How many orientations and registrations are we
going to have?! We don’t even orientate at our orientations nor register at our
registrations. At 9:00am I was speed walking to the venue on campus. When I got
there I wasn't even mad that it was early and freezing outside because the smell and
sight of breakfast put me at ease. There were glazed donuts, little fancy
tomato pizzas, hot tea, apple juice, orange juice, and my favorite mango juice.
I ate everything that could fit on two plates. I do not play games.
So everybody scrambled into the lecture hall;
it looks like an auditorium. There was a UWC tote bag and a free pen along with
the program on everybody’s desk. I LOVE free things! We started off by passing
the microphone around the room for introductions. There were a lot of
international students from different parts of the world. When the mic got to
William, from Howard, he introduced himself then set the record straight. “…Not
all American men wear their jeans below the butt, thank you.”
The head of International Relations, Ms.
Lamson gave us a welcome speech, followed by the director, Mr. Jackson. They
said something about welcome to UWC, it’s a colored school, and this year is
their 50th anniversary. Then Ms. Lamson offered a prize to the
person who can remember the name of the person she was about to introduce. I
LOVE prizes. The lady she introduced went up the podium and started giving her
speech in a low, monotone voice. O gosh, she was so boring! But I still wanted my
prize so I stayed awake as she put everybody else to sleep. She was talking
about South African history from the beginning of time until now. Who cares
what happened in the 1400s? She only had a half hour to get the job done and
she went over time.
Anywho, when she finished her speech I started
clapping to indicate to the sleepers that she was done. She handed over the
microphone to Ms. Lamson. I was hoping she didn’t forget about the prize
because I would remind her. Luckily she didn’t. She popped the question and my
right hand immediately flew up.
“Yes, Chantal what is the name of the
speaker?” she asked. “Sipokazi Sambumbu!” YESS!!!! I got a free t-shirt. I LOVE
free t-shirts! I can see that people were wondering how I remembered that very
complicated name, but if they weren’t asleep they would’ve noticed it was
written on the program. Hahahaha!
We had another long, boring presentation, then
an excited one by Cape Town tourism. This is what I came for. I want to hear
about cool stuff. They talked about shark-cage diving, surfing, mountains, and
party – awesome! Smart as I am, I knew that I had to take notes because they
had a bag of free gifts sitting on the table up front. Just as I thought, they
decided to quiz us on their presentation. They asked the first question and my right
hand immediately flew up. I answered correctly and got a free water bottle and
a gym bag. At this point, everybody in the room envied me. LOL. Two other
people got prizes.
The next presentation was about HIV/AIDS. This
lady came to tell us in 30 minutes what we already know. Her story of how she
contracted the virus was very moving though. Be careful guys! She didn’t have any
prizes so I wasn’t really feeling her speech (shrugs). When she got off the
stage, a cutie walked on. He had all my attention, and he had a bomb
presentation…and prizes! LMAO His prizes were gym bags with t-shirts inside of
them. How do I know? Because I won four of them. If wealth depended on how much free stuff one person has, I
would be Bill Gates.
Best part of today is that they put lunchtime
right in the middle of the program. I ate everything that could fit onto three
plates. Why does the food taste so good in South Africa? America needs to step
their game up. They called us back into the auditorium after lunch for more
boring talk. You can’t feed me and expect me to pay attention afterwards. God
sent one of his angels from above and told Ms. Lamson to excuse all the Howard
students from the rest of the program. Amen!
We left and went shopping. We had to prepare
for our long weekend tour.
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