3 days in and still no sign of sunburn on both me and Martin! It's a miracle!
Our schedule doesn't start until Monday, so Martin and I have the weekend off to continue settling into life in Cape Town. We decided we'd use today to visit a place called the Waterfront, which is one of the places where we'll be coaching at. It also has a pretty big shopping centre too, so we thought we'd might as well take a look around.
Lourens and Joe gave us a MyCiti bus card to use, which is like the Oyster cards back in England, where you tap in and out, and money comes off the card to pay for your journey. As the car we'll have is strictly for driving to and from our coaching sessions, this bus card will be of great use.
After our, lunch of chicken stir fry with egg fried rice, we got ourselves ready and got the bus towards the Waterfront. It was about a 40 minute journey overall which wasnt too bad, and it took us around most of Cape Town so we got to see the sights on our way.
We got to the Waterfront and walked around the shopping centre to see what was there. It was actually quite nice, with quite a few shops reminding us of England like Topman, Zara and a few others which I forget.
After walking round, nosing about for a couple of hours we decided to head home, as clouds were starting to creep in and it was getting a bit nippy. Nothing as bad as English whether but colder than the weather we've had since we've been out here.
We'd had a call from Conan, who we'd met the day before, asking us if we wanted to meet up later in the evening. We were planning to call him back when we got home, but as soon as we did I pretty much conked out. I was so tired! I slept for a couple of hours, but it was definitely needed. When I wokeup it was too late for us to meet Conan, which was a shame. So we went downstairs and watched Liverpool draw to Bolton in the FA Cup. It was an unbelievably boring game, but after hearing that Chelsea, City and Spurs were all knocked out by Bradford, Middlesborough and Leicester, I didn't really care!
While I was asleep Martin got chatting to this woman called Lesley who, along with her husband George, took care of Luke and Jeff last year when they were in the position we're in now. I didn't get a chance to meet Lesley but George came and sat with us while we watched the Liverpool game, and we had a good chat with him. He said that one day he'd take us up one of the roads by the mountain at night so we could see the views of Cape Town, which sounds like a solid plan to us! They both seem lovely though, and have helped make us feel welcome here in Cape Town, so thanks very much to both of them.
Tomorrow is going to be our second day off, and we've been invited out for a kick about with the Arsenal Cape Town Fan Club, before going to a pub called the Jolly Rodger to watch the game against Brighton, but having looked at the map it looks like an absolute nightmare to get to, especially for Cape Town rookies like me and Martin. Conan mentioned seeing us there, but, unless we can get a ride off someone, it may be the case that we stay in to watch it. Who knows for now, I'll let you know what happens tomorrow!
Harry
Saturday 24 January 2015
Friday 23 January 2015
Day 2 - Meeting The Communicare Staff
Day 2 in Cape Town, and Martin and I have started to settle into the Cape Town lifestyle now.
We had an early start this morning, as Lourens wanted us to meet all the staff of Communicare, so Martin was pounding on my bedroom door at 8:30 to wake me up, so we could have breakfast and get ready to be picked up.
After getting showered, dressed and sun creamed up we went for a little walk around the complex, before Joe (another one of our leaders) met us at the reception in Berghof Retirement Village.
We all sat down in our apartment and had a little chat about what the programme will be like for us, his role at Communicare, and the different places we'd be visiting to coach.
After that, we went to the Communicare office in Cape Town, where we were introduced to all of the staff, while being given a tour of the office. We then sat down for a meeting with Joe and Lourens, as well as a few other ladies from the office who would be taking care of us throughout our trip.
After the meeting was over Joe and Lourens took us around the Cape Town town centre, showing us the different places to go, where to get the buses and trains from and all other useful bits of info we'd need over the next 3 months.
We stopped for lunch at Burger King, where Lourens treated us all to lunch. I had a Whopper meal which was around 50Rand, which works out to be just under £3! Decent!
After finishing off our burgers, we headed out to the car, which we were told would be the car that Martin and I would have to drive ourselves to our sessions, meaning we don't have to rely on public transport. It was a white Toyota Tazz which, according to Martin, is tough to steer! But itwas a nice treat from Communicare. I forgot to bring my driving licence, so Martin was told to drive us to the other Communicare offices in Ruyterwacht and Brooklyn, to see if they could trust him with the car! They assured me it was my turn to prove myself on Monday though!
While introducing ourselves to all the staff at the Communicare offices in Ruyterwacht and Brooklyn, we met a guy called Conan, who was a massive Arsenal fan. He asked us for photos, which we were happy to give, and he gave us his number so we could text him and take us round Cape Town! Which was nice.
It's coming up to 5pm now, which would be around 3pm in England, so Martin and I are going to finish our blogs, eat our dinner and head out to a local pub to either watch the South Africa game, or see Man Utd get slaughtered by Cambridge in the FA Cup!
Harry
We had an early start this morning, as Lourens wanted us to meet all the staff of Communicare, so Martin was pounding on my bedroom door at 8:30 to wake me up, so we could have breakfast and get ready to be picked up.
After getting showered, dressed and sun creamed up we went for a little walk around the complex, before Joe (another one of our leaders) met us at the reception in Berghof Retirement Village.
We all sat down in our apartment and had a little chat about what the programme will be like for us, his role at Communicare, and the different places we'd be visiting to coach.
After that, we went to the Communicare office in Cape Town, where we were introduced to all of the staff, while being given a tour of the office. We then sat down for a meeting with Joe and Lourens, as well as a few other ladies from the office who would be taking care of us throughout our trip.
After the meeting was over Joe and Lourens took us around the Cape Town town centre, showing us the different places to go, where to get the buses and trains from and all other useful bits of info we'd need over the next 3 months.
We stopped for lunch at Burger King, where Lourens treated us all to lunch. I had a Whopper meal which was around 50Rand, which works out to be just under £3! Decent!
After finishing off our burgers, we headed out to the car, which we were told would be the car that Martin and I would have to drive ourselves to our sessions, meaning we don't have to rely on public transport. It was a white Toyota Tazz which, according to Martin, is tough to steer! But itwas a nice treat from Communicare. I forgot to bring my driving licence, so Martin was told to drive us to the other Communicare offices in Ruyterwacht and Brooklyn, to see if they could trust him with the car! They assured me it was my turn to prove myself on Monday though!
While introducing ourselves to all the staff at the Communicare offices in Ruyterwacht and Brooklyn, we met a guy called Conan, who was a massive Arsenal fan. He asked us for photos, which we were happy to give, and he gave us his number so we could text him and take us round Cape Town! Which was nice.
It's coming up to 5pm now, which would be around 3pm in England, so Martin and I are going to finish our blogs, eat our dinner and head out to a local pub to either watch the South Africa game, or see Man Utd get slaughtered by Cambridge in the FA Cup!
Harry
Thursday 22 January 2015
Day 1 - Arrival
Well, we made it! After almost 17 hours of sitting in a cramped airplane seat, Martin and I have arrived in Cape Town. Safe to say it was a long flight.
After doing a final sweep of my house, making sure I hadnt missed anything, Mum and I set off to Heathrow airport, via a stop off at Egham to pick up my god mum Sue, where we met Martin and his girlfriend, Tina, sitting in Cafe Nero.
After a quick coffee drink, Martin and I got our bags checked off, and got our boarding passes, before my mum insisted on taking plenty of photos of me, Martin, Sue and herself. She even asked if we could take a selfie! Haha.
As we said our final goodbyes, Martin and I glided through security, and onto a pretty overpriced soup at Pret, before boarding our plane.
Despite the plane being nice and fancy, the screens in our chairs often failed us, with Martin spending most of the flight to Doha unable to watch anything, as his screen was completely frozen.
The plane from Doha to Cape Town was much better though, with the screens not only functioning properly, but also seemed to have a few more options in what to watch, which is always nice. This increase in options didn't stop me and Martin being completely bored out of our skulls, though. As the 9 hour flight seemed to drag on forever. Especially as the seats were rock-hard, and didn't allow us to get any sleep at all.
After enduring through the 9-hour struggle, we had a bit of a scare after collecting our bags, as we couldn't see our leader (and lift), Lourens, anywhere! We managed to walk through most of the airport before conceding that he wasn't there and heading back to the arrivals gate.
Turns out he'd been there all along, just we were probably so tired we didn't actually spot him in the crowd!
Lourens drove us from the airport, through Cape Town, towards where we'll be living for the next 3 months, Berghof Retirement Village. It only took us around 20 minutes, but we managed to see loads of Cape Town on the way through and it looks amazing! The views are incredible. Our apartment in Berghof overlooks Table Mountain, which looks 10x more incredible than it does in pictures. Lourens promised us we'd walk up it soon.
Lourens also gave us our timetables for the next 3 months which, from the looks of things, will keep us nice and busy during our stay here! Tomorrow we meet with the rest of the staff at Communicare, the company we'll be working with, to introduce ourselves and get to know the people we'll be spending the next 3 months with!
Anyway, I'm going to end this post here, as I've been up since around 5am yesterday, and am completely exhausted. Got a 9:30am start tomorrow, as we get our lift to the learning centre for our meeting!
Harry
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