Cape Town: Week 1

Arrived in Cape Town Tuesday morning. Until today, the weather has not been great: overcast, windy, cold, and sometimes rainy. My apartment is in down town and has an incredible view of Table Mountain and Lions Head. Incredible. Only yesterday, when the weather cleared for a few hours, was I able to see the top of the table mountain.

I've walked around the city and done some scouting of the area. The nearest grocery store is about a 10-min walk. I joined a gym that's about a 7-min walk. Definitely will not be needing a car or using public transportation that much. The gym has a great indoor pool and workout area -- rivaling Lifetime fitness. I'm impressed.

Met a lot of the other interns at a little happy hour get together last night at Perspectives. We ended up holding it in my room because the room on the roof was closed. Managed to get by with no spills. Met some other interns who are on the opposite end of their twenties like me; it's reassuring that I'm not the only "old" guy. I also met a few of my coworkers at Planet Finance, also interns with Connect, and one of them has a car. Which is great. I start work on Monday.

The weather is great today and Torti and I heading to Cape Peninsula National Park (or something like that). It's about an hour drive outside the city. It's where the Cape of Good Hope is...as well as a Penguin colony which Torti really wants to see. After Ushuaia...I've had my fill. Penguins are penguins...but the landscape down at the cape sounds awesome. Looking forward to that and just hoping the weather holds up.

A few remarks so far:

- Living in downtown, they say it's not the best idea to walk around at night. Even in groups. Just get a cab and be safe. That's going to be tough considering I'll be going to the gym at night...but hopefully cabs are plentiful.

- I buy electricity for my apt from the security guard downstairs! 100 Rand gets me about 140 kWh. With a digital meter in my room, I'm definitely keeping an eye on my electricity usage.

- I pay for the internet by the MB. Which means no Slingbox...and no Spurs. Although, they're making it easier on me by going down 2-0. Not going to be missing too many more games. (Reverse jinx intended here).

- South Africa's history is amazing. In a very sad way. I knew the history on a high level and understood Apartheid's concept but until I started reading more about it here, I didn't make the connection that it's very different than what we had in the US. In the states (as far as I know), all of the past segregation laws were not apart of the constitution, and thus, over time, deemed unconstituional. In South Africa, the segregation policies and racial biases were incorporated into the constitution. They were law! It was an institution. And, obviously, the people in charge of amending/modifying the constitution were the white supremicists (the Afrikaners). So, it was going to take a miracle for the constitution to be changed. In the US, there were at least a lot of racially unbiased people that worked in the government, especially the Supreme Court. It was only a matter of time that the segregation policies were deemed unconstitutional. If it wasn't for the threat of major civil war and Nelson Mandela, South Africa would still have Apartheid today.

- Ghandi started his civil disobedience work in South Africa! There was/is a large Indian population in South Africa (thanks to the British, who brought many over here in the 1800's/1900's) and they were treated poorly like all other non-whites. Ghandi spent years here before heading back to India...