The weekend (and Monday) that was

The weekend started on Thursday but Thursday was spent removing cat hair from all surfaces, baking, and being firmly attached to my bed. The plan was to go to Betty's Bay for the rest of the weekend but my urge to do something else and go somewhere different took over and we found ourselves in De Kelders. We was myself, Trix and boyfriend and a couchsurfer from Germany. Trix found us a comfy, albeit horrendously decorated, low cost apartment. It was the Whale Festival and accommodation was not easy to be found. And not cheap either.

De Kelders is now my new favourite seaside town. We didn't get to explore the caves since they were closed but did get to hang out at the beach. I decided to brave the chilly waters even though I was more afraid of dead bird cooties than the cold. The water was decidedly pleasant and soon the dead bird was forgotten as I floated, staring up at the blue, cloud spotted sky. The beach later became known as Dead Bird's Beach but the I think the real name is actually Stanford's Bay. Whatever. I like Dead Bird's Beach better.

Later, after a few glasses of wine, there was the salad dressing drinking incident and other hilarities. We went to bed first ensuring that all animal skin carpets were out of sight and I woke up far too late the next morning but luckily no one had finished the delicious peanut butter cheesecake I had made. After finding the caves closed and the weather turning foul we decided to head off to Hermanus. We'd spotted a few whales before heading off and saw even more in Hermanus. There were even more whales frolicking in the ocean in Hermanus. I say frolicking but they were probably having sex.

After the long drive home I once again firmly attached myself to my bed until late Sunday afternoon, missing lunch with my mother but making it in time for afternoon tea. Supper was with an old friend from university that I haven't seen in far too long.

Monday proved to be utterly miserable. It's difficult to adjust to work after a 4 day weekend. My couchsurfer had to stay an extra night and wanted to take me to the movies to make up for it. We had sushi at Sevruga and I found it difficult to move after insisting on eating the last 3 pieces of sushi.

We watched Public Enemies and I can highly recommend this movie for reasons other than perving over Johnny Depp and Christian Bale. It's a top notch crime movie. It has a stellar cast but I wasn't mad about the female lead and would much rather have had some of the actresses playing cameos to have played the lead. Some of the scenes are far too long. And the movie was shot in HD. While some scenes are beautifully shot, others -incidently the ones that could have been cut, looked like they were scenes from some horrible cheap, crime reenactment show. It's hard not to fall in love with John Dillinger and some of his lines in the movie are entirely quotable.

What do you want?
Everything. Right now.


We're having too good a time today. We ain't thinking about tomorrow.

Bad day

I had a different blog post related to couchsurfing planned for today and my day was looking up as I fondly recalled the great couchsurfing experiences I've had to date.

Until I opened an email alerting me to a new post on the South African Couchsurfing group. It was a post about safety.

I'm sure everyone has had bad couchsurfing experiences. My worse so far has been the guy with really strong body odour. It's less than nothing compared this woman's experience:

Chinese tourist 'raped' after being offered free bed for the night from man on 'couchsurfing' website

This is such sad news. Utterly heart breaking and I'm crying as I write this. Why must there always be people who ruin great things for others?

I have been extremely optimistic about the world as of late. I'm trying to tell myself that I should do everything in my power to keep it so. But I'm not sure I have the power to keep my spirits up.

EDIT: The meds have worn off and I'm less emotional and vulnerable than I was this morning. This could've happened anywhere, anytime, with anyone. Couchsurfer or not. The woman could have stayed with someone she knew well, or someone a friend she trusts recommended and she still could have been raped. I guess sometimes I just want the world to be too perfect even though I know it is not and can never be. Try explaining that. Reading about this took away the perfectness that I thought was couchsurfing but I should have known better, shouldn't I? Or I did but conveniently ignored it. I'll admit that it was less about a woman being violated than my 'perfect' world being shattered. But not by much.

I guess the attitude around this will be: stupid woman staying with a stranger. That is completely unfair. This is an isolated incident and will hopefully stay that way. I'm not going to let one reprehensible act ruin what has been up to now, and can continue being, a great experience for me. I hope the other good couchsurfers out there feel the same.

Something to blog about

Is it sad that one of your thoughts when the front of your car gets ripped off and you're then arrested for drunk driving*, is, "Well, at least I have something to blog about now".

After an epic Friday night, after passing out on my bed still wearing all my clothes and jewellery, I woke up still drunk and agreed that a spontaneous trip to wine country is a fantastic idea. It seemed the best way to avoid the coming hangover.

Gorgeous wine farms and wine, golf carts and one Reuben's lunch later* I found my car missing its front which was later loaded into the back.

Couchsurfer Lana with a headlight

I later got pulled over for driving with a damaged car. But it didn't help that the car smelled like a microbrewery because of spilled beer. So I was arrested and spent the next 3 or so hours at the police station, with 30 minutes or so in a dark, dank cell.** I was "nice" and they were overcrowded so I was released early. I didn't receive any horrible treatment besides being denied a lawyer and my own medical doctor*** but the condition of the cells were unbelievably horrible.****

*I didn't rip of the front of the car while driving drunk. In fact, the car was parked and I was buying chocolate when the front got ripped off. The driver who ripped off the front was kind enough to go and report it and get a case number. I've spoken to him and he assures me that all damage will be paid for.

**I'm not being melodramatic. None of the lights in the women's cells were working and it was damp due to the weather turning foul in the evening.

***To be discussed with my lawyer on Thursday.

****I might have to wrote a serious post, not in keeping with the lighthearted nature of this blog, about the horrendous conditions of jails and prisons.

Eaglevlei photos

These photos were taken at Eaglevlei in Stellenbosch. I went with a couchsurfer who requested to stay with me for 1 night. 3 nights later she's still staying with me and the weekend we go wine tasting in Stellenbosch. By the time we got to Eaglevlei we were well tipsy. Continuing tasting at Eaglevlei got my couchsurfer to the "drunken rolling around on grass" stage. Me, I decided to snap everything in sight. Not all the pictures were horrible, surprisingly. The ones below quite nicely convey the drunken bliss I felt. None of these have been retouched.