Save a horse... Ride a cowboy!

The title is completely irrelevant, simply a very funny bumper sticker that I saw on the way here :)

So on Wednesday night I hopped on the Greyhound (with a bunch of ex convicts, it turns out!) to make the LOOOOOOONG journey to Dallas, Texas! The bus was FULL. Not an empty seat anywhere. Not even a window seat for moi :( as can be expected, I found it impossible to sleep as I had nowhere to lean against (the ex convict next to me, whose distinctive tattoos identified him as part of a very prominent prison gang, did not look very cuddly...) I had read almost an entire book by the time we got to Memphis at 2am and was not too excited to learn we had to sit in the terminal for an hour while the bus was cleaned and refueled. It turned out there was news to watch and it was then that I learned about the Washington DC shooting that happened recently. Terribly sad :( anyway, after waiting just under two hours, we finally boarded the bus again and were on our merry way! Luckily loads of people switched buses in Memphis so I got a window seat with an empty seat next to me and settled in for a long sleep. Being short has definitely got advantages :) after a sixteen hour slog, we finally arrived in Dallas where Nicolette met me and took me to her beautiful home just outside the city. 

On Friday, I spent the day wandering through a mall near where Nicolette and her husband Carl work. It was a lovely day. I found an awesome pair of jeans to go with my boots at Old Navy (what an awesome shop! Something between Mr Price and Jay Jays), explored the vastness of Nordstrom (HUGE Stuttafords/Edgars type store! Every girl would die to see it!), bought myself a few little trinkets and basically just shopped the day away! It was grand :) In the evening, I got to go and see the Suzuki Music Institute of Dallas where Nicolette and Carl work. It is fantastic! I would love to work there! My favourite part was a huge collage of her old South African students, featuring yours truly and my dear little brother with his Twinkler certificate (lolsies!) and all my old violin friends from the early days! Such a blast from the past :) Saturday was a huge treat, we went to watch the Dallas Symphony Orchestra at their concert hall performing Mahler and Tchaikovsky. The Mahler piece featured a brilliant singer with an incredible voice and the Tchaikovsky piece was orchestral but even more fantastic... The performances by the various solo instruments were PHENOMENAL!!! These artists played their instruments like I have never heard in my life. It absolutely nourished my soul :) 

Sunday is the day I've been dying to share and you'll die when you read it... We went to a Korean spa! Much to my (well concealed!) initial horror, if you wanted to use the pool or sauna facilities, nakedness was very much the order of the day. Luckily the men and women had separate facilities! But still... Anywho, I had to overcome my fears and bite the bullet, and very soon was frolicking nude in the pools with the other naked nymphs. Although, to be honest there was not a lot of nymphness... It was more Narwhal than nymph for the most part. But it seems nobody even notices nakedness when everybody's doing it! Weird. There were super hot and super cold pools, a heated sauna room and many rooms with various properties of healing in them. The healing rooms were all for general use and we were gifted a very sexy (sarcasm!) "uniform" to wear out in the general spa areas. Orange for women, grey for men, huge shorts and t-shirts. Yum. The rooms were amazing though, they had an ice room, a few salt rooms, an infrared room, a crystal room (all these rooms had different purposes and healing properties) and three hot rooms heated to different temperatures with degrees varying from "pretty damn hot", to "ok, struggling to inhale", to "which corner belongs to Satan??". I avoided the Satan room... My body already hated me... This also because I had a one and a half hour Swedish/Accupressure massage. It involved a lot of stretching and pulling in awkward directions and punching my sore spots. I basically paid for a little Korean lady to beat me up for an hour and a half. Very effectively, but ow! What a day though! 

Later, we went for a nice walk and jog around a creek in the neighbourhood Nicolette used to live in, before heading into the VERY wealthy suburbs (as in the abodes in this area should come standard with a moat!) for dinner with friends of theirs. FUNNIEST COUPLE EVER!!! I felt like Alice in Wonderland. Old as the hills, she is a typical ditzy old Southern belle (obsessed with dolls and strawberries so their house is basically a life sized, strawberry themed dollhouse, complete with upside down tea sets and china stuck up all over their kitchen roof!) and he is a typical old Southern farmer. Impatient as all hell, blunt as anything and straightforward to the point where we were all in stitches every time he opened his mouth. 

Today I am running around exploring downtown Dallas. I have stood in the exact spot where JFK was assassinated (creepy!), visited his memorial in Dealey Plaza, finally got round to finding a Diners, Drive-ins and Dives restaurant (just for you, dad!) and had the most amazing burger I've ever tasted, and now I'm off to explore a little more before heading back tonight to meet Nicolette and Carl for our very own Braai Day Braai with pap en wors! Woohoo :) Happy Heritage and Braai Day everybody!

And as always... Stay classy c",)

Heading South for the winter

Well, I believe I owe you an update on Nashville! It all begins back in New York...

I emerged from the subway on a balmy Monday evening headed for the bus station address I had been given. I felt a twinge of apprehension when I stepped out slap bang in the middle of Chinatown.... And it only grew as I finally found the tiny little hole that was the bus station I was looking for. All the signs were written in Chinese and I was the palest person in the entire area! The situation did not improve once I was on the bus... Although I was granted a bit of luck in having an empty seat next to me, which meant I could stretch out (a little!) and sleep for most of the sixteen hour ride! But it wasn't hard to understand why the ticket had been so cheap... No leg room, no toilet paper in the toilet (which was basically a mobile long drop) and no wifi or plugs to charge my phone (other bus companies offer all of the above). By the time we arrived in Nashville the bus stank to high heaven and I was on the verge of fainting as I had been breathing through my shirt for the last two hours. 

My host in Nashville was very conveniently located close to downtown which is where all the touristy stuff is, which was a stroke of luck! My first Nashville experience was salsa dancing, which took place at a gay club. At the end of the night, they had a drag show which we watched a bit of. It was absolutely hysterical and quite impressive! Flick flacks, cartwheels, real cleavage, a porn star and bizarre outfits were the order of the night. It was a lot to take in! The next night was even better though...

We hit the town for a night of music in Nashville's infamous honky tonk bars along broadway street. What a blast! We started out at a place called the Big Bang Dueling Pianos. It was a similar idea to A Handful of Keys. Two pianos with two very talented pianists who play and sing popular songs and requests from the audience. I thoroughly enjoyed it! We wandered in and out of bars along the street, eventually coming to Coyote Ugly! It was very empty because it was still quite early, but I was invited to dance on the bar (which of course, I did) and was lifted up and helped back down by a very large black bouncer. I felt like I was in the movie! :) there was an annoying persistent drunken fella who wouldn't leave me alone and the large bouncer kindly escorted him out of the club without me even asking! I giggled :) 

On Friday I spent the day exploring the town. I went to the Country Music Hall of Fame and soaked in all the musical history I possibly could. Saw Elvis's Cadillac and gold piano! Almost died :) along with all the history of everyone from John Carson, Elvis and Dolly Parton to Carrie Underwood and Taylor Swift! There were hundreds of amazing and beautiful instruments in the display cases, old cars and even a few guns! Also an entire wall of gold and platinum records and a room of brass plaques for all the Hall of Famers. I tossed a R5 coin into the Hall of Fame fountain and made a wish. Maybe one day... :)

Next I headed to the Johnny Cash museum and walked through the pages of his story. It was awesome! I did some boot shopping (who in their right mind would NOT buy cowboy boots when in the south?) and found some awesome boots! They'll come in handy with my Western riding later this month! I was also introduced to a South African writer and actress, Estelle Condra, who has been living in Nashville for over thirty years now! She is blind and such an inspiring lady. It was nice to pull some Afrikaans out of the cobwebs of my mind and chat with her about home :) 

On Sunday I went to the Tennessee state fair. An experience like no other!!! Redneck central and it was hysterical. I saw a 524lb pumpkin, a 273.5lb watermelon, onions the size of my head and chillis the size of my forearm! I watched pig racing (video available on Facebook for any interested parties) and almost wet my pants because I laughed so hard! They take this stuff so seriously! I had a unicorn painted on my face and won a bunch of stuffed toys at various games. Rode almost all of the rides for free because all the ride operators were South African boys who took a shine to me the second I spoke Afrikaans to them... They would literally pull me to the front of the line (which was usually about thirty or forty people long!) and pop me on the ride! It was priceless to see the shock on their faces when I spoke Afrikaans to them. One or two needed a few seconds to recover before they could even respond. Lolsies! Some of the rides were hectic... The megadrop being the hecticest (haha) of all! It's the ride where you are seated facing outwards around a very tall spire, the platform of seats is pulled up, released at the top and you plummet (with your heart beating at the top of your skull!) straight to the ground, stopping mere seconds before total annihilation. Our ride was even scarier because we waited at the top for so long. They kept pulling us up and letting us down a few inches as if something were wrong! Needless to say we were all completely terrified by the time the ride dropped! But phewee what a rush! :) I also ate my first corndog and had freshly squeezed lemonade. Yummy! 

On Wednesday night at 10pm, I hopped on the Greyhound to Dallas to meet up with Nicolette, my first violin teacher! It is from Dallas that I am writing to y'all now, but I will put the Dallas news in a separate post. Missing you guys like crazy! 

Stay classy c",)

The Music of the Night

It has been a crazy two weeks! Much has happened since the last post and I'm so sorry I took so long to update you all! 

As I mentioned in my previous post, I was lucky enough to fulfill a lifelong dream of watching the Phantom of the Opera on Broadway! We watched it in the Majestic theater, which I thought was rather apt :) and as the famous chords of the theme song rang out around me and the chandelier swung towards the ceiling to shed a little illumination on the Phantom's past, my skin was covered in goosebumps and my eyes may have been slightly misty :) what an awesome night! I will never tire of that story :)

My hosts Donna, Stephen and Holly were kind enough to invite me out to Fire Island with them for a weekend. It is such a cute place! It is a part of Long Island and acquired its name from a story. Legend has it that pirates used to set fires to trick ships into thinking they had found the New York City shore, and then plunder the ships as soon as they had docked. Pretty neat story methinks :) the island is about 800m wide in total, and none of the residents have cars there. It is a thirty minute ferry ride across from the main land and once on the island, everyone bikes around on the proper old fashioned bicycles (bells, baskets and the works!). Too cool :) Donna and I spent an afternoon on the beach where we saw whales! I spotted them :) I saw a splash on the horizon and (not wanting to look foolish for crying "whale!" if in fact they had none there) I innocently asked Donna if they had whales at Fire Island. She laughed. Of course they did. We spent a blissful few minutes watching the playful fella breaching to his heart's content until, unfortunately, Shamu tired of the game before we did and went off in search of better things to do, leaving us scanning the horizon fruitlessly for more activity. It was awesome though! :)

After a lovely week spent in the New York area with my wonderful hosts, and a horde of new and exciting experiences behind me, I headed up to Niagara Falls in search of a border crossing at which I could switch visas so that I can legally travel the States a little longer than my work visa would allow. I climbed on the Amtrak train at 7:39am and endured a rather exhausting ten hour train trip across the state of New York to Niagara Falls. I arrived at my hostel quite proudly lugging my newly acquired hiking backpack behind me (it's blue! Yay!) and checked in before being given the grand tour. I think the best way to describe it is quaint. It was basically just an old house with rooms stuffed full of bunk beds. Not unpleasant though :) they made us breakfast every morning and there was a lounge/tv room downstairs for us to relax in. 

The following day I ventured out to explore the tiny town and switch my visas. I met a few Brits, Lithuanians, Chinese and Hong Kong(ese?) people at the hostel, but unfortunately as I was the ONLY one who could not get into Canada, I flew solo for the day. I also failed to switch visas as I could not get INTO Canada (not even walk through the door and back) and thus apparently did not leave US soil, even though I walked ALL the way over the bridge into the Canadian customs building and got an important looking stamped piece of paper to prove I had been there. Grrrrr. Stoopid rules. I decided not to let this ruin my day, however, and had a wonderful time wandering through the Niagara Falls park and thoroughly enjoying my amazing new camera! :) 

The guy at the Niagara customs office told me to switch visas at an immigrations office (thus making my entire trip to the falls a rather pointless affair) so I took a bus down to Buffalo the following day to the immigrations office there. Of course, once I got there, they said they could not help me. Wonderfully organised people these government officials. They told me to fill in an online form, pay an obscene amount of money (more than the cost of both visas put together!), and my visa status would be changed for six months. No thank you. I will try Mexico first :) (I would make a deadpan joke here about making a run for the border if I weren't concerned about the 0.0000000000000001% chance that some humourless government lackey reads this and might not see the funny side).

On Friday, I returned to New York City on another ten hour train trip, arriving at 10pm in the middle of the bustling metropolis. A hop, skip, subway, train and cab ride later, I finally got back to my hosts' house outside the city at exactly midnight. Feeling slightly exhausted I headed straight for bed, although not before I got the very exciting news that my cousin got engaged! Congratulations Steve! :) #specialshoutout! Lolsies.

The last two days were spent getting organised. I have found a place to stay in Nashville from Tuesday until the weekend with a very exciting looking host. I also had my first door-to-door Jehovah's Witnesses encounter today. I almost turned them away, but could NOT resist being able to put it in the blog! Hehe :) they gave me brochures on the evils of Halloween and I assured them (read this in a deep Southern accent!) I would pray real hard and read my Bible extra careful to prepare for the second coming. For the record, if that didn't sound like Mater the tow truck in your head, you read it wrong :)

I am slowly catching up with putting pictures on my blog! It is slightly hard because they are uploaded all higgledy-piggledy and out of order in my picture folder of thousands of photos, so I'm having to put them up as and when I find them! Be patient :) Anyway, tomorrow evening I am hopping on a bus to Tennessee and saying a fond farewell to the city of blinding lights and a very excited hello to the South! Eeeeekkkk! You could bottle my excitement and sell it on eBay :) Apparently it's an entirely different world down there... Let's see what I can find to share with y'all :-P 

Stay classy! c",)