semi-time-lapsed USA-Algeria from ipickmynose on Vimeo.

I made a sort of time-lapsed video when I went to the thrilling USA-Algeria game. I took 30 seconds of video with my Flip every 15 minutes starting 1 hour 20 minutes before the match and ending right after the game ended. Then I put all the segments together and sped it up a bit (about 6X). It was all done hand-help so it’s not perfect.

Enjoy.

One of my favorite moments was during the New Zealand-Slovakia game. In the 94th minute, Slovakia was up 1 – 0.

Then New Zealand scored. Imagine the following with an accent:

A cross… a CHANCE and…GOOOOOOAAALLL! WOW O WOW O WOW O WOW!!! THAT IS WHY THEY CALL IT THE BEAUTIFUL GAME!! THE GOAL THAT NEW ZEALAND ALWAYS HOPED AND DREAMED OF!

It may not be as polished as the imported-from-England announcers that most stations are using, but I love it.

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I came up to the high country to go to a couple US America soccer games. I went to the US-Slovenia game on Friday. Even though I had the cheapest class of tickets for the game at Ellis Park, somehow I had great seats. See my view above.

I think America should have won with a botched call from the ref disallowing the would-be winning goal. That said, I really had a good time at the game. The atmosphere and the game were exhilarating.

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I drove up through the Karoo, the semi-arid interior of the country. It’s a stark and beautiful area. It’s cold at the moment; the snow on the mountains marks the first time I’ve seen it in the country.

It’s a long drive, some fifteen and a half hours over two days. It’s easy to forget that South Africa is this big.

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I rode the brand new Gautrain yesterday just for fun. I like high speed rail. This never really had a chance to get up to full speed but it was still impressive.

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Today I watched the Slovakia-Paraguay at a fan park in Newtown (pronounced as if it was two words) and went to the top of the Carlton Centre, the tallest building in Africa (but not tallest structure). The tower used to be prime property but is now in a fairly rundown area; on the other hand, Newtown seems to be in the middle of revitalization.

I’m not sure why I took this photo, but I found it today while looking through some photos on my laptop. I sort of love it.

It’s in my room in Menlo Park, my laptop on my bed. I’d just gotten back from a ten day trip to DC, NYC and Pittsburgh, where I attended two weddings. I think I also bought this Steelers hat on that trip.

I’d been at Function for two years at that point. I had another year in Menlo Park. Another few weeks till I was 26. I was just starting to recover from MIT and grad school. I was blogging a lot.

It’s weird how everything changes and how so much stays the same.

I still haven’t written much about my trip to Zimbabwe. It’s been a busy couple weeks here.

The falls themselves are still magnificent (I saw them in 1998 as well). The water was coming so hard now, though, that it was hard to see them through the mist in places.

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muscle car, vic falls

Strangely enough, there are a number of vintage cars in the town. I wish I’d caught more of them, but this is a great one.

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phone shop, vic falls

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high tea at Victoria Falls Hotel

I stayed at the famous British colonial opulence of the Victoria Falls Hotel in 1998 when I was traveling on someone else’s dollar but now that I’m on my own, I stayed at somewhere a bit more price conscious. I still went to the hotel for their afternoon high tea, though, which was lovely. It makes you feel like you should be wearing a khaki safari suit while chatting to Dr. Livingston.

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Speaking of dollars, the Zim dollar is not a legal currency anymore—businesses can accept US Dollars, SA Rand, Botswanan Pula and possibly some other currencies, but the default is the US Dollar. It’s quite strange to be in a sub-tropical rural African town spending US Dollars.

Since the Zim dollars went out of circulation, street merchants sell the bills, particularly the high value ones. I now own a 50 Trillion Dollar note. Yes, you’re correct in thinking a bill with a five followed by thirteen zeros looks ridiculous.

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Victoria Falls train station

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Possibly my least favorite part of Victoria Falls was all the tourists and particularly Americans, who seemed to do a particularly good job of embarrassing our nation.

On the plane there, I saw multiple Americans wearing all khaki, including vests and safari hats. On a British Airways 737. This is not 19th century colonialism, Americans. You can wear regular clothes.

Another particularly embarrassing instance was at a restaurant that served local-flavored dishes. One of them had a description that read: “A Shona dish with dried meat in peanut butter sauce.” Someone asked the waiter “What’s Shona? Beef?” Pro tip: learn the barest essentials about the country before you travel to it.

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In the town of Victoria Falls, I was told not to walk around at night, not because of crime. The reason: elephants. As if to prove this advice was sound, one evening two elephant walked right by the entrance to the hostel I was staying.

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elephant in the Victoria Falls National Park

On the morning of the day I left, I went on a horse ride through a wilderness area. We saw some elephant, who asserted their territory quite strongly, which was a bit exhilarating. We also managed to get very close to some bushbuck and warthog, apparently because they saw us as other animals rather than humans.

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handwritten boarding pass for Air Zim

I was on British Airways to and from Zimbabwe, but to get from Victoria Falls to Harare, where I was headed for a family wedding, I flew Air Zimbabwe. The first signs that it may be an interesting experience was that when I went to check in, they looked up my name on a print out and crossed it off. They then hand wrote out my boarding pass.

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Air Zim turbo prop

I’ve flown a lot of regional airlines in at least four continents but it’s been probably 15 years since I’ve flown on a turbo prop. The whole experience was interesting for a few reasons:

1) Turbo props are loud and shake a lot. I rarely feel the urge to drink on flights but I took the wine they offered on this flight.

2) When I booked, they told me the flight time was a bit under two hours. I checked in at the sign that said “Harare” and waited in the boarding area for the only plane on the tarmac. I boarded with everyone else for the only plane on the tarmac. So on the flight, I was in a near panic when they said “This is the flight to Bulawayo.” Another passenger quickly assured me that it was going to Harare after a stop in Bulawayo. But there was no way that the flight could make it to Bulawayo and then Harare in two hours. We ended up in Harare an hour late and I very nearly missed my shuttle to the wedding because of it.

3) Tiny chunks of dry ice fell out of the ceiling onto me during the flight. I thought they were paint chunks but when I brushed them off they were really cold. I suppose the insulation was going up there and CO2 is the first gas to liquify or freeze.

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the bride and groom signing the registry

My second cousin’s bride’s family is from Zimbabwe and her mother lives and works at a private school about an hour outside Harare, outside the small town of Marondera. There isn’t a lot of accommodation so all the guests stayed in the dorms (while the students were on holiday) and ate at the school. With guests from five continents, it was an interesting occasion.

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The wedding itself was pretty spectacular. The wedding was in a small game park that the school owned; driving to the site of the wedding we saw wildebeest and zebra; apparently giraffe were right there during the rehearsal.

Perched on a large rock surrounded by those typical African wind-swept trees and with an amazing view over the park, the bride was marched in by a marimba band from a local school. We sat on hay bails as a local school’s choir sang the hymns and the ceremony beautifully unfolded before us.

The reception was on the rugby field back at the school. There was some eating, some drinking, some dancing, some chumming around with family and strangers alike.

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jet dry cleaners, marondera

The day after the wedding, there were some braais and general relaxing. I went into town for an hour to look around and take some photos. It was bigger than I thought it’d be but it was still, in many ways, a typical rural African town.

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a rock and the moon in Gosho Park

I finished off the trip with a quick track back into the game park. I saw a couple animals, but one of the more striking features were the teetering rocks perched around the park.

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All in all a fantastic trip.

And I’ve seen lots of strange signs but this may be my favorite. So simply good!

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I’ve been making milkshakes. The most successful so far have been fresh mint + chocolate chunk, banana + nutella and banana + peanut butter. They have been well received by my flatmates. Mmmmmilkshaaaaakes.

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I’m going to Zimbabwe in a couple weeks for a couple days. It should be fun. It’s mostly for a family wedding near Harare but I’ll also spend a couple days in Victoria Falls.

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A good friend and his wife* will be here at the end of April for 10 days. I’m pretty excited about that. It’ll be great to see them and I like showing off Cape Town.

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*who I’m friends with as well.

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I’ve been biking around some in the last few weeks. I mostly go to the pool or shopping or to other things that aren’t far but are far enough that I wouldn’t walk. My knee and rest of my body is mostly okay with it so far.

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I make it a habit of not talking about work here, but lecturing/ coaching is going just fine. There are some interesting possibilities for other work as well.

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I’ve had weird sleeping habits lately, going to bed later than I intend and waking up at my relatively early alarm and turning it off.

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I’ve played ultimate frisbee at UCT a few times; there’s a pick up game on Fridays. It’s good times. I’m still alright at it. Given that I haven’t really played regularly since 2002 or thereabouts (though I did play a few times in 2006), I’m surprised how confident I am. I realized it’s one of the few things when I perform better under pressure than otherwise.

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I took a tour of Cape Town Stadium on Tuesday. It was pretty cool. It’s a well-designed stadium. I think going to games in it will be a pleasure.

I’ll see next weekend as I’m going to see an Under 20 soccer tournament with Brazil vs Ghana and South Africa vs Nigeria with a few people. I’m looking forward to it.

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This is the first year in a number that I didn’t either give up something for Lent or avoid eating meat on Fridays during the forty days (or both). I guess with so much instability currently, I didn’t really feel it. I’ll get ‘em next year.

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It’s a four day weekend here. It doesn’t mean the same thing when I wasn’t going to work (in the traditional sense) on Friday or Monday anyway.

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I’ve started working on a memoir of my time at Boston Tech[1]. Progress has been slow. Very slow on some days, but others I’m inspired and write a fair amount. I’ve also thought of a book of stories from my travels, which would be fun.

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My new flat isn’t without its hiccups, but it’s generally working out well. We had a house warming a few weeks ago that went well; a good time was had by all.

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My favorite poster designer has a book out. I think I’ll get it. Jason’s stuff is great.

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I’m tempted to get this old school US jersey for when I go see the US in the World Cup in just over three months time.

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And finally. I went to a Stormers match last weekend. They’re a Super 14 team representing the Western Cape. They were playing against another SA club, the Cheetahs—the team my aunt roots for, as it turns out. Stormers won, so that was good and it was a fun experience overall.

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[1] I really want to make a shirt that says Boston Tech in the MIT font. Who’s with me?

(All of the MIT servers were named after hacks. I’ve linked the hacks below.)

From: bischoff@MIT
Subject: sad
Date: August 26, 2003 3:27:31 PM PDT
To: tepd@xyz.org

nerd-xing and cathedral-seven are no more. nerd-xing was my favorite dialup for a long time

18.7.16.67       25  TEST        contents-vnder-pressvre           3000
18.7.16.73       25  ATHENA-NORMAL  buzzword-bingo                25731
18.7.16.69       25  ATHENA-NORMAL  department-of-alchemy          25902
18.7.16.80       25  ATHENA-NORMAL  magic-pi-ball                  26066
18.7.16.75       25  ATHENA-NORMAL  biohazard-cafe                 26092
18.7.16.71       25  ATHENA-FTP  mass-toolpike                    26227
18.7.16.64       25  X           no-knife                          41390

(and mass-toolpike isn’t an express server anymore. it’s ftp!)

Cheers,
Adrian

[1] Of course we didn’t actually dial-up to them, we just used our T1 and sshed in.

1. My room is color coordinated. I mean, not ridiculously so, but things generally match. When did I start caring?[2]
2. Who doesn’t want a man cave? Unfortunately my room is closer to just a cave.

[1] I moved last week.

[2] Probably when I moved to SA and bought all my room things at the same time.