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March 24, 2005

An Odd Sight

This morning I ran my usual route around the circumference of the campus, and something rather strange happened. As I come around the back of campus, Table Mountain comes into view behind the nature reserve. It was large and looming, like usual. Each loop takes me roughly 20 minutes, and when I came around again, Table Mountain had completely disappeared! The fog in the distance completely erased the background of the mountain and left the foreground looking totally unchanged. It was so strange to expect Table Mountain in the distance but to see absolutely nothing! I'm going to miss Table Mountain...

So, 40 minutes of running today because I had to rush back to my dorm to study for my final combinatorics exam. Well, not the final exam, but the last in-class test. Needless to say, I aced the test. Maybe it was all those exercise-enduced endorphines...

Posted by rgutwin at 11:01 AM | Comments (2)

Warning: No Internet Access

Today commences the fall break here at the University of the Western Cape, meaning that I won't be able to get online again until Monday, April 4th. Consequently, that's the day that I also have to register for next semester at HWS. It's going to be a busy re-introduction to life at UWC.

The next four days, however, will be fairly uneventful. I might go into Cape Town on Friday night and during the day on Saturday. Since we're all going to be basically stranded at the university on Easter Sunday, our group is having a potluck where I'm assured that South African pancakes will be making an appearance, courtesy of Chequira. This means that I have to think of something to make and go to Pick and Pay on Easter to buy the materials. I'm thinking that individually wrapped chocolate eggs are looking good right now... The kitchen is going to be a disaster area on Sunday, and as I don't have a dish that I'm super enthusiastic about cooking, I'll do something simple and yummy.

So if you want to contact me before April 4th, you can't. Well, technically you can call me on Frances' cell phone, but I'm assuming that the cost-effective e-mail and blog-posting route is more appealing to most of you. I hope everyone has a great Easter filled with lots of delicious food and enjoyable company. Maybe I'll be ambitious and energetic enough to get up on Sunday morning and watch the sunrise on campus...

Posted by rgutwin at 10:50 AM | Comments (2)

March 23, 2005

The Bike is my Friend

Even with an injured hamstring, I was able to bike this morning for an hour without any pain. I lifted this morning at the same percentage that I lifted last week, because a) the gym wasn't open on Monday, so I haven't lifted since Friday, and b) it's very difficult to increase the weight I'm lifting because it's generally in increments of 5 or 7.5 kilograms, which is slightly over 10 and 15 pounds, respectively.

Posted by rgutwin at 05:47 AM | Comments (0)

Goals and Aspirations

Rayda Jacobs came to the university yesterday to speak with us about her novel. As I sat there listening to her talk about her motivations for writing the book and the process it entailed, I realized that I've never heard an author speak on a piece of literature before that I've read. It was very interesting to hear how passionate she is about writing: any of us would be lucky to have such a clear desire in life.

I am happy to announce that I have finally figured out the remaining eight courses I have left to take at HWS! Well, I have one open course in the spring next year for an elective of my choosing, but my schedule is now set for the rest of my time as an undergraduate. Math, computer science, psychology, and acting will entertain me next semester. My senior spring, I'll be taking more math, computer science, philosophy, and something else. And I must say that I'm a huge fan of the Good Society minor, as it is probably the most versatile minor around. I like it when I can design my own program for things...

This does not mean, however, that I have all of next year planned out or that I have any clue what I'm doing after I graduate in 14 months. I'm looking into doing honors work next year, but that depends on whether or not I can find a topic interesting enough to occupy my time for a year. And as of right now, I don't have any plans on graduate school, but that also depends on what I discuss with my advisor back in Geneva about my options once I graduate. I'm not particularly thrilled right now about the idea of aquainting myself with a whole different school. Twice is enough for me.

Posted by rgutwin at 05:33 AM | Comments (1)

March 22, 2005

A Little More Rest

I was good this weekend and took both Saturday and Sunday off for my injured ankle. I ran for 45 minutes on Monday morning and 50 minutes this morning, both of which felt fine on my ankle. However, I have potentially now pulled my hamstring...

Posted by rgutwin at 07:57 AM | Comments (0)

An Entertaining Weekend

Although some of my plans fell through, I actually got off campus a few times this weekend! On Friday night, Frances and I found a small, out-of-the-way Chinese food place that served us a relatively tasty dinner. After dinner, we still had slightly under two hours to kill on Long Street, and after following a couple around until they were sufficiently sketched out, we hung out in the internet café and had a chat about the men, or lack thereof, who have influenced our lives. Frances' experience beats mine, hands down.

On Saturday, I planned to go into Cape Town and visit the District Six museum with Nikki and Crystal, but the man who's in charge of our transportation just randomly cancelled the ride, and we walked one and a half miles to the Spar down the road. Perhaps because it was Saturday, or maybe because we were in a group of three, but we got considerably fewer honks than we usually do. We had a great time walking and chatting, and when they mentioned that they were going to a Freshlyground concert and asked if I wanted to come along, I said I would be there.

Shaun picked us up a little after 7:00, and after hanging out near the theatre for slightly over an hour, we paid our 30 rand to go in and await the band's arrival. Nikki, being the avid concert-goer that she is, hung out near the stage, while Crystal and I had a comfortable experience on the couch at the back. Shaun was nice enough to drive us both there and back, and we returned to campus at the modest hour of 1:00 am.

On Sunday, I slept in (which entailed waking up at 8:00 instead of 7:00...), and watched a few movies and played a few games of solitaire while Frances was out shopping. I got a little bit of work done, but since Monday was a national holiday and UWC actually observes national holidays, I knew that I had another full day to procrastinate. My dad and Beth called shortly after 4:00 in the afternoon, and we talked for an hour and a half or so. It was so nice to hear a familiar voice from home!

After my run on Monday morning, I spent the majority of the day reading Confessions of a Gambler by Rayda Jacobs, because she's coming to speak to my class later this afternoon. Her novel was incredibly interesting, and I'll be flying home with it at the end of May if anyone wants to read said novel. Monday was a bizarre day because it was like another Sunday on campus, minus all the worship services everywhere: almost everything was completely shut down, and only a few people littered the campus when I went out for a walk sometime in the afternoon. When they all started piling in again this morning, I was rather glad to see the campus at its normal capacity again...

Posted by rgutwin at 07:34 AM | Comments (0)

March 18, 2005

Another (Frustrating) Injury

My ankle has been bothering me since late December. For some reason, the lower lateral area of my right leg hurts sometimes, but it doesn't seem to have anything to do with my workouts or other activities. When I got to Johannesburg, it started hurting about two days into the trip, but the pain went away after a few days and just started recurring late yesterday. Now it's to the point where any time I try to use the ligaments near my right ankle, I get an unpleasant twinge of pain. I'm going to take Saturday and Sunday off from running and see how I feel.

This morning I spent an hour on the bike and 20 minutes with the weights, as usual. I've got to start thinking of ways to spice it up a bit, but I also like routine workouts. And plus, when I decide to do something a little more involved, I always end up going a little harder than I should...

Posted by rgutwin at 04:48 AM | Comments (0)

South Africa Gets Hot in the Summer...

For those of you who don't know, South Africa is beginning to head from summer into fall. What is "spring break" in Geneva is "fall break" here (which made me think a little harder than usual the first time I heard it). Supposedly, the western cape's climate is similar to that of California's, although I haven't lived in California since I was six years old, so I can't evaluate that statement very accurately. What I do know is that it has been close to 90 degrees this week, with the 10 day forecast looking (slightly) cooler. What does one do on a 90 degree day at the University of the Western Cape? Stay indoors as much as possible, and avoid the third, fourth, fifth, ..., fourteenth floors of buildings like sketchy baboons.

Actually, the only building on campus with 14 "floors" is the library, but the floor reference is deceptive because of the way the building has been designed. It's pretty neat: you enter on the fifth "floor", and to get to any of the other ones, you walk around and around this huge spiral ramp that goes up like so:



The library is air conditioned, which makes it a rather pleasant place to camp out in when it's 90 degrees outside...

I never thought the sentiment would pass from my lips, but I'm glad that fall and winter are shortly on their way. I guess it's not really passing from my lips, eh? More from my surprisingly-moisturized hands in the middle of Geneva's brutal winter. I hear that it's starting to warm up a bit on the eastern coast, though, so perhaps my attempts to blow some of the extra-warm air in a north-westerly direction towards the United States is finally starting to pay off.

Posted by rgutwin at 04:27 AM | Comments (0)

March 17, 2005

More Cardio

I went running for 50 minutes this morning (which entailed about 15 minutes more of rushing around because I had made myself a few minutes late for class). After running slightly too quickly on Tuesday, I set the custom page on my Forerunner to display time, distance, and calories, the three units that didn't have anything to do with my speed. Technically, being the math major that I am, I could have calculated my speed with the given information, but I made a conscious effort not to do so. Therefore, my pace was about 30 seconds slower than Tuesday's, which made a whole world of difference.

Posted by rgutwin at 10:23 AM | Comments (0)

Fire on Campus!

After camping out in the library for a few hours yesterday, I decided to take a 10 minute walk to the International Relations office to see if Janine had any more of an idea of how I can register for number theory next term. On my way, I had to walk past a portion of the nature reserve that is enclosed within the campus fence. As I approached, I noticed that it was rather smoky out, and I just figured that someone was having a bonfire or braai or something somewhere. But as I passed by the reserve, I saw huge (rather warm) flames! It was obvious that this fire was not intentional, because it was really, really close to buildings, and it looked very uncontrolled. I kept walking, because I didn't want to be one of those people who stands around gawking and getting in the way, but it was pretty cool to see. Somewhat scary, but still pretty cool. Nothing like that would ever happen in Geneva, and if it did, everyone on campus would know about it. When I got to class later last night, most people hadn't even heard about it!

In reference to my post yesterday, I think that everyone on the trip is starting to get a little burned out and somewhat frustrated with little things that are accumulating into bigger issues. My friend and I were talking about how we don't want to look back on our semester in South Africa with major regrets, but the program is somewhat poorly designed in a few areas that are falling below our expectations. Even though nothing can really be changed for us at this point, I think that HWS is going to get enough negative feedback from the students here that quite a few things will change for the next group. I knew that we would be the guinea pigs, and I completely admit that the professors and program directors at HWS are doing the best they can to make this experience as enjoyable as possible for us. It's just somewhat discouraging when even the most optimistic on the trip are starting to get a little down...

Posted by rgutwin at 10:11 AM | Comments (6)

March 16, 2005

The Ditz in the Weight Room

I try very, very hard not to make a fool of myself in the gym. I know my way around the weights, and I spend the majority of my time away from them on the bike. I spent 45 minutes on the bike this morning and then ventured into the lifting section of the gym (ie, I got off the bike). As I was using one of the weight machines, I went to go put the peg in the right weight hole, and I noticed that there was no peg! So I grabbed one from the machine next to me, put it in, and didn't lift the weight at all. I thought that maybe I had been slightly too ambitious in my weight lifting goal, and I lightened the weight. Still nothing. Then I looked closer at the weight stack, and the peg was all the way down in the bottom hole! I had inadvertantly been trying to tricep press 150 kilograms, which is slightly less than 300 pounds. Um, yeah. I'm not there yet.

Posted by rgutwin at 05:36 AM | Comments (5)

Exhausted

I'm really tired, and it's from more than just getting up every morning at 7:00 to get my workout in. We're halfway through the semester here, and everything is starting to get a bit too monotonous. Karl talked about finding something to appreciate every day, and while it's rather easy to do that in a completely foreign country like South Africa, I still go through my daily routine without particularly wanting to do any of it. I have mounds and mounds of reading to do for my HWS courses, and a contrasting lack of work for my combinatorics class. I have lots of little essays to write and mornings to spend running and biking when I'd rather be rowing. Granted, the same feeling of monotony has happened at HWS, but it didn't even cross my mind that I would be bored and slightly unhappy in South Africa.

The main thing is that I can't go anywhere off campus without travelling with someone or paying more money than I have to go by myself. I'm literally fenced in here, spending the majority of my time either in my room, reading or playing solitare on my iPod, or in the library and computer lab, trying to get all of my work done or passing the endless supply of hours I seem to have in front of me. I'm having great, new experiences here that I would never be able to have back in snowy Geneva, but I still find myself wondering why I'm 8000 miles away from anything familiar. I keep wishing that May 29th would get here a little sooner...

Next week we only have classes on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, because Monday is a national holiday and Friday is Good Friday. I don't currently have any plans for Easter on Sunday, but on the Tuesday after Easter, I'm heading east with my group to travel along the Garden Route. Then it's back to the university for April and May, where I'll be taking number theory instead of combinatorics (I still need to figure out how to register for that...) and trying not to forget everything from combinatorics for the exam that isn't until the end of May. Yeah, I don't really know why they decided to do that, either. Two thirds of the class is going to fail anyway, but you take away their fighting chance if you leave a two month gap in between the time they've seen any of the material and the time they're expected to regurgitate it back. The exam is technically scheduled for June, but I'm really hoping that I can arrange a time to take it earlier. Preferably two months earlier.

Posted by rgutwin at 05:12 AM | Comments (6)

March 15, 2005

Highlight of the Week Moved to Tuesday

As many of you know, because I've pointed it out a few dozen times, I have my weekly shopping trip into Tyger Valley on Wednesdays for three hours. However, due to some student's complaints, the trip has been moved to Tusdays. Therefore, I have to get a workout in, shower, go to class, and eat breakfast all before 10:00 in the morning. I guess that I can't complain that I'm too bored on Tuesday mornings, although now this means that my Wednesdays will be really slow. I don't have class until 5:30 in the evening on Wednesdays...

By the way, if anyone has a really simple, quick recipe that doesn't involve too many ingredients and can be cooked in a kitchen the size of a sardine can, please send it my way! I'm looking for easy things to make to put over rice and more interesting pasta dishes. Although, I have to say that given my lack of culinary skill, I've actually been enjoying quite a variety of food thus far this semester. My cooking tends to involve lots of eggs and pasta and bread. I can't wait until I get home and have real (skilled) people to cook for me!

I looked for Maple Syrup in Pick 'n Pay today, because I made French Toast on Sunday morning, and I only had a raw sugar packet and butter to top it. Generally, people use a generic "syrup" here for their pancakes and yogurt and stuff like that, but I actually found maple flavored syrup! There was real (ahem, Canadian) maple syrup on the shelf, but at over $10 for a very small bottle, I decided to stay within my college student budget and purchase the $1.50 fake one. I wish I brought real stuff with me...

Posted by rgutwin at 08:19 AM | Comments (3)

A Not-So-Much-Recovery Run...

It's important to mention that Frances and I have a squeaky door. This means that whenever she wakes up, I wake up, because she inevitably has to use the squeaky door every morning. So I was going to take Tuesday off again this week, because I've been really, really tired, but I figured that since I was up anyway, I'd go for a run.

Also, the Forerunner that Mom got me for Christmas has been amazing, because I get all sorts of information while I'm running without having to do complicated math in my head. However, it's not so great for encouraging me to run slower when I'm tired, because the really super competitive part of me wants to beat my previous run's pace every time. So I end up running faster than I probably should, but that's the way I tend to train. I spent 45 minutes running around campus this morning, and then 15 minutes running around my dorm to shower and get dressed, and then 10 minutes running to class, an hour class break, and then 15 minutes running from class to my dorm to try to get some breakfast before I went on my shopping trip. It's been a hectic morning...

Posted by rgutwin at 08:13 AM | Comments (1)

March 14, 2005

No Gym Buddy Sighting Yet...

This morning I spent the standard 60 minutes in the gym on the bike, and then 20 minutes of lifting. Unfortunately, my buddy didn't make an appearance today. Maybe I'll see him on Wednesday or Friday...

I took Sunday off this week because the hike that Frances and I took on Satruday was more than enough of a workout for the weekend. That hill was really, really steep.

Posted by rgutwin at 08:11 AM | Comments (0)

Cecil Esau

My friend has configured her laptop so that she can plug into the ports in the library, and she offered to let me upload my photos! I've put some online in my Snapfish album, and more are on the way when I find someone else camped out in the library. In the meantime, here's a view of my dorm:

My room is behind the fifth and sixth windows from the left on the ground floor(the first two are Crystal and Christina's room, and the third and fourth are the bathroom). I have to get going, but I'll post some more pictures from off campus soon!

Posted by rgutwin at 07:27 AM | Comments (1)

An Amazing Weekend

Frances and I had ambitious plans to go hiking this weekend, because we were both fed up with spending so much time in our room and not being able to take ourselves anywhere. However, it was over 80 degrees on Saturday, and Frances didn't feel particularly enthusiastic about hiking in such temperatures. So we decided to walk from Cape Town, where we get dropped off on Adderly Street, over to Camp's Bay, which is a semi-nearby beach.

The tricksy thing was that we had to climb the 'hill' in between Table Mountain and Lion's Head. Since we are both young and lively and the walk looked like it was less than 5 kilometers, we decided that the hill wouldn't pose too much of a problem. So after Frances ate breakfast in Cape Town, we set off down Long Street and made our way to the other side of the peninsula.

The walk wasn't too bad: it took us about an hour and fifteen minutes, and we had fun chatting while we made it. The hill that we had to climb on our way to Camp's Bay reminded me of Marin Avenue in Berkeley - lots and lots of uphill. But once we got to the top, the view was absolutely amazing. We could see Cape Town on one side and Camp's Bay on the other. I can't post pictures at the moment, but you can click here to see someone else's photo of what it looked like.

When we got to Camp's Bay, we spent an hour eating lunch and the most delicious ice cream I've ever had, and then we had about two and a half hours left to spend on the beach before we had to hike back to Cape Town to catch our ride back to UWC. The beach was wonderful, although the water felt like it was about 40 degrees! Frances and I only stuck our feet in, but we felt plenty refreshed. The walk back was somewhat difficult on Frances, as she doesn't work very well in the heat, but we made it back in one piece and are looking forward to the introduction of fall! We're planning on going on lots of hikes in our spare time...

There was also a cycling race going on, which made me want to find a road bike and jump in. Every year there's this race around the peninsula, and Frances and I just missed them at the top of the hill between Cape Town and Camp's Bay. Some day I'm going to find someone who wants to take a trip to South Africa with me to go biking around, because it would be a lot of fun to see the Western Cape from a bike rather than a car window.

Yesterday was very uneventful, but it was nice to spend the day in the room and take time to relax. I walked around campus and took a few pictures, so hopefully I'll find a way to get those online soon. I only have two more weeks until spring break (which is called fall break here...), and then I have less than two months left in South Africa! The time just feels like it's flying by, but I also can't wait to get home and see everyone! I'll have lots of stories to tell.

Posted by rgutwin at 02:51 AM | Comments (2)

March 11, 2005

Gym Buddy

After my 45 minutes of bike time and subsequent 30 minutes of lifting, I headed out of the gym in my sweaty spandex attire back to my dorm. On the way, I passed a guy in my combinatorics class who has talked to me once and seems rather nice (ie, not as pushy as many of the other men here). It was rather obvious that I was coming from the gym, so after I said hi to him, he pointed at his watch and said that he would join me sometime. So I now potentially have a gym buddy, which is rather welcome because I spend quite a bit of time in the gym, and yet no one ever talks to me! Perhaps that's because I spend most of the time zoning out with my iPod headphones in my ears, but still...

Posted by rgutwin at 04:36 AM | Comments (1)

Leaving Impressions

I realized in class the other day that I might be the only American student that my combinatorics professor will ever have. Students don't tend to come over from the United States to study math in South Africa. So if I'm the only American student he'll ever have, it places an unrealistically large burden on me to represent the stereotype of American math students in general.

I also realized something else the other day. I was in the computer lab, and I ran into this Indian girl that I keep seeing all over campus. We've chatted before, and this time she asked me if I've been to any concerts and who I've seen. I had to explain to her that the whole pop music thing isn't really my scene, and I was surprised to find out that she knew (at least something about) the genre of country music! So it's made it all the way to South Africa.

But the thing that really struck me was the realization that, because so much of South Africa's music and entertainment industry comes straight from the United States, people here don't really have opportunities to go to concerts and see their favorite artists perform. I guess that I just took it for granted that I lived in the same country with all of this media power. That's what I like most about going abroad: stepping back from my life and realizing what I have that I didn't take much notice of before.

Posted by rgutwin at 04:24 AM | Comments (7)

March 10, 2005

Not Just Post! A Package!

This afternoon I had to walk all the way across campus to the International Relations Office to ask Janine a question about registering for number theory next term. As I was sitting at her desk, I saw a package in the corner of the room that looked remarkably familiar. So, I asked her if it was for me, and it was! Diana sent me a spectacular assortment of goodies from the United States, which has definitely made my week!

Thus, I have accumulated the following statistics about the postal service:
(1) It takes approximately 7 days for a package to get from South Africa to the United States.
(2) It takes approximately 12 days for a package to get from the United States to South Africa
(3) It takes approximately 10 days for a letter to get from the United States to South Africa
(4) I'm not really sure about the amount of time it takes for a letter to get from South Africa to the United States. A little help here?

Posted by rgutwin at 10:50 AM | Comments (2)

Track Time

I spent the majority of my 40 minute run today running around the track. It was somewhat sketchy, because there were people who were obviously setting up for an event that was about to take place, but I was on my way home before anything started.

Posted by rgutwin at 06:15 AM | Comments (0)

More Post!

The tally is now up to five pieces of mail from five different family and friends! My grandparents sent me two cards that arrived yesterday in one envelope so as to provide more surface area to cover my wall! I am very excited that so many people have taken the time to send me something, and I still have two and a half months here. I am expecting more cards and letters where those came from, folks.

I'm glad that this week is almost over, although it seems like every week here at UWC seems to fly by, which makes my remaining time here seem very short. I got sick this weekend and had a total of four papers due this week, which was a little excessive. In addition, I have another combinatorics exam tomorrow. I can't believe that my class is ending in two weeks. But, then, on to number theory it is! Maybe HWS should consider these term courses...

Posted by rgutwin at 06:09 AM | Comments (0)

March 09, 2005

Still Trying to Shake This...

Much to my disappointment, I woke up with a (still) sore throat this morning. But since I wasn't particularly tired, I headed over to the gym for a light and short 45 minutes of cardio on the bike and subsequent lifting. This nasty virus better get out of my body soon, because I'm getting rather tired of it. Quite literally.

Posted by rgutwin at 10:10 AM | Comments (0)

Food Purchase Issue

Wednesday has become my new favorite day of the week, because I get to go shopping for my weekly supply of food! I have had fun cooking and experiencing the freedom of eating what I want to eat (that is, when I take the time to make it...).

I do have somewhat of a problem, though. I buy both fresh and non-perishable items at the store, and since food in South Africa seems to have fewer preservatives and thus doesn't last as long, I have to eat a lot of the fresh food before I can start on the shelf food. Also, once I open things, I have to keep eating a lot of them until they're gone. For example, I bought a jar of pasta sauce two weeks ago and an still trying to eat enough pasta to be able to finish it! So I still haven't eaten the rice or soup or other interesting and yummy things that I bought over two weeks ago, because I keep getting so much fresh food!

Therefore, in conclusion, I wish that they made fresh food in smaller containers that lasted longer. This week, I refrained from purchasing many perishable items, so hopefully I'll be able to have fun with my rice soon. I also found this veggie burger mix that sounds really, really yummy. I might pick some of that up next week...

Posted by rgutwin at 10:04 AM | Comments (3)

March 08, 2005

Cell Phones Prohibited

It's important to mention that I am the only student in our 25-person group that has not purchased a cell phone, and I have no intention of doing so. My theory is that it's very possible to get through four and a half months in South Africa without needing to buy such a device, considering the fact that they only became popular in the past decade. And plus, 6 of the 25 people who purchased phones have already had them stolen, which makes for a rather miserable statistic on the fate of a cell phone should I purchase one.

I'm guessing that almost every other student in my Combinatorics class has a cell phone, though, and a surprisingly large majority of them don't turn off their phones before they get to class. The first time a student's phone went off, the guy actually had the nerve to answer it, and when he exited the classroom, the professor chased him down the hallway and ordered him to get back in class. However, three phones have gone off in the past two days, and the professor has reached the point where he just says, "Get out" when someone's phone rings. Even if the student turns it off right away, the professor won't let him stay in the classroom. I find this rather amusing, because at HWS, it's fairly common knowledge that you need to turn your phone off before class. I have a feeling that my Combinatorics class isn't spectacularly representative of the general teaching behavior at UWC, though...

Posted by rgutwin at 10:57 AM | Comments (4)

Still Ill

It took me over two hours to fall asleep last night, so when my alarm went off six hours later and I awoke to a general feeling of sickness, I decided not to go for a morning run. I'm planning on heading to the gym tomorrow morning to lightly bike and lift again, though.

Posted by rgutwin at 10:45 AM | Comments (0)

March 07, 2005

Spring Sickness Follows Me to South Africa

I honestly didn't expect to get sick this semester. Summer at home is usually spent illness-free for me, and since I haven't been training very hard, I didn't think my immune system was particularly low. But something found its way inside, so I took an extra rest day on Sunday to try to recover faster.

This morning I woke up at 7:00 and spent an easy 45 minutes on the bike followed by my lifting routine. If I don't feel drastically better by Wednesday, I'll ease off even more, but I don't want to let the sickness affect me more than it needs to.

Posted by rgutwin at 07:34 AM | Comments (0)

Illness Strikes Cecil Esau B12

On Thursday afternoon, Frances came down with some flu-like sickness, and I knew that it was only a matter of time before I picked it up from her. We stayed in on Friday evening and watched movies, and then we spent the day on Saturday doing work. My throat started to hurt as I sat at Frances' computer writing about collaborations with apartheid, and within five hours I was pretty miserable.

Naturally, I had to get up at 6:45 on Sunday morning to go to an Anglican church with my professor and a couple of classmates. In South Africa, Anglican means Episcopalian, and since I've been to at least two Episcopalian services in the United States, this church was more familiar than the Mormon church. However, I was not such a fan of all the incense that they were waving all over the place, as it was making me more nauseous than I already was. The thing I don't like about Episcopalian churches is that there are so many rituals and hymns and everything that the service is less about the sermon than it is about doing all these habitual things. So when the service had to be shortened due to a meeting, they decided to cut out the sermon instead of a few of the dozen or so hymns we sang, thus leaving us with a very abridged version of the speaker's notes. I don't think I'll be returning to that church very soon, either.

After church, we headed to Greeen Point Craft Market. It's important to note at this point that Sunday was the first rainy day I've experienced in my month in Cape Town, and it naturally had to be dreary and miserable when I wasn't feeling much better. So we spent an hour or so wandering outside at this huge flea market, and then we headed to the McDonald's across the street so that Emily and Richelle could get some lunch.

Then we walked to the Waterfront and made our way inside the indoor craft market that seemed to be the less-messy-tourist-version of Green Point. That was fairly educational, but by this time, we were all getting a little tired and decided to call Calvin and have him pick us up an hour early.

But wouldn't you know it, Calvin didn't have any vehicles left for the whole day! Yes, even after we called him on Saturday to confirm that he could pick us up on Sunday afternoon. We were all somewhat upset with no way to get back to UWC except for public transportation. Many people here know that public transportation in South Africa is not my favorite thing, and after Sunday's ordeal with getting back to campus, it's probably safe to say that the public transportation is my least favorite part of South Africa. Especially when I'm so sick that I can barely function, let alone try to figure out how to get three very white, obviously American girls to a university an hour away.

To make a long story short, getting home required us to do a few things that our professors definitely would not have approved of. We took a bus from the Waterfront to Cape Town station after a woman at the information desk told us that taxis on a Sunday afternoon wouldn't be incredibly safe for us. We were supposed to take the Bellville bus from Cape Town, but all of a sudden we found ourselves in the middle of a train station with 5 minutes left to get on a train leaving for Bellville. The next one wasn't leaving for another hour and a half, so we rushed to the ticket counter and then onto the first train car that we came to.

Unfortunately, once we sat down, all three of us realized that being on a completely empty car with one man on his cell phone and two late-teenaged boys wasn't the best idea in the world. But the train started moving, and we spent the uncomfortable 40-minute ride talking to avoid the reality of the potentially dangerous situation. The train line going into Bellville isn't safe for South Africans, let alone American students.

We got to the Bellville station fine, only to be notified that the train to the UWC campus had just left. So a very helpful girl showed us to the taxi stand, where we crammed into a Belhar taxi for a very crowded 10 minute ride. I don't think I've ever been so happy to get back to UWC...

Posted by rgutwin at 07:10 AM | Comments (10)

March 05, 2005

Lab ¹ Hit-on-Becca Time

I had my two-hour lab for combinatorics yesterday, and this guy sat next to me who spent the entire time talking to me instead of doing the exercises. Usually, I'm all about the chatting, but not when I have a dozen or so problems in front of me that are demanding my attention. At the beginning he was asking me how to do certain things, and I didn't feel like going over the common sense explanation of generating r-combinations for an n-set. So I kind of gave him the 20 second it's-not-that-complicated-just-do-this speech, and I kept working. But then he started asking other things, such as:

"Have you been clubbing yet?"
"No. I don't really do that very often."
"Yeah, me either. I just like hanging out at home with a few friends."

and

"Do you have a boyfriend?"
"No."
"And why not?"
"Oh, just cuz."

and

"Where do you live?"
"In res."
"Which dorm?"
"Umm, Cecil Esau."
"I'll come visit you."

The thing about South African men is that they're very forward, and unless you're forward about the fact that you really aren't interested in them, they assume that you're just playing hard-to-get. But this guy seemed nice, so I didn't want to tell him to stop talking to me. However, I don't see anything happening with a mid-twenties computer scientist who can't get the hang of lexicographic order.

Posted by rgutwin at 03:10 AM | Comments (6)

March 04, 2005

Impressive Stuff

I am prone to be relatively unimpressed by men's strength in the weight room, because I think it's somewhat ridiculous to spend hours and hours a week lifting weights for the sole purpose of having abnormally large muscles. However, since the bike I use faces all of the weights, I have nothing else to look at except the dozen men who are lifting really heavy things. This morning, one guy proceeded to bicep press much more than his body weight, so that when he was finished with his reps, he held on to the handles and lifted his feet off the floor, and the machine lifted him up! And then there was this guy who was leg pressing 140 kgs: that's more than twice my body weight!

So I spent an hour on the bike this morning while I was observing all of these impressive feats, and then I proceeded to lift my (slowly increasing) weights. I can't wait until I get home for the summer so that after I use all of the weights (in pounds) at the gym, I can get lots of protein in my body to help my muscles grow. Protein shakes and bars are not particularly popular here, as I have yet to see them sold anywhere here.

Posted by rgutwin at 05:38 AM | Comments (0)

Sleep (or lack thereof...)

For some reason, I haven't been sleeping very well here. Maybe it's due to the 90-degree weather (not to rub it in all of your frozen faces...), or maybe it's because there are a lot of exciting things over here that produce cognitive function not condusive to sleep. However, this happens fairly often at William Smith and is definitely not anything new. What is strange is that I wake up at 7:00 in the morning to head to the gym or the track, and it takes me less than a minute to get out of bed. Usually, if I get less than 8 hours of sleep, the next morning involves many uncomfortable minutes between the anticipated beeps of my alarm clock's snooze function. I have a feeling that this can't go on forever, though, and I'll either get really, really sick or really, really tired.

Posted by rgutwin at 05:24 AM | Comments (2)

March 03, 2005

On the Road Again...

I have a math class at 8:30 in the morning on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and since the track and weight room don't open until 7:30, it's very difficult for me to get my cardio workout in before I have to be sitting in the science building awaiting a lecture. However, due to the extreme South African heat, it is not a good idea for me to attempt a workout at any other time of the day. Therefore, I was forced to run on the pavement today for 45 minutes, even though it has been giving me quite a few issues recently. I figure that if I build up to longer runs slowly, the hard terrain will be somewhat nicer to my body.

I thought it was rather impressive that I woke up at 7:00 and was able to run for 45 minutes, shower, eat breakfast, finish a proof, and walk over to my lecture hall all before 8:30. Efficiency is my motto in life. Well, that and a few other hundred things...

Posted by rgutwin at 07:28 AM | Comments (0)

Bad Planning

The way that the HWS professors have scheduled our classes here means that I have two classes on Tuesday and Thursday evenings and a different class on Wednesday night. Thus, over the weekend I spend hours preparing mostly for Tuesday's and Wendesday's classes, so that at the end of every week I have a lot of work to do for Thursday and Friday and not much time to do it. For example, this weekend I worked for the majority of Saturday and Sunday. I had Combinatorics on Monday, two classes on Tuesday, grocery shopping for most of Wednesday followed by a class until 8:30 at night, and I had 130 pages to read and a short paper to write for today. Furthermore, I got an assignment in my Combinatorics class this morning that is due tomorrow at 2:00, and I have relatively little free time between now and then to get the work done.

Note that I am not complaining about this situation, as I am a college student and I understand that this is why I pay thousands of dollars a year. Some people here are voicing frustration about the workload that our professors are placing on us, noting that they didn't come to South Africa to sit in their rooms and read all day. And while I have much sympathy for these people because I am going through the same thing, they did sign up for the same study abroad trip that I did. The material that we're reading has everything to do with the country we're temporarily residing in, and it's very interesting to be able to apply what we're learning to the environment that completely surrounds us.

In conclusion, my study abroad trip to South Africa has involved much studying, despite the warm summer-like weather and my proximity to the ocean. With that said, I am enjoying my time here more than I initially expected, as I have become much more aware of what is around me and conscious of the fact that my time here is quickly passing. I wish that I could bring everyone here just for a day or two to show them what I've been learning about! If anyone happens to be heading to South Africa before the end of May, let me know...

Posted by rgutwin at 07:10 AM | Comments (2)

March 02, 2005

Another Female in the Gym!

This morning, as I was merrily peddling away on my stationery bicycle in a very warm weight room filled with a lot of sweaty men, another woman walked in and made use of the vacant recumbent bike next to me! I was very happy for the slight shift in the ratio of testosterone to estrogen in the room, and although she didn't make use of the plethra of weights like I did, it was one of the only times that I've seen other females in the gym. It's strange, because although there seems to be a high emphasis placed on body image and weight loss here, not that many people actually excercise. At all.

After 45 minutes of biking and about 20 minutes of lifting, I headed out of the warmest place on campus and jogged back to my dorm. I'm very glad that I don't have any morning classes on Monday, Wednesday, or Friday, because this way I have time to get back to my room and remove my sweatiness before I face the 14,000 students at UWC.

Posted by rgutwin at 09:27 AM | Comments (2)

Quality Mall Time

As I may have mentioned, Wednesday is my shopping day to Tyger Valley: a huge mall about a 10 minute drive from my campus. Although I am very excited and grateful to be able to go grocery shopping once a week, it does not take me the alloted three hours to get my grocery shopping done. Those who know me at all know that I have very little tolerance for malls, and the prospect of wandering around for over two hours a week in such a place is rather discouraging. I know that if I were in a mall in South Africa with Miss Jenna Katz, she would be able to entertain me for much longer than the required three hours. But alas, she does not arrive in Africa until after I am back in the United States, and she is going to be in a different country several thousand miles away from South Africa, anyway. I guess I will have to find ways to entertain myself.

I'm not particularly fond of our shopping excursions partly because Bellville used to be a white suburb during apartheid, and the Tyger Valley mall is almost exclusively full of white people in a black-majority country. This is true of many beaches in the area, too, and it's a rather strange phenomenon to walk into such a place and feel like you've been instantly transported to the United States. As I've noted before: South Africa still has a long way to come, but sometimes it feels as if certain aspects of the country are going backwards...

Posted by rgutwin at 09:08 AM | Comments (4)

March 01, 2005

Rest Day

With my 3-days-on, 1-day-off, 2-days-on, 1-day-off schedule, Saturdays and Tuesdays are my rest days. I think I'm going to stick with this whole extra-day-of-rest thing for a couple more weeks, because I'm feeling remarkably less tired and sore than I usually do.

I made it to the gym yesterday afternoon and spent 45 rather warm minutes on the bike and 20 minutes or so lifting. Conclusion: I don't like working out in the middle of summer in South Africa when there isn't any air conditioning...

Posted by rgutwin at 07:28 AM | Comments (0)

Coloured Chalk and Washing Machines

With my vast expanse of knowledge I have gleaned from a month and a half of observation in South Africa, I have come to some conclusions. Although UWC is rather far behind HWS in a plethra of areas, the university does have a few key advancements over the colleges back home. First of all, my professor broke out the coloured chalk today in math class, and I was astounded not by the proof he was drawing on the board (although it was a rather nifty proof), but rather by the fact that the coloured chalk erased just as cleanly as the regular chalk! It is a phenomenon that I have never seen in the United States, and something that seems to me to be rather desirable.

Second of all, even though you have to pay for your plastic bags at every major grocery store you go to, laundry at the university is completely free! I am not as excited about this as I probably should be, because it means that I have less of an excuse for not doing laundry, but I am very pleased that I don't have to hunt down the right number of coins before I can cleanse my not-so-clean clothing. It's going to be strange to have to pay to wash my clothes again when I get back to Geneva.

So, the other day in class, my professor asked us to go home and write a Pascal program that generated a series of numbers using an algorithm we had just implemented in a proof. Since I am not a Computer Science major and not at all familiar with Pascal, I told the professor that I couldn't do the exercise. He told me to stop by his office yesterday so that he could give me another problem instead. I walked into his office right after class, and the first thing he did was apologize for the fact that the class is moving so slowly and that I look so bored. I explained that I was used to it, and he then proceeded to give me an introduction to graph threory. So now I have all these complicated graphs to make and no really solid idea of how to go about doing so. I'm going to have to go and see him on Thursday to make sure that he's really asking me to design a graph with 56 vertices and several hundred edges...

Posted by rgutwin at 07:07 AM | Comments (7)