home.
Many queues, flights, one night in London later, and I am in the land of Starbucks and obesity. I have been in the States for a mere few hours, and I can barely even handle being here. Call me cynical, but it is so difficult coming from such an exquisite, complicated country, where I made friends that became family to me to a place that I call home, but I have to get used to so many aspects of it after being away for five months.
I must admit, that it will be nice to walk around the street at night and not feel that I am going to be mugged, being able to check the weather and know that there will not be four seasons in one day, having people look at me differently because I am American, and of course, seeing my family and friends that I have missed dearly since I have been away.
But there are still things that have become accustomed to in South Africa that I must adjust to at home. I must get used to passing people on the right instead of the left, being on time for things, not spending money like it is monopoly money, not having new things to explore every day, not going to school with ivy covered walls that sits on a mountain that overlooks and entire city. I must get used to not hearing Molale’s whistle from metres away, hearing Brianna’s music from her laptop from my room, watching Weeds with Neo and Mavis, and drinking “blind wine” when I should be doing homework.
There is something about saying goodbye to friends when you cannot foresee seeing them again in the near future. I smiled at my friends, saying of course I will see them “in 2010 for the World Cup, of course” “You must come to the States and drink beer at a frat party.” And of course, being an optimist, I hope these happen.
“What is that feeling when you’re driving away from people and they recede on the plain till you see their specks dispersing? – it’s the too-huge world vaulting us, and it’s goodbye. But we lean forward to the next crazy venture beneath the skies.”- on the road
liz said,
September 8, 2008 at 7:52 pm
i read a book called “im with stupid” and funny thing is in the book this young rich boy named manuel that was always showing off his riches said that u can swim with penguines in cape town- the main character in the book didnt believe it and ended up in the book it was true. its a fiction book so i was wondering if it was true, i asked my classmate that was born in south africa but she said she wasnt sure. so i googled and here i am on ur blog- that is so awesome! penguines on a sunny beach! well i told my boyfriend but he wasnt surprised. he said he already knew of that and that its actually rally cold and theres alot of sharks over there. is my boyfriend right? i told him- how can that be sharks and penguins living together in the same area hehe….
-liz from houston