ninjas, townships, muggings and cheese

So, yet another crazy week. First, some more comments on the elections. We went around and saw the polling stations and things seemed generally pretty laid back but organized. After you vote you get the top of your thumb marked with an ink that stains like henna, only faster. I heard about people trying to wash it off right after it was put on, and it would re-appear rather quickly. People are still walking around with thumbs that look like they were maimed by car doors...
As for parties, some of my favorites I saw were the Cape Separatist Party, the plethora of Muslim and Christian parties, and the party founded on the basis of bringing back the death penalty. Especially the Separatist one. But in the end it happened just like everyone thought it would, and by Saturday we had found out that Jay Z was in fact the new president and the ANC had won in a landslide, but just below 2/3 majority, which is good. So no constitution changing. In the western cape (where I am) the Democratic Alliance (aka DA, aka generally white middle class) won the regional parliament and premier (like a governor). Last election they just got the premier but the ANC got the parliament so they were both basically deadlocked. Throughout the rest of the country the main opposition came from the Congress of the People (Cope), which is an offshoot of the ANC. Cope Leaders were generally in Robben Island along with Mandela, Zuma and the like, but either quit or were kicked out of the ANC due to their non-support for Zuma. As a side note, I think it's interesting that I've seen newspaper headlines calling Jay-Z SA's sexiest politician, which is horrifying. Here's some context: after purportedly raping a girl he was asked if he was afraid of getting HIV/AIDs, and he said no, he'd taken a shower. Awesome. He also has hundreds of counts of corruption and fraud against him that will basically just never be brought to trial probably. One of the minor parties that will be lucky to get even one seat in the national parliament, the Independent Democrats (ID), had as one of their slogans, "Put criminals in jail, not in government." Pretty telling if you ask me.
Aside from that, the week was interesting in and of itself. Emily and I went to see Elections and Erections on Thursday at the Baxter Theatre, which is right on campus. (I know that I'm probably mis-using "which," but I can't help it. I apologize to the proof readers and English buffs out there). It's a one man show by Peter Dirk-Uys, a political satirist who also wrote Macbecki. It was in two acts and really good, but I fell asleep during the second act and couldn't seem to stay awake. In the first act he dressed up as different (female) characters in order to speak as different voices commenting on the elections and politics in general. In the second half he dressed as his alter-ego, Evita Bezedenhuit (or something like that) and interviewed some local political figure. His fame basically comes from being an anti-apartheid activist as well as being openly gay. He's spoken to both Mandela and the national assembly while dressed as Evita, which definitely takes some balls.
Friday I went to a house party that my friend Sebastian was putting on at the house he considers himself an honorary member of. The theme was "Ninjas For the Advancement of the Space Program," and it was loads of fun. Emily and Maggie went as well, and we met loads of cool people and generally had a great time. It was nice to be able to go to a house party especially, because so much of the going out here is clubs, which never feels quite as comfortable. Sebastian had done some really cool art for the walls, and they had (for a reason I never picked up, but wholly agreed with) decided to fill the bathtub with fake blood and a disembodied arm. Walking to get a cab we got mugged, but we were carrying barely anything and the muggers definitely weren't too pushy, so it was not nearly as bad as it could have been. Somewhat scary, but we were intact and even got to keep a few things, so it could always have been much much worse. The only annoyance is having to figure out how to get a new phone, my task for later today...
Saturday I went to Yzerfontein to see some archaeological sites that had been discovered when building excavations had disturbed them. The sites were about an hour from Cape Town and we went for a class field trip. They were mostly shell middens, which are sites with tons of ancient shells that were eaten by ancient people (probably about 120 thousand years). It's amazing especially because they think that modern humans actually evolved here, partially because of the high amount of marine food intake which supplied ancient brains with the omega fatty acids necessary to encephalize (get bigger and more interconnected). Sadly we had to leave everything we found behind. Damn Monument Protection Act!
Sunday (sorry, I know this is a long post!) we went to Gugulethu to go to a really popular restaurant there calls Mzoli's. Shannon has a flatmate name Sia who's married to a girl named Zola (who's about our age) from Gugulethu, so she took us. Gugulethu is a black township, which means it's generally very poor, a little bit rough, and it's likely that some percentage of the population lives in handmade tin shacks. Lots of the townships started when black or colored populations were forcibly removed from where they were an put into these makeshift settlements. We walked around a bit during the day and some sites, including a place where they make Umqoboti, a traditional African beer made from fermented maize meal, among other things. We paid 5 rand to get a big coffee container full of it, and it was pretty good. It tasted really metallic, we think because of the metal container it was served in. I'll post pictures soon, it was quite an experience. We also saw some old hostels where men from the Eastern Cape would stay when they came to this area to make money. No women were allowed in the hostels, but often men would have a wife at home and a girlfriend here. Generally polygamy is widely accepted here. The idea of a "white wedding" - one were the marriage in monogamous - is pretty recent, and even Zuma has multiple wives. In the evening we made it to Mzoli's after buying some alcohol at a shabeen, which is an illegal liquor store (illegal because it doesn't have a license, tends to stay open later than others and will do things like sell you alcohol on a Sunday). Mzoli's is actually the freshest butcher in Gugulethu, so what you do is buy fresh meat then take it back and they grill it up for you. It takes forever, but we had brought salad and bought some dumplings and pap (it's like polenta), so it was a good time even for the vegetarians.
Yesterday was a day off, so we rented a car and went to wine country for a cheese festival. Basically the whole day can be summed up as wine, cheese, chocolate, olives and sun. I was driving so I did a bit of wine tasting early on, but then stuck to juice and water tasting. I think Maggie got sick off of all the cheese, which means we definitely got our money's worth on the entrance ticket. It was so much fun, and I'm already getting excited about the gourmet food festival in May!
So that's about it. I'll post pictures when I can. And kudos to any of you who were dedicated enough to make it all the way through! Love ya all loads!