Day 5

Today was a low key day, BUT we did have a swell time! We got up early and took our trusty bus to the University of Western Cape to meet with the HIV/AIDS unit, aka the SHAPE of UWC. They are awesome people and they do sooo many great things geared toward spreading awareness, reducing stigma and educating UWC student and younger learners in the community about HIV/AIDS and other sexual health topics.

 First we got an introduction to their program and its crazy cool. They design posters, organize free HIV testing all. the. time. (and they usually get 200-300 people each day for free testing), they go into schools in neighboring townships and teach, they do drama programs around UWC, and so much more. They are super organized and train their peer educators intensively. They also get about 200 applicants for the program and accept only 40.

hehe

Also I really like how they are using multiracial advertisements. I didn't realize until I came here and noticed South African ads, but US ads are really white. Mix it up, US. 

  I truly enjoyed meeting these peers and their coordinators. We then chatted in a roundtable about each of our programs and what we are doing in our own schools and sharing ideas about the future and brainstorming. Man it was great. They really are SHAPE at UWC and we communicated super well with each other.

  After lunch we got into three groups and planned a lesson that we are giving tomorrow at Khayelitsha (the largest township in Cape Town) to 9th and 10th learners (Cape Tonians say learners instead of students, and I like it). My group is doing our lesson on teen pregnancy and healthy sexual practices.  I will let you know tomorrow how that goes! :-)
We were all exhausted and hungry so we went to dinner right after we got back. We walked to this cute little square by the market and had a lovely meal. I had ratatouille. yum. Then we went to the market to get more medication and cake:

this is where it's at.

Also, some of the people-not me- moved to an apartment today (it is part of the same hotel- this place owns like half of the neighborhood) it is swanky swanky. we will be hanging out there, and it has a rooftop lounge:

the view!

cheers!