Leaving tomorrow :(

I leave tomorrow and my heart is breaking but I know I'll be back and have a lot to do in order to get back here and the right way. I interviewed two poets here and hopefully made enough contact to get more. I made life long friends with my housemates, met up with my Cape Town Sage Arlene for dinner (and will see her again tonight), and really fell in love with who I am, what I do, and where my life is and could go. I wish I could stay, even just a bit longer, I really wish I could just have one more night in Joburg on my way home (anyone know an SAA agent I could bribe?) but I will go home with a full heart and a determined spirit and that's more than I could have ever imagined. This evening we are having a goodbye braai for me (my first) and then it is off to an open mic event (where if I'm brave enough I will read) with good friends and I talked Arlene into coming! I have to show this place off right because it showed this traveling feminist woman one hell of a time :) Can't wait to tell you all more when I return, sorry my posts have been shorter--Internet has been hard to come by!


peace and love,

Cristina

Cape Town

So I am alive, sorry, I've been without internet here in Cape Town where I'm in love with South Africa everyday. I went to an amazing event held my an organization called Sparkling Women here and I'm trying to see if any poets from that or affiliated with that organization will be interested in being a part of my project. I don't know how but I've transcribed all 7 Joburg interviews over the course of my time here. I look forward to interviewing the founder of She Speaks at the very least while I'm here and having a phone interview with another Cape Town poet who is unfortunately out of town because of a family emergency. I'm hoping I can at least make it to 10 participants. On other notes, my housemates are amazing, I mowed my first lawn at the house yesterday on South Africa's Women's Day which I felt was very fitting-- Catherine and I had a blast doing that. I ate amazing Eastern Food at a bazaar in town and have attended two gay film nights, one for me and one for women, meeting many amazing people. I've also had a wonderful weekend this past weekend-- Cape Town is so gorgeous, I'm hoping my meeting with the Gender Studies professor who specializes in LGBT activism research reveals not just amazing information but job opportunities in the area as I'm trying to move here to live for sometime (maybe Ph. D after, not sure right now). I also am attending some more queer events this weekend and poetry slam on Monday so I'm doing all I can to uncover more poets, wish me luck and send me love!

Cristina

Leaving Joburg

I leave for Cape Town today and although I'm excited it is definitely bittersweet. I completed seven interviews in Joburg with seven amazing poets and the interview process was everything I wanted it to be and more. I'm glad to call these people my friends and I plan on doing whatever it takes to come back here to live and work for some years. I have a couple interviews for Joburg that unfortunately will have to be through phone or via email since schedules were hectic but I am so grateful to have had the response I've had and more people than I expected wanting to be a part of what I'm doing. I have at least two people to interview in Cape Town and I'm hoping like Joburg I uncover more, I'm looking forward to experiencing Cape Town in a new way but Joburg has been so intense and special for me. I'm going to miss my South African parents whose love and support made me feel I had family here, I'm going to miss my amazing friends and activists as Wits who I had a blast with at the forum, I'm going to miss my She Speaks collective--the way they moved and inspired me with their poetry, their passion for it and for each other and their hopes for change, I'm definitely going to miss the Fox street in Arts and Main, my little Bohemia while I was here and all that came with it.

Bye for now Joburg, I'll miss you,

Cristina