Chicken, Venting, and the Weekend of Sloth

Tonight marks our first true Friday night since the MERS recovery classes took away the large part of our Saturday, and we most certainly relished it. We left work, ate chicken with our co-workers, and then bumped into one of our friends from around Dongtan on our walk home. All in all, it was an uncharacteristically social start to what we have dubbed The Weekend of Sloth, but a most enjoyable one.

Today, the teacher’s room was filled with a strange mixture of exhaustion from the week and excitement for the weekend. A full two days off? Unheard of! We were all itching to get out of the work doors, and the moment the time came around, we vanished from the face of the office. The majority of us walked to a regular barbeque chicken haunt of ours. We sat down, ordered food, ordered drinks, and were very merry indeed. We spent a couple of hours doing nothing more than eating great chicken, having some beer, and spouting whatever came to our minds. We spoke of everything from children to sports to games, avoiding serious topics so as not to ruin the celebratory atmosphere. Once we had eaten our fill, Kris and I parted ways with the gentlemen on their way to various locales and liquors.

Whilst we were walking home, we bumped into one of our friends, a fellow teacher, albeit from the school a little way from our school. As we walked our mutual way home, talk was far more serious than with our jolly co-workers. We discussed breaches of contract, questionable communication from superiors, and the perils of vegetarianism in Korea. We walked all the way to our house, sat down for a time, and vented some more. It felt good for all involved to get several grievances off of their chest, even if it was not to anyone that could actively do anything to fix the problems whirling throughout the conversation. Once we had all let off necessary steam, our friend left, and Kris and I returned to our normal nightly routine: we played a game of DotA2, read some comics, and generally lazed about the blisteringly hot house, giving off a sweaty glow.

Gloriously, this is to be the trend for the weekend. Apart from a Dungeons & Dragons session on Sunday and grocery shopping tomorrow morning, we are likely to not leave the house or see another human in person. We will not have the chance to do this for another short time, because we are taking trips both next weekend (to a mud festival) and the weekend after that (TO JAPAN). Accordingly, we have dubbed it The Weekend of Sloth. And it shall be wonderful. After spending six days a week at work for the last two weeks, we will relish simply being able to waste some time. Because, after all, time that one enjoys wasting is not wasted at all.

Seoul Spring League: Season Finale

For most of our time in Korea thus far, playing Ultimate in the Seoul Spring League has been a regular feature of our Sundays. It has given us much needed exercise, forced us out of our anti-social cave of a home, and a host of new friends. This past Sunday, the season came to an end. However, it did not end with a whimper, but with a string of tense matches and more chicken than we could have hoped to eat. In short, it was an eventful, memorable end to a fantastic season of Ultimate.

We started the morning with hope – the playoffs were elimination rounds, so if we won two games, we could compete in the final against the top-ranked team from the league, and challenge for the title. Uncommonly for our team, we had enough players to field a full team with several reserves before the game even started. We warmed up, threw a bit of disc to get our throwing arms ready, and stepped onto the field for our first game.

We were facing Gaksi, a team that we had previously defeated in two very close games. Both of these games had gone down to Universal Point, the Ultimate equivalent of Golden Goal in football. We were fairly evenly-matched, and this showed in our game. We dominated the first few points, quickly rising to a 7-3 lead with some quick, surprisingly co-ordinated manoeuvres. We then got complacent, and Gaksi fought back with some of their own slick inter-play between their handlers and cutters. As time ran out, the game went to universal point once more. This time, we were not able to stop their momentum, and we lost the game 8-7. We were gutted.

Despite our heads drooping slightly from the loss, we had no time to rest, as we were set to play the bottom-ranked team of the league five minutes after our loss to Gaksi. No rest for the wicked, indeed. Again, we quickly gained a lead over the other team, and let it slip slightly in the middle of the game. This time, however, we rallied and managed to close out the game with a win.

This allowed us to reach the third-/fourth-place play-off game against Choraengi. They were known for fierce yet fun games, and for managing to consistently field a horde of players. The game lived up to its reputation, and both teams fought hard. As was common with our team, the game went down to Universal Point. Everyone attending watched as both teams ran on their last legs to try catch every disk, to make every possible cut, in the hope that it would be the difference between victory and defeat. In the end, Choraengi had one amazing passage of play left in them, and we lost the game. We finished fourth place out of five teams. While we were a little downhearted, we had still had a great day filled with Ultimate. And great things were still coming.

Once we had finished our game, we sat and watched the final between Gaksi and the league-toppers Imae. It was a tight game, with both teams truly on form. Imae proved a little too strong, as they had done all season. The game dragged on, and as the sun rose high in the sky, there was but one phrase dominating the chants from the sidelines: “CHICKEN!” For once the final was complete, there was said to be a feast of chicken and beer waiting at a nearby restaurant. Everyone was tired, hungry, hot, and the feast called to us, promising to soothe all of our ills. With the cheers for poultry pushing them on, Imae managed to secure the win and the league as a whole. Chicken was soon to be upon us all.

We all packed our things and walked what felt like forever in the stifling sun, until we reached our oasis of umbrellas. Once we were all seated, pitchers of ice cold beer and frosted glasses were handed out, and we all heartily grabbed our first (and, for some including me, last) mugs of the cool amber liquid. Promptly after that, mountains of Korean fried chicken were placed on every table, and we all ate like the kings and queens of obscure sporting achievement.

There was a brief but well-put-together awards ceremony, celebrating the best of the league during the season. Kris was crowned Female Rookie of the Year! Once this was finished, we all returned to mingling, talking with former comrades and former adversaries alike. It was a wonderful bonding experience, and showed once again the unique power of Ultimate to bring people together.

As the day wound on, Kris and I ate and talked our fill, and we left amongst the last few stragglers. We left behind buckets filled with chicken bones, plates wiped clean of their delicious chicken sauce, and many empty pitchers. More importantly, we looked back and saw friends that we will see both on and off the field in the future. Friends we did not have when we first arrived. Friends that gave us memories that will be among the happiest we have from Korea so far.

Flicker, Aflame

We are going to Japan! We received a confirmation from the Japanese Embassy, telling us that our passports are ready for collection. All we have to do is travel to Seoul, pick them up, and we are sorted. Therein lies the rub. With the hours we work, even the most insignificant bureaucratic task requires more planning than a politician’s response to a sex scandal.

The majority of bureacratic entities in Korea, be they embassies, banks, or immigration, work normal weekdays, just like we do. This means that we would have to take at least a part of the day off in order to allow this to happen. For a normal person working a desk job, this can vary in difficulty from packing up and leaving to filling in some forms. For a teacher, however, it requires a good deal more. Who is going to replace you in the class while you are gone? Have you planned lessons for that time? Are those plans comprehensible to people other than yourself? All of these considerations are of utmost importance when one thinks about taking some time off in a hagwon.

Nevertheless, we have been in communication with our director surrounding this, and we have a couple of days where we could potentially leave the school for a few hours. Our excitement for Japan is growing! In less than a month, we will be in the land of many childhood fantasies, and we cannot wait!

Flickering Dream

When we were sitting back in South Africa a year ago, contemplating whether we actually wanted to go to Korea or not, we drew up a list of pros and cons. Amongst the list of pros was the fact that we could (we thought) easily travel around Asia, because we would be so much closer to the region than we would be back in South Africa. One country in particular that we both wanted to visit was Japan. We thought that it would be simple to get to Japan, with it being only a short flight from Korea. We became very excited at the prospect of getting on a plane and an hour or two later being in the country that is the heart of so many geek cultural icons. Nintendo, Pokemon, anime, manga: all of these things come from that small island. We dreamed of seeing their roots with our own eyes. Had we known how difficult and frustrating the process of getting into Japan would be, our dreams would be much more faded and greyscale.

Our most deluded thought was that we would simply be able to walk into Japan without a visa. Reading on forums online, we were spun tales of flights of fancy for a weekend with no more than an hour’s planning at an airport. We thought that we could be able to do that as well. One factor we didn’t take into account is that the people who penned those tales of whirlwind weekend trips were from the United States of America, and held USA passports. The USA passport was recently ranked the fifth most powerful passport in terms of accessing countries without a Visa (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/travelnews/11552784/The-worlds-most-powerful-passports.html). The South African passport sat in a distinctly lackluster forty-second place. Crucially for our purposes, Japan is not on the list of countries that South Africans can travel to without a visa. Maybe next time we’ll travel to Belize, or even visit the dictatorland that is Zimbabwe.

Once we realized this, we began the process of applying for a visa. We booked our accomodation via airbnb.com, bought our plane tickets, and submitted what we thought to be the necessary documents, including our Alien Registration cards (essentially a dompas that allows us to work as a foreigner in Korea), passports, and the statement from our joint bank account. We were told that we would receive an email the following day notifying us if there were any additional documents that we would need. Two agonizing weeks later, we sent the Embassy an email asking for follow-up, hoping that they had simply forgotten to let us know that we could collect our visas. If only. The weak light of our dream began to fade – the visa could take two weeks to print after an accepted application, and our time window was closing.

As it turns out, there were two major problems with our application – our accommodation did not appear to be licensed by the Japanese government, and there was no bank statement for my application (our bank account is in Kristen’s name). The first problem was fixed relatively quickly by booking at a hotel that is properly licensed for the duration of our stay, and submitting that booking to the Embassy for application purposes. No, we have no intention of staying there, and we will cancel the booking the moment that we hear that our application has been accepted. Apparently this is a common practice amongst travellers to Japan, and is the easiest way to get governmental approval. It is understandable that accommodation from airbnb will not be licensed, as it is essentially people renting rooms from their homes online. Nevertheless, once we submitted the illusory hotel booking, it was accepted. That left only the banking details still to fix.

This problem would remain unresolved for far longer. The first representative from the Embassy that we spoke to simply could not comprehend that I simply did not have a bank account. We engaged in a frustrating exchange of emails trying to explain this to them, but the concept simply would not dawn on them. We tried to set up an account for me, but there apparently needed to be three months’ worth of transactions to show financial stability. We even debated forging my name and account number of my account onto one of Kristen’s bank statements. Luckily, about a week of constant back and forth later, another Embassy employee began to talk to us, and seemed to understand our situation. He saw that the account was stable, and had enough money to provide for our stay. All we need to do now is provide an official document from our employer stating that my salary gets paid into Kristen’s account each month. With this insurgence of logic into the conversation, the light of our dream began to grow bright once more.

Today, our journey towards a visa may be drawing to a close. Our employer should provide us with the necessary document at some point today, which we will happily send off to the Embassy. Hopefully, by this weekend, we will hear whether it has finally been accepted. We are beginning to see the bright colours of our childhood characters surrounding us with nostalgia and happiness. In about four weeks’ time, we’ll see them with our own eyes, and not just our imaginations. And that will make all of the hassle worthwhile.

+1

While the majority of the world (as represented by my Facebook feed) celebrates the landmark ruling in the US legalizing same-sex marriage, Kristen’s mother’s time in South Korea is coming to a close. Her first week here was filled with travel around the country, kayaking, and time together, the last one has been significantly more toned down. While love wins in America, responsibilities have won out in South Korea.

It has been a refreshing experience having Dalene with us on our adventure, even if it has only been for a short time. Her presence has helped us rediscover our urge to seek the small aspects of Korean life and culture that make it so different from that of our home country. Giving ourselves daily missions to show Dalene something new showed us how much there truly is to see and do within both Dongtan and Seoul itself. Dalene was initially blown away by the scale (particularly the vertical scale) of Dongtan, and was content to wander its streets in search of curiosities whilst we tried to keep children from running amok nearby. And then she went to Seoul for the first time.

We took her to Myeongdong, one of the major shopping capitals of Seoul. She was instantly entranced by the closeness of everything, how tiny shops could be filled to the brim with everything from jewelry to confectionery to dog couture. The smells of a host of Korean delicacies and street food mingled with the sound of people from every part of the world all reveling in the combination. And trying to find that cute shirt in a size greater than that of a small child. After this trip, Dalene returned to Seoul repeatedly, sometimes with us, but most often alone. She probably knows more about Seoul than we do at this point.

And that is the weird thing about travelling to another country to work, particularly if you are hermits like Kris and myself: most of the time, you don’t notice that you are on the opposite end of the world from where you grew up. You learn to live with the tanks of live crabs in the supermarket. You adapt to making pork cutlet your primary protein, and not beef. You find your comfort zone of going to work, coming home, spending the hard-earned time together within the confines of your own home, going to bed, and repeating. Occasionally you leave for frisbee or have friends over for board games or D&D. You don’t go outside much.

This is why, towards the end of Dalene’s time here, things calmed down. We showed her all of the things we felt she absolutely needed to see with us, and sent her on her own quests whilst we were at work. In the evening, we all came together, ate somewhere and something new, relaxed together, then went to bed. And repeated for most of this week. This hinted at our inevitable return to hermithood. However, it also helped our house to feel more like a home, with a live-in guest making it far more variable and vibrant.

We will miss Dalene tremendously, and Skype cannot ever fully equal having someone with you in person. We will cry when we see her off to the airport. But we will also remember the good times that we have had while she has been here, and smile. We will try to keep her energy with us, and go out and see something new from time to time. We will try escape the clutches of complacency and routine, and let our love of our new country win out.

Nanta: A Culinary Theatre Masterstroke

Every once in a while, I am prone to wearing silly clothing. If it has a Star Wars reference, it can be as eclectic as Elton John. I have been known to wear a bright red Shortstraw onesie at concerts of theirs. I have even LARPed in nothing more than a fake fir skirt, chainmail, and duct tape. But never before had I gone up on a stage, worn up a chef’s hat, and stacked bowls of dumplings while a small theatre full of strangers looks on in laughter. That is a small taste of the glorious madness that is the Korean food/dance/music/comedy show NANTA.

We had heard only good things about the show, and it is amongst the top ten things to do in Seoul. So, while Kristen’s mother is here, we felt it to be a good time to go and see what all of the fuss was about.

We arrived in a theatre in the heart of Myeongdong, and the setup of the theatre built our expectations, but did not give too much away. There were the usual posters with rave reviews from places as far abroad as the Edinburgh Fringe and an obligatory facade where one could take a picture or twelve between two cardboard chefs. Once we had done so, it was time to find our seats and experience our first taste of theatre in months. And what a delicious taste it was.

I shan’t give much away, but the show builds around drumming. But not with traditional drumsticks and kettle drums. With razor-sharp knives. And cutting boards. And pots, pans, whisks, bowls, and a host of seemingly innocuous kitchen utensils. The ingenuity of the manner in which NANTA uses its set was something to marvel at.

And this sense of wonder extends to every aspect of the show. The dancing was flawless, as was the drumming. The actors never missed a beat, no matter how manic the action became. The comedic timing was exact. The show contained largely physical comedy, which helped it to pierce any language barrier that could have existed. While it was hilariously ridiculous, it never reached a point that felt excessive. I had not laughed that hard in a long time.

The show even managed to perfect something that I generally see shows misstep with – audience participation. We were so enraptured by the performance, none of the members of the audience asked to participate seemed to be averse to it. This did not depends on what we were asked to do, whether this was to wear a caricature of Korean traditional dress and sample soup, to pull a dustbin off of one of the characters’ backside, or to help prepare dumplings, as I did.

My moment on stage was brief, but eventful. I managed to nearly concuss myself with a wooden mallet, knock over a stack of dumplings, and look like a prize fool while doing it. It was glorious, and it is a memory of Korea that I will most definitely carry with me. Possibly because I will have a bump on my head to remind me. Time will tell, and hopefully heal, just as NANTA healed my negative mood.

I walked into the theatre a sullen, moderately unhappy gent, and left it beaming like a puppy who’d found the secret stash of dog treats. I recommend it highly, and will probably see it again before I leave. Probably many times. Thank you, NANTA.

Dad, I’m Sorry

Dad. I’m sorry that this will be the first Father’s Day I’ve missed.

I’m a bit busy right now.

Life is going on around me, and sometimes I need to play my part.

 

It’s hard being so far away from your calming presence, especially when things get hard or frustrating.

You would do it so much better.

You would be calmer with the kids.

You would know how to show them the wonders of the world

Without flailing like a fish in the bottom of a sodden barrel.

 

Thank you for all that you have done for me, and for us as a family.

You showed me how to be a man.

Today I shaved my beard

For I am not yet worthy to join the club of men.

Someday I will be.

But until then,

I will always look to you to see how it’s done.

 

Happy Father’s Day.

Love, Jodi.

The Student Becomes the Master

This week has been a far from regular week for Kris and I up to this point. Apart from a host of students still staying away from school due to fears surrounding Middle Eastern Respiratory Syndrome (MERS), the majority of the adjustments come as a result of Kris’ mother, Dalene, visiting us.

The first major change has been to our morning routine. Gone are our communal showers and commiserative cuddle time. They have been replaced by separate cleansing and, well, going to work early. Our lunch times are now spent showing Dalene local food close to our school. And our evenings have gone from being lonely hermits in our cave of isolation into excursions around Dongtan and, starting from tonight, Seoul itself.

While I do miss spending time alone with Kris, it has still been a wonderful experience. Showing Dalene both
the big and the little things we love about the city and country we’re living in had helped us to see past the mundane drudgery of the work week and appreciate the good things about where we are right now. This has been great at warding off despondency, and cheered us up a great deal.

Dalene has also, impressively, taken it upon herself to see as much as she can in her short stay here. Every day while we’ve been at work, she has been pounding the pavement, taking in as much of Dongtan as her eyes and legs will allow her to. She has seen places that even we have not seen (hence the name of this post). We have become so caught up in our daily routine that we have not explored as much as we first did. This has been a reminder that we should take some time to see more of our city every once in a while.

Overall, Dalene has been a wonderful guest, and it has been a week that has given us renewed strength to carry on with our lives here. And maybe venture out of the fortress of solitude from time to time. Maybe.

The Wheel Turns

After our rather fabulous holiday sure to Middle Eastern Respiratory Syndrome (MERS), Kris and I returned to work today,unaware of the curveballs that would be thrown at us from both within the school environment and from outside of it. Had we known, we probably would have stayed in bed, or blankets and perpetual closeness to reach other shielding us from the frustration that we would encounter today.

The first figurative knife in the back was the school’s policy for recouping the educational ground that was lost due to MERS. We were calmly informed that there would be two makeup days on Saturdays to allow both the kindergarten and elementary students to catch up to where they theoretically should be in the curriculum. While this made sense for elementary students, where there are books that they need to progress through during the year, the fact that there was also kindergarten catchup was a tad baffling. Expecting 3-5 year-olds to come in on a Saturday and work seemed like child cruelty. But the worst part about the sessions was still to come.

Kristen and I braced ourselves when we were informed as to when exactly the seasons would take place. Kristen’s mother is on a flight to Korea as I write this message, and we hoped against all the odds that the sessions would both take place after she had returned to South Africa. This was not the case. One of our four free days to spend with her is now to have a mundane several hours at work right in the middle of it. We were both immensely disappointed.

Soon after we received this news, we were informed by the Japanese consulate that we were missing necessary documents on our visa applications. This notification comes eleven days after we had sent an email to them asking whether any more documents were necessary. We were practically livid at the inefficient bureaucracy. The day was most certainly covered by a dark cloud of anxiety and annoyance.

But it was not without a silver lining or two. Some of the students’ parents were still reluctant to send their children to school or if fear of MERS, so our classes were a little easier than normal. Kristen had no kindergarten classes today, as all of her students were missing. Only one of the Saturdays with Kristen’s mom will be taken up by school, and even then only partially, as it director informed us that Kristen’s kindergarten class is unlikely to sign up for the Saturday revision sessions, so Kristen will have more time to spend with her mom. Most importantly, however, we are in a bus to pick her up as I write this, every word bringing us closer together. And that is a heartwarming thought.

While we may be messed around by various forces in the near future, we will do so whilst being smothered with love and the small treats from home we have been missing these past months. It’s easier to jump through meaningless hoops while scoffing good chocolate, drinking good tea, and sharing your life with someone close to you soon you haven’t seen in far too long.

Seeing Seoul’s Sights whilst riding a Tiger

Our MERS-induced holiday is beginning to wind down, and we have entered the last few days of freedom before we are inevitably told that we will have to return to work and tend children once more. Kris and I made the most of our day yesterday by taking a bus tour around the suburbs of Seoul. While we had been to Seoul a number of times, we had never taken the time to see a great deal of its sights, and we thought that it was time to rectify that situation. So, we boarded the first Tiger Bus (complete with a coat of arms bearing two tigers), and wondered what we would see on our day out.

Upon boarding, we were given a small pamphlet, detailing the route that the bus would take. We quickly researched them on the Internet, and a few of the stops instantly piqued out attention. We realized that we could not stop at each one of the 22 stops on the tour, and quickly made our preliminary decisions as to where we would stop for a half hour or longer. We decided we would stop at Namdaemun Market, Itaewon, Namsang Hanok Village, N Seoul Tower, and one of the various palaces on the tour. Everything else seemed either something we weren’t interested in or something that would be better suited to devoting an entire day to (such as the National Museum of Korea). At almost the same moment that we had completed our research and vaguely planned our stops for the day, the bus sped off.

Our first stop was Namdaemun Market. It has been said that you could find anything from cameras to clothes to fine dining at Namdaemun, and this is most certainly accurate. After gracefully plonking ourselves onto the pavement from the bus and weaving through traffic, we reached what looked like a nondescript alley, and tentatively walked up into it. We slipped around a couple of corners, and were met with a whole row of shops lining the alleyway. And another. And another. Namdaemun is a labyrinth of good value, with everything seeming relatively well-priced, whilst not looking overly seedy. After a half hour of browsing everything from cereal to monumental camera lenses, we boarded the bus to take us to our next stop.

Our next stop was Itaewon, the famed expat district of Korea, which most certainly lived up to its name. We were met with more English signage than Korean for the first time since we arrived. While it may not have had the buzzing atmosphere we were expecting (it was only 10h00ish after all), it was still a welcome experience to see such a great amount of English. There were restaurants to suit every taste, from Louisiana Cajun Lobster to a traditional German bar to a gewoonte South African restaurant named ‘Braai Republic’. We will most certainly return to Itaewon many times to try out as many of the global delicacies as we can, but none of the restaurants had opened for lunch service yet. So, we left Itaewon, vowing to return someday.

Next on our tour was the Namsang Hanok Village. This is essentially a re-creation of traditional Korean living throughout the centuries. All of the buildings are crafted in the traditional style, with slanted roofs and wooden supports, and it all looked rather charming. While we were in the Hanok Village, we were given the opportunity to have a checkup from a practitioner of traditional Korean medicine. This sounded fascinating, so we accepted. We removed our shoes, and were handed a cup of hot, glorious herbal tea and told to wait while the doctor prepared for us. Coming from a vague knowledge of traditional medicine in South Africa, I was slightly worried what preparations were going on. Luckily, there were no sacrifices involved.

We were lead to decidedly un-traditional heart rate and blood pressure monitors, and our basic vital signs were checked. Then, we were lead to the doctor. While I had been picturing someone vaguely shamanic, the sight of the demure, friendly doctor that awaited us comforted me. With the help of a translator, she established that both Kristen’s and my energy was out of balance. Kristen had too little energy, while I had too much. She administered small acupuncture patches (which were not painful at all) and gave us medicine to take twice a day for two days to help rectify the situation. She also gave us a list of herbs and fruits we could use to rectify our energy. It was a very enjoyable experience. Sadly, our medicine tasted more like warm dirt than the delightful herbal tea we had been given, but we would only find that out later.

The Tiger Bus then delivered us to the N Seoul tower. This tower sits atop Namsan mountain, and boasts a wonderful panoramic view of the entirety of Seoul. We paid for a package that included both access to the tower and an Italian lunch at one of the cafes near the top, and entered the tower. We rode an elevator (complete with inflight movie boasting of sailing through the universe), and were soon at the highest point in Seoul. It was only here that I truly began to realize how enormous Seoul truly is.

While I had pictured Seoul as very closely-packed with high-rise buildings, I had not realized that it sprawled itself over the majority of the landscape in all directions. The view was spectacular, and we spent time taking it in, looking to see if we could spot where we had already been that day, and taking the requisite photographs. We then rode the elevator back down (with a similar inflight movie of returning to Earth), and went to have our Italian lunch. This would turn out to be the highlight of our entire day.

We were not entirely sure what to expect of our lunch. Whatever expectations we had were most certainly exceeded tremendously. We were treated to a three course meal of a light yet sophisticated salmon salad, refreshing margarita pizza, and delectable creamy pasta. While the menu classified it as carbonara, this was questionable. What was not questionable was that it was most delectable indeed. All the while, we overlooked Seoul in a high-backed couples chair, so that we felt like we were in our own world, overseeing the goings-on of some other mystical people, removed yet connected. It was a profoundly memorable experience.

It was also the last stop we would make on our tour. We returned to the bus with our bellies full to bursting, and were hit with an instant case of magie vol, ogies toe. For those who don’t understand Afrikaans, that’s a simple expression that roughly translates as ‘stomach is full, eyes are closed’. We were so sleepy after our delicious meal that we decided to leave on that positive note. We took in the remainder of the sights in passing and in a food-induced haze. We rode the bus home content with our experiences that day, but also excited to return in the future to fully relish all of the places we had merely passed by.