Day 171, I turned 30 in Africa. My 29th birthday was spent in front of a computer screen with multiple choice questions comprising the Applied Knowledge Test of the Royal College of General Practice. My thirtieth didn’t involve much academics.
The day itself was celebrated starting with my friends banging on the door with gifts and cake. After a relatively uneventful day at work we had a typical South African braai with surpluses of meat and wine. Cards from friends and family were opened though the facebook messages, emails and calls had to be postponed as in classical Mseleni fashion cell signal had abandoned me for the day.
But postponement was a prevailing theme as the bulk of celebrations were reserved for the days after when I ventured with my friends to Cape Town and the wine lands for the long weekend. I had been warned about snow being seen on Table Mountain and packed accordingly but arriving in an airport bathed in sunlight I had a feeling it was set up for a glorious weekend.
My friends took me on a scenic tour around Cape Town and the surrounding areas as we circumnavigated Table Mountain. In the warm sunshine we drove through Chapman’s Peak, Camps Bay, and Fish Hoek. No trip in South Africa would be complete without some wildlife and I saw my first ostriches as well as seals and baboons. The vistas were about as stunning as I have ever seen.
My friends insisted we celebrate everyday as my birthday and we had several renditions of Happy Birthday, one was even an unrecognisable tune in Afrikaans played by street kids for pocket change. The celebrations also included “proper” sundowners, ones where we can actually sip a cocktail and watch the sun dip into western horizon as opposed to general dimming on our usual eastern shores.
Dining was at the finest establishments, a far cry from our local eateries on the Elephant Coast. The following day was spent sampling the wines of Stellenbosch and Franschhoek. Tasting a multitude of chardonnays, shirazes and pinotages my taste buds may have dulled through the day, but the fragrant vineyards with their bright yellow and orange seasonal colours were vibrant to my other senses.
The weekend was capped off with another exercise in indulgence at the South African Cheese Festival. For the lactose intolerant it included a selection of wines, liqueurs, olives and other pantry fillers. By the end, it wouldn’t have surprised me if I had exploded.
Thirty is meant to be a significant milestone, and perhaps it will turn out to be so. But for now it will just be synonymous with an exuberant celebration made special with fine foods, good wine, and even better friends.
I am sure this can't beat the venue for your 20th....
ReplyDelete(That comment only works if I counted the years correctly)