I woke up this morning knowing someone was looking at me. It was Maggie, my neighbor’s cat who had jumped through the window and was sitting on my desk waiting for me to wake up. Windows are open all the time here and there are no screens, instead windows have metal designs that don’t allow anything big to come through, but air and small things, like cats, can come and go as they please.

Mangos are in season now. They’re big and delicious. I accidently spilled coconut milk in a cup of mango chunks and it was delicious. Lots of seasonal fruits and vegetables are available now in the middle of summer. At the grocery store I’ve learned to say “yes” when asked by the cashier if I want “sakkies” so I'll have something in which to carry things home. Sacks aren’t expensive, they just have to be requested.

Biltong is a dried meat famous in South Africa (Ann B. would love it.) It’s like beef jerky but made out of different meats—primarily from Spring Buck. I saw some Spring Buck (a small antelope type animal that springs into the air and whose jump looks like a flying fish but on the ground) yesterday on a game farm. Game farms are huge pieces of land where native animals graze naturally, some game farms are private and some are public. Yesterday I went to one of the public farms where, unfortunately, the monkeys and rhinos were in hiding, but the giraffe, willdabeast, zebras and many types of anelope were sunning themselves.

After I greeted Maggie this morning, I went with some neighbors to the Reformed church attached to the theological college. There’s a service in Afrikaans and a much smaller service in English. The University semester starts this week and the English service evidently expands just after this time of the year, at the end of the summer, with all the returning international students. I’m among them!

Yesterday I went to the store to get a headset for my computer for Skype. I’d been to the same store last week and remembered that it was “Moslem”, closed on Friday for prayers from 1 to 3. The Moslem population in Potchefstroom lives in the Indian district of the city where Hindu is also practiced on a smaller scale. The Indians came several hundred years ago to work on the sugar plantations.

At the store, an Afrikaans sales person (not Moslem) helped me find what I needed and said, “Ben Laden can check you out” pointing to a young middle eastern cashier with a modest head cover. A lot of South Africans migrate to Australia, the U.K., and Dubi to make more money than they can make here—this guy looked like he might have been from Dubai. I got into a conversation with “Ben Laden” and mentioned something about his name. He didn’t want to talk about that saying his full name was something, something, something. He wanted to know where I was from and when I told him he put his head down and said, “everyone in America hates us.” “It’s not true” I said telling him that the average Americans live without the preoccupation of anger toward Moslems just has average Arabs simply want to live in peace. He didn't buy it and said that 9-11 changed the way America thinks and it think unkindly about Arabs. I responded, “on behalf of America I want to apologize.” He didn’t say a thing. Only after I walked out did I realize (because someone told me) that the Africans guy was teasing Ben Laden by calling him that name after the famous terrorist.

Many of the people I’ve met (Arabs, Indians, Afrikaans, black South Afrikaans, etc.) have had little exposure to personal relationships with Americans. (Many Africaans think I'm British.) Interesting to see how they view it: some in a good light, some not, but always informed.

Morning comes early in South Africa. Just after five am the outside sensor lights go out because the sun has lit the entire sky. One of the window of my flat faces the clothes lines for the complex (even though there are washers and dryers, the clothes lines are always full) and someone inevitably comes to get their clothes shortly after five. So the day begins.

I finally have internet connectivity in my flat, so the day this morning began with research for my dissertation. Then I went to the gym. It’s just a block away, beautiful and fully equipped—probably for the Olympic athletes who train here. I saw some of them on the athletic field several days ago when I went with neighbors to the University swimming pool. The field is lush and green and seemed somewhat magical as I saw it from up high looking down. Runners and high jumpers lined the tracks.

At the gym, I decided to take strength training and yoga classes; didn’t think about the fact that they were taught in Afrikaans. At a break during the first class I thanked the instructor who said, “why didn’t you tell me you were American”, then she taught the class in English.

The people I talk with are fully bilingual. Afrikaans and English. If they don't know me, they begin sentences in Afrikaans, see my bewildered look and switch to English. At the Theological College (pictured) everyone knows that I speak English and conversations convert when I am around so that I can understand. I’ve met with several of the professors, many of whom have impressive CVs. One NT professor wanted me to read one of his recent papers, so I did and we’ll talk about it tomorrow. Today I found some really helpful information for my topic for which I’m so grateful.

Tomorrow I will have been in South Africa for two weeks. My first week was packed with adventure. Stay tuned and I’ll catch up on what’s happened so far …

South Africa is beautiful this time of year. The high elevation (roughly 5,000 ft) keeps the air clean and cool in the mornings and evenings, this afternoon the high will be 82° Fahrenheit. Many of the streets are brushed with color from big trees and beautiful flowers in full bloom. The chatter in the streets is either Afrikaans or one of the eleven official languages in South Africa.

This morning we visited an Anglican church where we were greeted outside by a group of school boys dressed in dark blue suits with jackets that have broad, thin orange stripes. They were wearing hats that reminded me of the old movie the Music Man. Remember the straw hats with the flat brim and flat top with a band around them? I’ll try to take a picture and post it here. These boys, and their young female counterparts, go to the boarding school supported by the church that helps black families in outlying areas by educating their children. It’s much like the British system where they don’t see their families for extended periods of time and become family to each other.

My flat is in a very cozy complex with international students and their families. Manya, from East Berlin, is a postdoc student working in nutrition--she lives next door. Uta and Sabastian, ironically also from East Berlin, live nearby with their three young children who pop by daily. Sabastian also finished his Ph.D. and is working at the Theological College. Madupe, a physicist, finishes her Ph.D. next January. She and her two small girls are from Nigeria where her husband lives and visits from as often as possible (two or three times a year). David is from Ivory Coast. Katharine, a classical pianist expecting her first child next month, is originally from Kakastan and is married to Ingo from West German where the couple lived before they came to the University. Ingo is an astrophysicist. I've briefly me a Bengali family who returned from holiday recently. Summer break has just come to a close. This close knit international group shares meals, cars, fellowship and fun.

Friday night we had a Shabbat dinner together. The children picked up the song “Shabbat Shalom” quickly and made up dance movements to go along. There were about 12 of us celebrating in all. When I told the children that we were doing what Jesus and his disciples did each Friday night, they assumed that meant that we’d be doing this every week. The adults later asked if we could. Perhaps a new tradition has started.