i love Ram!

ok wow, so Ramfest was incredible, crazy and hot. our carpool left Cape Town at 1pm all cramped up and listening to Phoenix's Lisztomania (soundtrack to my life currently) and embarked on our lil adventure.

We had our tents, sleeping bags, booze and food and we were ready to rock the weekend out of its socks! we arrived and were brisked right through the entrance, no queues for the awesome, found our site and immediately headed for the pool for a swim.

the vibe was incredible. the weekend had begun.

i had checked out the lineups of all the acts and made a mental note of everyone i wanted to see. i probably missed more than half of my "want to see" list for, uh, reasons.

friday afternoon we kicked off with some vino and bounced around from electro pyramid to main stage to river to main stage to river to river to river (it was hot ok) and just generally had an awesome time. then i got hungry, got tired and passed out only to wake up in time for Die Antwoord.

the ninja and yolandi were disappointing. but even though the sound was terrible and they were shouting at us i couldn't tear my eyes away, especially when the fiesty little blonde pulled down her trademark gold pants and flashed us all her lily-white ass.

then i headed over to the pyramid and was blown away by Tom Deluxe and Haezer. somewhere between all this my lovely friend Se and i made a sneaky late-night trip to the pool for a little bit of swimming and i managed to slice open my palm a bit on the broken asbestos of the pool floor: fun. the medics were super accomodating even after i'd been back a fourth and fifth time for a redressing. needless to say i'd be swimming with one hand for the rest of the weekend.

saturday passed in a hot, dusty time loop of swims, refills, chilling, more chilling, arbing around and food. i tried to enjoy the "beach party" vibe they had set up but the acts were all scheduled wrong. bummer. and let me just say this right now: Alkaline Trio and Funeral for a Friend: disappointment. i didn't watch either passed the first two or three songs.

instead i revelled in the madness of the pyramid. Mr Sakitumi, Bruce Willis?, P H Fat all totally blew my mind. and of course throughout the weekend i'd amble in and out of crazy reminiscence at the Mercury tent where everyone loved everyone else and everyone knew the words to every song. DJ Sideshow you are pure, beautiful music-love.

my Ramfest highlights:
+ Vodka slushies
+ the river
+ late night missions
+ the pyramid
+ naps
+ redbull
+ hanging around our awesome campsite (Sash, Se, Wal, Paul, Kaley, Key, Jeanne, Matt, Nick, Kyle, Steve and Karl, you made this weekend amazing - thank you!)

how was your Ramfest experience?

oh and thank you Griet, your excellence is well-observed.

pics to follow

also if you've got Ramfest FOMO check out more of Paul Ward's pics of the entire weekend, they'll almost make it better.

the weekend that was

wow Ramfest was brilliant!

this weekend i...

+ went to Ramfest
+ got really really dusty
+ cut my hand
+ danced for hours
+ saw P h Phat, Mr Sakitumi, Die Antwoord, Bruce Willis, Isochronus, Alkaline Trio, Funeral for a Friend and Tommy Gun
+ made some new friends
+ got lost
+ got found
+ only slept about four hours
+ swam in the river
+ spent a lot of money
+ got home and bathed
+ spent Sunday at a chilled family braai
+ finally watched Forgetting Sarah Marshall

what did you do this weekend?

image from here. 

first things first

yesterday i went with the lovely Se to get tested for HIV and Aids at UCT. technically i'm not a student anymore but shh.

every semester the university sets up booths in the jammie hall and invites students and staff to get tested for free with the goal being to eradicate the stigma around the disease by getting people to know their status.

we waited in line for about 20 minutes and chatted about condoms, same-sex relationships and plans for Ramfest. i didn't stop to think about what i do and don't know about HIV and when i was called into one of the nurses booth i got quite a shock.

firstly it was very hot and when its very hot your blood doesn't seem to flow quite so easily so not only did i have to get two jabs but i had to "let" myself by pushing the bright red liquid up and out of my finger. those of you who know me know that that is the scariest notion for me. but my nurse was so gung-ho she wouldn't even listen to my mumbling about being scared of needl...ow!

more importantly though, i learnt something about myself.

you see was totally clueless about the most simple aspects of the disease that so many people in Africa suffer from. these things i did not know:

1. there is a window period in which if you've been infected the antibodies will not show up. my nurse said they say that it's about 12 weeks.

2. HIV is the first stage of the disease. the bad cells start to kill off the white cells that keep your body healthy.

3. you only have AIDS when the bad cells have successfully killed off pretty much all of your white cells and other illnesses (such as TB, flu etc) can kill you.

4. HIV/Aids doesn't kill you, it affects your immune system allowing the other diseases to have a fatal effect on your body.

the thing is, i honestly thought i knew all this kinda stuff but when asked about them i came up blank. it was really a learning curve for me.

it's a good idea to be in the know about this disease especially because it is such a problem in our country.

on a positive note, happy Thursday lovelies.
anyone gonig to Ramfest this weekend? i am *so excited*

ps, i also don't know what my blood type is (very bad!) do you know what yours is?

image from here.

sailor jerry....ahoy! (the Holy Smoku party)

so on Friday night i went to the sailor jerry party at Mercury Live and had some of the liquid gold (which, turns out is way too sweet for me with coke).

twas an excellent night spend frolicking and dancing with friends, listening to bands and letting the stress of the previous week go. here are some things i think about the night:

Albert Frost was a bit of a laugh. at some point i remember watching him at the downstairs stage and he had guitar problems. fair enough but then he stops playing and the music continues? huh? did i miss something here and if i did please correct me but isn't the music suppose to be heard when the artist is playing it? at first i thought i was going crazy but my friend noticed it too so there you go.

Machineri are cool cause Sannie Fox is a sexy frontgirl a la Natalie, former frontgirl of Red Light in June. but the fox had lost her heart (or something). she stood onstage like some sort of zombie sultrily (i don't care if that's not a word) singing away. kinda a weird mix.

i loved The Bone Collectors. they're mad zany and have such a cool onstage vibe. the bluesy rock and the action onstage as these guys bang on their instruments is lovely.

and, to be perfectly honest, i missed Peachy Keen. by that time i had migrated to the great watering hole that is The Shack.

were you there that night? what did you think?

Image from here.

clothes on another girl's body

Image from here.

so i really loves clothes, and i especially love scouring thrift stores for awesome once-in-a-lifetime pieces.

i also tend to watch people and occasionally admire their fashion sense. i'll sometimes be out or at a concert or an event and look at what everyone's wearing and then allow myself to pick one item from every person to have (Even though i know i'm not really goin to have it) and it's kinda fun.

i love the outfits that these girls are wearing.

also,

 

 Image from here.

and, 

Image from here.

the weekend that was

I had such a busy weekend; there were so many things to do in Cape Town!

This weekend i…

+ Danced on a table and sang Black Eyed Peas songs into the neck of a bottle of wine.
+ Went to Mercury for the Sailor Jerry party.
+ Decided Sailor Jerry and coke is too sweet.
+ Lazed in bed.
+ Ambled around the Design Indaba with the lovely Se, wonderful Meh and visiting Kiz.
+ Had a Cosmo at Sky Bar to celebrate my CocoChanello friend Nat.
+ Went to the most 60s house for snacks and it wasn’t trying to be 60s, it just was 60s.
+ Watched some cricket.
+ Ate some springrolls at Leaf and ordered a Virgin Mary (yum).
+ Hung out at Ground Zero while the boys played poker.
+ Found out some sad news. Am thinking about you friend.
+ Wore my new dress and felt like a lady. 

What did you do this weekend

Ps, could someone please come over to my house and make me some pancakes for breakfast?

Image from here.

River Dance

last night i got to see the river dance show at the Grand Arena, Grand West Casino and wow was it awesome!

My grandparents and dad are Irish and when i was little i used to sit in front of the television and watch their old VHS of Michael Flatley and the rest of the performers tap their hearts out. i always marvelled at how pretty all the dancers were and how daintily they moved (i was and probably always will be a bit of a klutz). i would daydream about being onstage and flipping my hair up like they did.

it was so incredible to see the dancers live and even though i was quite high up i was still mesmerised by the unison and power of the performance.one thing that was a bit of a disappointment was that there was no running theme or story-line, the skits seemed a bit disjointed.

but we got to see Irish dancing, an excellent violinist, singing, a bagpipe player and even some good old traditional jazz tap.

i would recommend anyone go see the show! it was phenomenal!

image from here.

the weekend that was

Hey lovelies! I hope you’re all having a fabulous Monday? I am indeedy. This weekend was a very chilled one with a few wonderful highlights, this weekend I …

+ went to the Baxter Theatre Taste, Tweet and Theatre event
+ met a few Tweeters in person who are lovely
+ tried (and enjoyed) the pinotage from Diemersfontein, and I don’t usually drink red wine
+ read comics in bed
+ celebrated my gran’s 70th with her and all her friends with a mouth0wateringly good spit-braai (sorry little lamb)
+ went to Sirocco in Kalk Bay and tasted the most delicious mojito I’ve ever had
+ had four visitors (two from Joburg, two from south korea) staying at my house
+ chilled with some friends at Banana Jam
+ listened to the interview with U2

What did you do this weekend? 

Also, how cool are these stairs?My favourite ones are the first ones that criss-cross and the ones in the libraries.

a sunday afternoon cocktail

my uncle and aunt have a friend down from England so my mom spent the day with them at Cape Point today. on their way back home they decided to go to Sirocco in Kalk Bay for a quick cocktail so picked me up on their way (lucky me).

If you like mojitos then i suggest you make your way to Sirocco; man, oh man it was good! so tangy and pepperminty!it has to be one of the best-tasting mojitos i've ever tried.

i had a plain croissant to go with it and wasn't impressed, to me croissants are supposed to be light and flaky but this one was quite heavy and dense. but someone at our table ordered a piece of carrot cake and it was lovely; all caramelised and natural-tasting.

hope you've had a wonderful Sunday!
image from here. 

the BaxterTTT

Last night was lovely. I was invited to attend the second Baxter Theatre "Taste, Tweet and Theatre" event and took along the lovely drummer boy. I wasn't too sure what to expect and it turned out to be an awesome evening.

Diemersfontein made sure that everyone's glass was full with tangy whites and full-bodied reds. I don't often drink red wine but simply fell in love with the Pinotage - you have to try it. We were also treated to some scrumptious morsels of canapes, what a perfect way to spend a Friday evening!

I also think a visit to the wine estate's "Pinotage on Tap" is in order. It's happening sometime around October and if you enjoy live music, wine and the outdoors then I'll see you there.

It was really cool to meet some of the Tweeps in person too. I often wonder what my Twitter friends are like in person and was a little nervous about actually meeting them but everyone I met was friendly, fun and full of interesting stories.

I'm quite a shy person when I don't know people so it was quite intimidating for me to just go up to complete strangers and start up a conversation but last night made me realise that most people are naturally warm and inviting, and once the wine started to warm the insides it felt like some of us had known one another for much longer than half an hour.

We were then ushered into the theatre space to watch the show. Wow, I was completely blown away. Neo Muynga's "Memory of How it Feels" has been described as "inspired by the traditional Zulu practice of exchanging beads encoded with secret messages between lovers". The play's central theme is love, but it's message extends all boundaries. The amalgamation of visceral movement, the musicianship of the piano-, cello- and violin-players and the passionate story-telling was more than a glimpse into the intimate moments of people who love; it was an invitation into the very essence of those moments.

I love the theatre and it's because of shows like this one. The female performer, Chuma Sopotela, for me was phenomenal. Her potency flows outwards through her muscles and her vocal chords and she demands your attention when onstage in a way that endears you to her.

You should definitely go see it if you get the chance!

Happy Saturday lovelies.

Image from here. (I can't believe I did not take one photo lastnight!)