion. I used to think people were exaggerating about random cows in the street- they're not. There were goats and cows just roaming all over the place and Chennai is not rural. The streets are jammed with buses, auto-rickshaws, bike rickshaws, cars, bikes, motorcycles, walkers and carts with oxen like cows pulling them all together. Chennai is in a pretty conservative area of India so we didn't see any Western style clothing on any women. All the women were in saris in pink, orange, teal... There are significantly more men then women out in public- I never saw a female waiter, police officer, cab driver and only rarely did I see one working in a shop. They really stand out partly because there’s so few out and because of their dress, bright colors and flashy/noisy jewelry. Everything just jammed on top of each other. There'll be a snack shack next to a cell phone dealership next to a shanty house next to a restaurant next to a temple. Poverty here is like nothing in the U.S. The sheer amount of poverty is indescribable. After a while you can become jaded by the beggars and hawkers on the streets. There are random living situations going on all around too. Even on major roads there's string on the walls with people's laundry drying on them. Even at major intersections there's towels, sheets, underwear, pants... right next to us. By the end of day I really felt the need for a shower and some physical and mental space from everything. As an American I can't imagine the constant assault on your senses- especially personal space and hearing. I could never live here- to me there was nothing soothing about the country. After a while I needed a break from the constant attention and stimulation and made me appreciate why many would turn to meditation and yoga in order to mentally regroup.

I spent the day at a Dalit neighborhood painting a school. Dalit is the term used by the people instead of Untouchable. It means oppressed in Hindi. We thought we were just going to go to a random community center, paint some stuff and leave but not quite. When we got off the bus (there were about 20 of us) a marching band led us down the street. Women put garlands of jasmine around us and the bindi of powder on our foreheads. A huge crowd followed us from the bus down to the school. Everyone was staring and waving. It was basically like that the whole day. Apparently since this is such a poor inner city area most people have never seen foreigners especially not a group of young Americans. We were like celebrities- everyone wanted to touch us and shake our hands especially the kids. You'd think we were the biggest thing to hit India since the invention of rice. It was pretty overwhelming.
When we got to the school it was a compound with a primary school and a high school. It was two stories and had a big courtyard in the front. It kind of reminded me of pictures of Soviet era housing complexes that are the first thing to be torn down in the move to capitalism. They had a chairs and an awning set up with singers and children dancing. The administrators gave speeches in front of this huge laminated sign welcoming us and hundred of kids clamored to touch us and meet us. One woman put henna on my hand. Every child wanted to shake our hand and ask our names. Some times there would be three or four hands over mine with the kids repeating my name, saying nice to meet you and doing the Indian head bob thing which is neither a yes nor a no and looks like a figure out. The kids were supposed to stay in the classrooms while we painted the hallways and railings but people (adults and kids) kept coming out to watch us. As we were painting, classroom-by-classroom the kids were all allowed out and they would run to the over side of the railing while I was painting and ask (and by ask I mean scream the way only 10 year olds can do) my name, say their's, reach over, shake my hand, say nice to meet you, and then stare at me as I move on to the next kid. Eventually they started asking for our signatures and they clamored on me to sign my name in their notebooks. We felt like celebrities- I've never signed my name so many times. The kids have uniforms and are segregated by sex. The teachers were all female but the administrators and random people in the courtyard were all men. They never stopped staring as we painted for the next two hours (the kids or the men) and the kids would get so excited when we waved or signed our names. Kids would try to sneak out of class to talk to us or get us to sign our names and the teachers would come out and yell at them. If the kids didn't move they gave them a whack with a long, narrow wood stick! There were no doors on the rooms, no glass in the windows, no desks, no books, no toys... just chalkboards, a few maps and paper decorations on the walls. The kids sat on the floor with binder like things, which they wrote on and in and took off their shoes before entering.

While we painted (a girl and I were partners) there was a man who stood behind us for the entire time and added paint to our buckets when it got low and during the other times would point out where we still needed to paint. I don't know if was because we were women or what but after I while I got so fed up I was like, "Why don't you actually grab a brush and we could finish the whole school by the end of the day?" He goes, "no no- I supervise." Me: "Don't you trust me" Supervisor: "no." That put an end to that conversation and at this point I'm still not sure what his role was. We when left the kids went crazy and the parade of the bizarre sight of so many Americans started up again. It wasn't necessarily bad just odd. I can't imagine being an actual celebrity and having people constantly stare and get really excited when they saw you. It was interesting because we're in India basically as tourists but in the Dalit neighborhood I felt like the tourist attraction. Again it wasn’t not bad just odd.

Oct. 15
I flew to Delhi to see the north and Agra where the Taj Mahal is on a Semester at Sea planned trip (as opposed to independently traveling the country). In Delhi which is also a huge, urbanized, chaotic city I went to the Gandhi Memorial where his ashes are buried. It’s basically a big green park in the middle of the city with a monument area in the middle. It’s a bit strange because it’s a fairly large expanse of green lawns and quiet but on the edges you can see shanty towns up on hills or industrial smoke towers or electrical wires. As we sneakily tried to take pictures of the beautifully colored saris of the Indian women one of them walks up to us and whips out a camera phone and asks if she can take a picture of us. More often people take pictures of the girls since they don’t see many young, white girls in public (as opposed to maybe seeing older American or European businessmen in say Delhi). The men are fairly aggressive or blunt when staring or directing comments to foreign girls and on the whole it isn’t socially acceptable for the Indian girls to be so forward with foreign men. With our light hair and skin (my curly hair), cameras, sunglasses and Westernized clothes we definitely stood out and we as big a tourist attraction as Gandhi.
Later that day we took a train to Agra which was an experience that I never feel the need to repeat. The station was absolute mayhem- I couldn’t imagine trying to navigate the station on my own- sooo dirty, people sleeping everywhere, children begging, rats, trains coming and going, and just general chaos. We were on one of the “nice” trains which wasn’t air conditioned though it was supposed to, creaky, smelly and we were afraid of falling asleep on the 4.5 hour ride because of the huge bugs. I’m glad I’ve done it just to know what it’s like for the majority of Indians though once was certainly enough. Luckily I met some nice students on my trip to talk to one. One of the girls it turns out is from San Francisco and her grandparents live in Atherton (which for non-Bay area people is almost next to my town) and actually goes to Boston University though we had never seen each other on campus or on the ship.

South Africa Update

Cape Town is such a lovely city with the different mixes of architecture, bay in front, Table Mountain in back and wide variety of cultures. The ship is docked at the Victoria and Albert Waterfront in Cape Town which is a fabulous location since it has tons of shops, restaurants, bars, a mall, an aquarium, hotels and is the ferry depot. When we’re in port most people still sleep on the ship and there’s still meal service if you don’t want to pay for meals or whatever in port. On the first day I shopped and had lunch at the Long Street Café. In Namibia and South Africa I’ve noticed they always have milkshakes and fruit shakes on the menu- nice restaurants, cafes, fast food places, everywhere. There are a few things that I miss about the U.S. (other than my family and friends obviously) such ice (it’s rare to get and to get much if you do), free safe water at restaurants (it’s all bottled and you have to pay for it), free refills and decent iced tea (it’s all canned Nestea or Linton nastiness). The soda cans here are smaller and made with heavier aluminum. Instead of Diet Coke there’s Coke Lite, which isn’t actually calorie/sugar free. It still has very low amounts of calorie oddly enough. I ordered a small tea at a café but forgot the sizes are smaller outside the U.S. A small is 8 oz, medium is 12 and large is 16. In the U.S. a small is 12 oz, medium is 16 and large is 20 or 24 oz!
On Long Street, some friends and I got awesome Don Pedro milkshakes at a place Caroline recommended called Mr. Pickwicks. There’s a bunch of cool shops on Long Street selling boutique clothes, beads, crafts, cakes and surf gear. It reminds me a lot of parts of San Francisco like Union Street or Chestnut Street or part of Haight Ashbury, except that we also wandered a market of African crafts and South African tourist stuff.

On Saturday I did an FDP, which is a faculty directed practicum. It’s a SAS trip led by guides and a professor. Every class has required FDPs that we have to do with the professor though you can still join other professor’s FDPs. SAS has a bunch of day trips planned in every port which you have to pay for but often are worth it if it’s a hassle to plan stuff on your own, the country’s not super safe, it’s the first day, or if we don’t have much time. On this day trip I went to the Malay Quarter, which is the Muslim neighborhood of Cape Town. The houses, shrines, mosques and shops are extremely brightly colored which apparently is a new decision because during Apartheid they were allowed to live in the same neighbor but had to paint their buildings gray. After Nelson Mandela became president and proclaimed South Africa the “rainbow nation” he gave a speech in the Malay Quarter to thank Muslims for their service during the fight against Apartheid. In celebration of Nelson Mandela’s speech and the end of Apartheid they echoed the rainbow nation by painting the area in pinks, blues, greens and every shade of the rainbow.

Before going to some of the township we went to the District 6 Museum, which is a former church converted into a museum about the forced removal of Blacks and Coloureds out of areas so that they could be converted into White neighborhoods during Apartheid. In South Africa the terms Black, White and Coloured aren’t considered politically incorrect or rude though it’s a bit jarring the first time someone used the term Coloured to my American ears. Thousands of people were forcibly removed from their homes though there was such a backlash and construction crews refused to work that the homes were razed but a new neighborhood was never built. Some of the property has been returned to the old neighborhood members (though obviously most are older and have started over in other parts). The Museum was an interesting explanation of Black and Coloured life in the townships during Apartheid.

Then we went to the Khayelitsha and Langa Township to meet with local people. It’s a bit of an odd experience to drive up in the big tourist bus to these huge townships of squatter homes and poverty right outside the city. Cape Town has an official population of about 3 million but an additional 1 million unofficial population mainly in the townships. At first it feels a bit like a human zoo and if you don’t interact with the people it will definitely feel like that. We met with a local business owner who opened a B and B in the township and uses it to fund community services like day care. Meeting the people, especially the hordes of children are for the most part inspiring abet also disconcerting.

We went to lunch in a different more developed township in which the government has been building new housing. The woman who owned and operated the restaurant said that she’s a member of the Xhosa tribe/nation/people. She thought it was interesting the way White people had specific times and food for specific meals. Specific breakfast, lunch and dinner times and certain foods associated with them that aren’t eaten with other meals was a foreign concept for her. We were eating around 3 so she was saying, “is it lunch? dinner? can I serve the same for one or the other?” She was saying that they eat what they have, when they have it. I’d never even though of meal times and specific meals as not being a cultural universal. The food was really good (though not something I’d necessarily feel the need to eat everyday for every meal). There were a lot of root vegetables, corn, stewed meat and starches.

After lunch we went back to the waterfront past all the World Cup Construction in preparation for South Africa’s hosting of the 2010 men’s World Cup, to get the ferry for Robben Island. It is an island in the bay right in front of Cape Town. It’s like a really big Alcatraz but mainly for political prisoners. People still live on the island though during the last century most of the non-prisoner population was guards and their families. It still has it’s own elementary school, gas station, etc. It has a long history as a leper colony, WWII fort and prison (for past native leaders like Zulu chief men or Malay mutineers). It’s most famous role is as a prison until 1994 for anti-Apartheid leaders like Nelson Mandela who spent 18 years and wrote “A Long Walk to Freedom” while incarcerated here. Visitors arrive on the same ferries, which took the prisoners to the island and former guards and inmates conduct the prison tours.

We saw the quarry where the prisoners until the 1970s did manual labor. There’s a cave that the prisoners had to use when they needed to go to the bathroom where the guards didn’t go. When the prison began to be mainly political prisoners very few were literate but they started writing the in sand in the cave in the quarry and taught each other to read. Nelson Mandela’s eyesight is poor as a result of the blinding sunlight while working in the quarry. There are tons of rabbits on the island (something like 10,000) apparently because Cecil Rhodes brought them and the guards used to shoot them when they were bored. There are also deer and adorable penguins on the island.

A former inmate conducted my prison tour. My guide spent 7 years there in the late 1980s for terrorist activities (illegally entering and leaving the country in order to gain military training, membership of the ANC, illegally having a weapon, sabotage- destruction of government property). He told us all about living in the prison, type of labor, separation of the races in the prison, etc. We sat on the same bunk beds the prisoners like the guide slept on as he told us about the different levels of food for the prisoners. The guards tried to divide the prisoners by giving the Whites and Coloureds better food but it backfired and they would try to share food. He told us about his interrogation/torture and “trial”- said he has never forgotten the full names of his interrogators. The political leaders lived in solitary cells with windows only with bars so they were cold in the winter and hot in the summer. We got to see where Nelson Mandela worked, lived and wrote “A Long Walk to Freedom.” Our guide had an amazing sense of humor- cracked jokes about the prison and the tour. He spoke of the importance of reconciling the future with the past- importance of passing on knowledge, experience but also of moving forward in the interests of the nation. Robben Island was an amazing example of the best and worst of human ability and determination.

On Sunday I climbed Table Mountain, which surrounds the city of Cape Town. The hike was surprisingly difficult hike up the mountain- I had to use my hands in many places. It was often straight up with zigzag trail of steps. Most of the hike is straight up a ravine with views of Cape Town in behind you. The trail can be wet because there are random natural waterfalls next to the trail. I climbed pretty fast and it took me two hours. I went through an entire water bottle on the hike up. In front of me were three German college girls- one of whom wasn’t really prepared for how strenuous the hike was but it was funny because some things don’t require a translation- the pants, sighs and plaintive questions of what I assume were things like “oh dear god how much longer?” or “why did I think this would be a good idea?” By the time I reached the top I definitely had a great sense of accomplishment. At the top it really is flat like a table and has a stunning view. I met up with other people at the top for lunch and we took the cable car down (hiking down would have been even more difficult)- there was wonderful view of the Cape area. Apparently people who climbed it on the last day got to hang out with Dave Chappell who was in town after they asked him to take a picture for them and then realized who it was.

Monday:
Today I went to the Wine Lands outside of Cape Town. The Cape Town region is in the Mediterranean climate like much of Northern California, Chile and obviously the Mediterranean so it has the right conditions for producing wine and has been doing so for centuries. Two girls and I hired a driver/wine tour guide to take us out of the city to the wine region. Only about a hour outside the city is the wonderful wine region. The weather in general has been beautiful- low 60s/late 50s with clear skies but on Monday it was rainy so we decided to leave the city- it looked like San Francisco in January or February. We went to three different wineries and tasted and learned about wine. I’m still not a big wine person but it was interesting having a personal wine guide helping explain things. Unlike in Napa where most vineyards have Mediterranean or Spanish colonial architecture these are obviously mainly all with Dutch Cape architecture- a white Dutch colonial look. In the Post-Apartheid period the number of wineries has gone from 300 to 600 and South Africa imports basically no wine- it’s incredibly expensive to get any other type of wine though native wine is incredibly cheap.