A new day today, a new month, a new home on Polo Road. It's been splendidly sunny in Cape Town the last week, but the wind has been swirling about like nobody's business. I thought I'd escaped it today by moving from Camps Bay to Observatory. Last weekend the wind was so terrible it felt like the whole block of flats was about to fly off towards the land of Oz.
My new neighborhood is very colorful, literally and figuratively. To many peoples' shagrin, it is a bit of dodgey area, though I reckon it's not so different from Logan Square (where I lived in Chicago) in comparison to other neighborhoods here. There are a lot of homeless people about, but the exciting part to me is that is a very mixed area. Economically, racially, and culturally I think the whole spectrum of South Africa is present. It really is quite magical after having spent so much time in affluent areas too exclusive to invite a mixture of people. I'm sure the longer I spend here, the more I will have to say.
I finished my Teaching English as a Foreign Language (TEFL) course on Friday and begin back at St. Paul's on Tuesday. I will have exactly 5 weeks left to teach when I return, though I suspect the bulk of my time will be directed towards the library. There have been an incredible amount of new monetary donations - including about $800 (some from China, some from Mt. Holly) - and used book donations from local Cape Townians. So there will be a lot of purchasing taking place and a lot of book prep in this last month, which is very exciting!
Yesterday, with a sore neck, I decided to pre-emptively spend some birthday money on a shiatsu massage, by a local therapist who many had recommended. It was one of the more emotionally intense experiences of my life as he actually "channelled" my energy. He was talking to me the entire time I received the massage and he tapped into many things about me that I never mentioned. It was almost like he was inside my head and halfway through the massage I couldn't help but let tears stream from my eyes. He challenged me so thoroughly it was as though he'd held a mirror to every criticism I already hold of myself. He worked on my lower back where I hold a lot of memory tension and still today I am sore. Even he found it to be remarkable that he had received so much information about me. I think it actually marks ground I need to focus on and in light of that I am glad I had the whole of today to "unpack" my bags. It's time I stopped living out of a suitcase.
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