Sunday morning started out with us hiking up Table Mountain, which was INCREDIBLE. I had never hiked any sort of real mountain before. It was so killer. Everyone in the group went. The original plan was to have a fast group and a slower group. What ended up happening was that Rose is an expert hiker (from what I can tell) so I hiked up with her, while Lauren and Anthony were shortly behind (clearly Anthony would have beat all of us but he’s a nice guy), and Naomi, Danielle, and Victoria were a little behind them. By the way, when I say I hiked up with Rose I actually mean that she set the pace and I kept up with her. She’s a quick one. It was such a work-out. We were told it would take us about 3 hours to get to the top, but we made it up in about an hour and a half. Nice. It is breath-taking all the way up the mountain and is totally worth the climbing and slipping (if you’re like me, I have a battle scar on my palm) and sweating that it takes to get to the top. CABLE CARS ARE FOR WEAKLINGS! Or those with injured limbs. We spent quite a bit of time just enjoying the top of the mountain, taking pictures and having a snack at the café, before deciding to hike back down. Going down was more difficult and less enjoyable than going up. You’re so worried about losing your footing that you can’t even look around at the scenery. Lame. But it was such a great experience and I feel like I had conquered the world by the time I reached the top with Rose. The air was clear and the view awesome beyond belief. Totally worth it.
The evening was the beginning of my birthday festivities. The group all went to dinner at Café Paradiso, a really yummy restaurant that has amazing desserts. It was a little bit of an ordeal to try to coordinate something for everyone. The original plan had been to go out Sunday night, but nothing was really open so instead we settled on dinner. But I was having difficulty choosing somewhere because you know how you don’t want anyone to feel obligated to spend money or do something for you? That’s how I was feeling. There were 10 people waiting for ME to make a decision. That’s a lot of pressure! They were so funny though, being sneaky with a cake for me. First clue I got was when Julian called our room and asked to speak to Lauren, and she told him “I sent someone else to get it.” (The cake by the way was ammmmmazingly delicious! Chocolate layers with whipped icing stuff and some fruit. Mmmmm I love Lauren for knowing me so well.) Second clue was Karlyn trying to sneak down the stairs with a huge box in her arms. Third clue was the reflection of candles I saw in the glass after dinner at the restaurant. It was so nice though, everything and everyone. They’ve all been so nice to me and treating me like a princess, literally even calling me princess. And we all know how much I love being a princess haha. It was more than I could have asked for.
The rest of our evening was pretty relaxing, just hanging out for a bit before bed and work in the morning. Work was decent on the day of my actual birthday. Catherine (the girl who took me around the first day and has become one of my favorites in the office) wished me a happy birthday in front of everyone, so of course the rest chime in as well. The highlight of my day though was easily my present from Hasnain that I downloaded in the morning. Here’s the link if you haven’t seen it. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FkvlDlhvfEY I cried so hard when I saw it the first time this morning, and have since watched it every hour or so. I love it to no end. We went out to dinner again, and that was basically the end of my 21st celebration.
If you had asked me before what I expected my 21st birthday to be like, I would have probably told you something along the lines of “VEGASSSSSSSSSSSSS.” I was so convinced for the longest time that is where I was going to be spending it. I don’t know what part of my birthday being in the summer during people’s internships and travels made it seem plausible that I would spend the weekend of July 6 partying it up in Vegas with all my best friends, but it seemed very logical to me. If you would have asked me post-acceptance to DukeEngage South Africa what I expected by 21st birthday to be like, I could not have even begun to imagine how great it would be. Everyone here has made these past two days beyond incredible for me, and I never would have been able to predict how great of friends these people have become to me.
It was fantastic. Nothing less. Thank you everyone, no matter where you are in the world, for making me feel so special.
I love you all and ukuthula,
Lynn
No comments:
Post a Comment