So… I’m in love with Cape Town. Just putting that out there. I feel sure I’m neither the first nor the last person to start a blog post that way. Alas, onward!
Our last couple of days in South Africa were dedicated to sightseeing and cultural excursions. On the first day, we were together as a group, visiting Bo-Kaap, Boulders, and the Cape of Good Hope (all three were stunning and I’m so glad to have seen them!); on the second day, we split up and participated in the sightseeing and cultural activities that spoke to us individually and in small groups. I spent day two visiting Robben Island, ambling about the city and outdoor markets, and hopping on a classic Red Bus Tour (I'm predictable like that). While experiencing Robben Island was perhaps the most culturally significant and profound of my experiences that day (not to mention the one that allowed me to connect A Long Walk to Freedom with my experience in Cape Town), it was actually the Red Bus Tour that I enjoyed the most. I say the aforementioned not because I value it more than my other experiences per se--certainly not more than Robben Island--but because it felt like the perfect completion of the trip, as if I were both literally and figuratively looping around the city and its people and all the varied demographics and income groups that bring it to life, all the townships set up against the wealthy suburbs and beach towns, all the erstwhile sites of protest now paved over as if themselves old tropes, all the bits of history and pain and beauty that make up any real place in the world. It was all of the books and films and all of the discussions and assignments and all of the people meshed up together. I loved it as much as one could possibly love a tour.
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AuthorI'm Kelly. I teach English as a Second Language, business English, and writing. I eat poems for dinner. Archives
January 2019
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