Hectic Start

I would like to start off with something everyone should know, CapeTown is Freaking Awesome. This place has everything you can wish for. The whole city is built in the valley of the table mountain, ending at the sea, giving this place the perfect blend of full grown green nature on one side and a blue ocean on the other side.
Even though the sea looks absolutely amazing, there is one thing I have to confess, the water over here is seriously cold, the temperature of the sea water is about 15 degrees. Nice to cool down but too cold to have a long swim.

My first week has been a very interesting one, I’ve arrived on a Friday after a long flight from Dusseldorf to London to Johannesburg and finally to CapeTown. I’ve arrived in the city smelly, sweaty and completely disorientated about what was happing around me. Basically exactly the same as what happened to me in Kuala Lumpur, but it’s not possible to get used to it. Lucky I already arranged a cab driver who would bring me to the hostel. I wanted to stay in the hostel for about three days so I could sort out a place to live, since I didn’t have one. This would be the main mission for the weekend. After making a list with houses I wanted to visit I was ready to go out for visiting these places. by pure coincidence I’ve met a Belgium guy(Warre) who was looking for houses as well, by pure coincidence Warre met a professor from the university who was driving him to the houses he wanted to visit. Lucky I could hop along this ride and the professor was willing to take me to the places I’ve listed down as well. This great help resulted in me finding a place to stay within five hours, winning! Further I’ve made my first friends in CapeTown, winning!

The place I’m staying now is quite the catch, I share this place only with the owner, I can make use of everything in the house, and it feels like home already. I’m living up hill so when I walk out of the door I can see all the mountains of Capetown behind me and when I look in front of me I can see the harbor and the sea! Simply briljant. The area is called Woodstock, only for this name I already liked the place but it’s also right next to the city and 10 minutes from the train station, the perfect spot for me.

UWC
After I sorted out a place to stay, my school started last Monday, I had no idea what to expect, but what I saw exceeded all my expectations. The University is absolutely enormous, it’s basically impossible to find one lecture hall in the amount of buildings they have. I’ve got now idea what to compare it with but I can tell you that the University has an own rugby stadium, cricket stadium, swimming pool, student village, and to top it off they have their own nature reserve. These are facilities they have and I didn’t even include the actual lecture halls. The University provides lectures for 22.000 students.
Sooo, yeah, I was totally lost when I arrived, lucky the students are very helpful and guided me through the University. I’m following the classes for Human Resources, Finance for SME’s, Project Management and Political studies. All very interesting I guess, we only had introduction classes so far and coming week I guess the work is gonna start. Hopefully I can still find all my class rooms and then I should be just fine.

Further I’m doing very well, I’m slowly getting to know the city. I found the party streets, found some festivals already, found the beach already and the people over here are super relaxed.

Now it’s time to go to the Football stadium (yeah the one where we lost against Spain) to see Ghana play in the African Cup final. See if I can find a vuvuzela somewhere, talk to you soon!

Yours Truly,


Robert Peeters