Since I have written last, I have joined a gym and bought a car! Thank god for both. The drinking culture here in SA is taking its toll on my mid-section, and since it isn't safe to go for a run (well that's what I tell myself to make myself feel better about not doing a single bit of exercise since I have arrived) my only alternative is join a gym. I joined on Monday afternoon and woke up Tuesday early and took the minibus all by myself (a terrifying experience) to Rondebosh, the town where I joined "THE ZONE". Their equipment is a bit dated, and thus, not very easy to operate! I fiddled with one treadmill for about 10 minutes, then decided it wasn't me, it MUST be this stupid old machine. So I moved to the next, and the next, and still couldn't get a single one to function. A worker came to assist me and apparently I did something wrong on all 4 that I tried, and so the employee had to reset them all and when he stood up from unplugging them all he looked at me angrily, breathed in deeply, and exhaled at a ridiculously loud volume. Like it was SO hard…give me a break! I will tell you what is hard buddy- getting on a treadmill after a month of no exercise in a gym with close to no air conditioning - now THAT is something to "sigh" about! I went to work later that day and my duty was to design the membership cards for the scuba diving club (which I have uploaded onto my blog for you all to see). I am not too impressed with them myself, but Sean liked them and they went to the printer that day! That night, our other roommate came back from her trip trough Africa. Her name is Beota, she is German, and is studying at UCT. So now there are four of us, and we are waiting for one more to move in this week sometime. I am still very happy about my living situation, and can't wait for the last person to move in!

There is a severe energy crisis here in Cape Town, which is driving me mad. Apparently there isn't "anything of extreme importance" in OBZ and thus, they have decided to turn off the power from about 12-8pm everyday this week! I just went shopping the other day and bought loads of food only to find that the next day it all spoiled because the refrigerator was unable to operate. The next day, I was certain that because our power had been turned off the day before that it wouldn't happen again soon, so I went out and purchased another cartful of refrigerated food, only to find that we had no power again. Hello? South Africa? Have you heard of "rolling blackouts"? Punish everyone in small amounts, give everyone their turn to deal with no power, but please don't turn off our power everyday just because OBZ is the ghetto! Because we had no power, we were forced to have a braii (BBQ). It was our first house dinner, and it was delicious. Scott made Bratwurst, potatoes, and corn on the coals in our back yard, and I made a salad! No power, no refrigerated food, and we still had a great meal…SUCCESS! After that, a few more friends came over and we played a huge Poker game. Once again, I got my ass kicked, I am just not patient enough for that game, so about 4 rounds into it I bet my entire pot and I lost…SHOCKER! Following the poker game, we went out to STONES (my favorite bar in town) and shot some games of pool.

The next day was a big work day. James and I went to 4 locations to drop off our brochure stands and talk to the people about why our Scuba Dive Club rocks! And then we went and bought my car. It is a 2003 VW Golf Citi and it rocks! I drive on the right hand side of the car, on the left hand side of the road, and my shifter (yes it is a manual!) is on my left! It is soooo different but I have only almost killed myself once thus far! About 4 hours after I got my car, I had to drive to Hout Bay (a windy 30 minute drive) to go have dinner at my Aunts best friends house. You should have seen me go! I only stalled once on my way there- I am quite impressed with myself. The first day was terrifying but now, three days later I am a pro. I am now the crazy driver on the road, yelling at people who are in my way, and racing past them when they drive like idiots!

I stayed in on Friday night because my aunt Tessa was passing through the Cape Town airport early Saturday and I wanted to go hang out with her on her 5 hour layover- and I don't think her 6:15 am arrival time would have paired well with a hangover. After my breakfast at the lovely Cape Town airport I had to go to work in Hout Bay. Well if you call sitting in a chair outside the scuba trailer, sunbathing, and looking out over a gorgeous harbor WORK, then yes I was at work…but it was awesome. We took our trailer out for the first time and set it up in the harbor by the boat launch and we actually got a customer! A British lady, Tina, walked up to our trailer and said she saw our banner on the side about shark cage diving and was very interested. She told Sean and I that she just had lipo-suction and was not sure if the holes in her stomach were going to be closed in time, but she wanted to go shark cage diving on Tuesday but didn't want to go by herself. Being the outgoing person that I have become here, I volunteered myself to assist her (I mean it is part of my job here)! Sean thought it was a very good idea, so apparently on Tuesday, my new 55 year old, British, skinny (lipo-suctioned) friend Tina and I are going shark cage diving. If I don't write Wednesday that means I have been mauled by a massive great white. Speaking of great whites, after work today I was invited to a braii with Nick and Steve (my Dive Masters). They failed to mention that we were going to one of the largest estates in all of Cape Town! We pulled up to a gate and when it opened it was like Heaven! Aaaaaaaaahh….A huge mansion with guesthouses and pool houses and maids quarters…and everything else you could think of. It was a big party with about 50 people just drinking out of glass goblets and sunbathing and swimming…it was so surreal to me. It was pretty windy, and so when one of the glass goblets would break, they would just take another one out of the box! So…back to the great whites…one of the first people I met at this incredible party was a 20 year old guy, who about 4 years ago had his leg bitten offwhile he was surfing by a great white shark at Mutzenburg Beach. A few days later, his leg (still attached to the board) washed up to shore! Can you imagine!?? I am actually off to that beach in the morning, so wish me luck!

All day today Peter, Jenika, Bodo, Ludwig, Jenette, Scott and I went to Llandudno Beach. It is by far my favorite beach yet. It was along the cliffs, and you drive down a windy road all along the coast to this spot, and it is much less touristy than every other beach we have been. It was wicked windy but I was intent on renting an umbrella because in this African sun my skin completely bypasses the tan stage and jumps straight to this lovely cherry red color- it is just gorgeous! The umbrella man was not keen on renting me an umbrella because he said it was too windy, but me, thinking I am gods gift to earth, told him that I know how to dig a deep hole and that it will be no problem. Well it was no problem….for the first TWO minutes, and then the spokes broke and poked through the top of the umbrella and there we were, wind burned with a mangled umbrella- there was no hope of any form of shade. We went exploring over some rocks and found ourselves a private-like cove with rock caves to lie under for shade! All in all it was an amazing day, UNTIL we got home! Peter opened the door to his bedroom and his room was in shambles and there was a 14 ft wooden stick on his floor and his window was open. A robber climbed our fence and stuck this huge stick through his window and tried to scrape everything of value in Peter's room towards the window. He got Peters computer off the bed and across the entire room to the window, but someone must have come home right at that moment because he didn't steal anything and left all his robbing tools outside Peter's window. His comforter was off his bed, his suitcase was opened, and his computer was upside down right by the window. It is so odd though because we left for 11 am for the beach, and our roommate came home at 2 pm! So this happened in broad daylight on a Sunday- weird! We did some more examining, and outside his bedroom window Peter found another 14 ft stick, a screwdriver, and another stick with a metal hook tied on the end. I actually think it is so funny to think of a guy with these GIANT sticks and hooks trying to finagle things in the room towards the window. Can you imagine seeing him walking down the street with all these "scamming sticks?" The only thing that he got was Peter's watch, but that is minor considering he almost got the computer! We have now gathered all the robbers tools and hung them on our "robber souvenir wall." We are going to see how many contraptions we have collected by the end of our stay!

Well my camera broke today so there are only a few pictures, but hopefully I will get a new computer by Tuesday for Shark Cage Diving! Miss you all…talk to you soon.