Here are some winter street scenes from my photographic adventure into a few beautiful and quaint avenues and lanes of Stellenbosch yesterday. When it rains for so many days on end and then suddenly the sun shines, it feels like God is smiling on this little historic town and all its treasures. The sky is so blue and the air is so alive with possibility.
I sit here embracing the spirit of adventure and letting my diva hair down by nipping on a glass of Woolies Reckless Red, which by the way is a great value wine for its price tag. I know I have blogged about it before but it is such an everyday winner! This rowdy blend of red cultivars is alive with lascivious fruit and a down-to-earthy savoury finish.
Word of the day: A nip also means a sip (as in wine), or can mean to pinch or to “knuip” or to dash or zip (as in zippy MINI cooper) or I guess can mean to hope that credit card transaction goes through when shop clerk swipes card through the machine when it’s end of the month salty cracks time!
Oh so I better give diva movie feedback as promised as few weeks ago… I “heart” the Sex and the City movie! This is the ultimate chick flick and I really loved it, like Carrie loves Big and NY and shoes. It was like watching a whole new series crammed into 2 hours, a real treat for those of us Sex and the City fanatics who have watched our dvd box sets over and over every few months while hoping the NY foursome would get their act together, get along and finally make the movie. But yay yay, it has been well worth the wait. Carrie’s outfits are more spectacular than ever. When the movie started it felt a bit surreal to me to be sitting in a movie theatre with these familiar faces on the silver screen instead of the TV screen but after a few minutes, the usual good chemistry between the four characters lured me in and by the time it was half way through I was hoping it wouldn’t end. I won’t give too much away because you must go see it with your girlfriends but I like the addition of Carrie getting a Louis-Vuitton-loving personal assistant. Also I had rather hoped that Samantha would get it on with her saucy sexy neighbour and maybe the script writers could’ve given Big a few more lines but that’s all I am saying. I managed to get 5 of us together for a viewing and we went for drinks afterwards, a fitting girls night out reunion all round as I was home with my homies (Pretoria) for that particular weekend. Better and more magical on the big screen so don’t dare say you’ll wait for the DVD.
So last week I attended the first Cape Town gathering of the Global Dinner Network, organised by Jo Duxbury of Freelancentral. This wide-reaching forum was started by a professional woman who travelled a lot for business and found that “strange cities can be daunting when you’re on your own and perhaps can’t speak the language. You might not know what areas are safe to explore after dark or aren’t keen to sit in a restaurant having dinner on your own. Being stuck in your hotel room with room service and CNN isn’t much fun.” So she started the Global Dinner Network as a clever way to unite cosmopolitan, intelligent and interested women to break down the barriers of business travel and come together to exchange ideas, experiences and cultural identities over a good meal. It also means that you can “travel the world” in your own city through attending the regular global dinners and/ or making contact and arranging exchanges with international travellers belonging the network.
We, the first CT GDN newbies, met at an Indian restaurant called Bihari in Tokai. A bit of a trek for me from Stellenbosch on a school night but to make friends in this strange clicky bubble that is the Cape, I will travel. After a bit of chatting and some wine, Jo told us more about how it all began, her involvement and how the social networking site works and then we all took turns introducing ourselves. It was quite exciting to think that on that very evening women all over the globe were having dinner and networking just as we were. I had such a stunning time and it was a real inspiration about what can be achieved when women come together and extend the hand of friendship. I sometimes feel that women could be so much stronger as a group if we form alliances and collectively share our strengths, ideas and talents. Too often we stand alone in our everyday struggles and try and do it all without asking for assistance and inspiration from our sisterhood.
The food, atmosphere and wine (Cab Sauv/ Merlot and Sauvignon Blanc from Groot Constantia) were all first rate. As participants of the first Cape Town group we each received a euro-chic eco-friendly pink net shopping bag. I remember my granny taking one along on her shopping trips into town – and I wonder how we ever regressed to using plastic carrier bags when these stylish reusable bags have always been an option.
Ahem, and toilet time provided for lots of giggles and entertaining stories. One particular “Rolls Royce” full service lavatory supposedly offered various programmable settings to those perched on this unique throne and made for fascinating conversation when the girls who tried it eventually came back from the ladies room. If you ask me, we already kill enough time queuing for the little girls’ room without them adding further time-consuming although tempting distractions while “powdering our noses”.
Last night I had dinner at my neighbours place and we had a excellent time. We shared our life stories over red wine, tasty home cooked chicken and broccoli bake and chocolate fondue for dessert. Next weekend we plan on going wine tasting together. Watch this space.
Tonight I am home with my Missy, just vegging and catching up on quality time together. We went for a drive in the MINI and a 5.2km run this morning at Maties athletics track. I saved a lot of earthworms which had obviously been water-logged out of the grass by the non-stop rains and onto the tarmac and were squirming around in agony. Eeek, I know. I hope the Gauteng refugee hadedas get the ones I couldn’t save.
From wine to girl-talk to potties to chocolate fondue to beached worms, it’s been an interesting week!
Wine Diva, reporting live from the Cape Winelands, land of the refugee Gauteng Hadedas, bouncing squirrels, schongalolos and chameleons. It’s true! What is a wine diva without a wine country to call her own? Just a diva? And since I am no Mariah Carey I figured I had better hunt me down some vineyards. So for the love of wine, I packed my diva bags, my high-heeled shoes and my entourage (my dog, Missy) into my MINI Cooper early in April 2008 and left Gauteng (maybe not for good). And I have since taken up residence in the Cape winelands, smack-dab in the middle of the R44 on the outskirts of the student village (middle name Tassies) Stellenbosch. I am on a mission to discover the wine countries of the world (the long-term-sugar-daddy plan) and decided to start with the wine country right in my backyard (the-short-term… Waiting-for-sugar-daddy! Where-is-he-already? budget plan). I dream about slowly and savouringly (notice I didn’t say soberly) do what it takes to complete the world winery loop, but it’s evidently not gonna happen in the next 80 days because the sugar-daddies here in the Cape are much too sugar-coated even for my sweet tooth.
My TV is on the blink and I have no room in the budget to fix it or buy a new one. I can hear but I cannot see, so it’s basically a radio. Having no TV means that I just spent my long weekend knitting and having French-conversations with myself. Actually I am becoming quite a brilliant cook as a result and my slow reading speed is improving. I am wading through the endless novels and guides that I purchased just to swipe my Exclusive books fanatics card back in the day when life was too exhausting to get through more than one page at bedtime before passing out and then rereading the same page the next night before passing out again. A vicious groundhog reading cycle, I know you know what I am talking about. I am finding that books and wine pair very nicely together. It’s so quiet without a TV that I can hear when a lost schongalolo has sneaked in under the front door. Ah the simple life! When last did you see a schongalolo in Gauteng? In fact, the last time I saw one I couldn’t spell schongalolo. Maybe I still can’t… is that how it’s spelt?
My original plan was to work full time for one wine estate and learn the tricks of vine before going on to conquer and wow the world of Wine, but I have since realised that with all these wine estates on my doorstep and no Grey’s Anatomy to distract me from my goal, I would be a fool to put all my wine writing in one barrel. I will therefore continue as an independent.
Last week Thursday, 12 June 2008, I was invited to visit the Old Mutual Trophy wine show in Cape Town and it was excellent. I took a friend along from Wine Web and we wine divas had a fine time meeting the who’s who on the wine circuit and tasting what the winners had to offer. The show is a celebratory sampling of the silver and gold winners of the Old Mutual Trophy competition, now in it’s 7th year, and is a great chance to savour top quality wines that often times are only available in very small quantities to the highest bidder. I asked one of the exhibitors what his coveted gold sticker wine would cost me if he had stock (which he didn’t) and he said R425. When I said “a case”, he just rolled his eyes.
Hey I just got an sms from my neighbours inviting me to dinner on Friday night. Yay yay, I may well break through this clicky circle of Cape friendship thing after all.