Cape Town

There's a directional marker at Cape Point, the kind that has about 20 arrow-shaped signs designating the distance & direction of various other cities. I noticed that almost every place--Buenos Aires, Sydney, New York, Paris, Shanghai, San Francisco etc--seemed equally remote... Cape Town is far away no matter where you are. We were chatting with a French businessman who laughed: "Yes, it really feels like the end of the road here!"

Geographically, this is as far away from home as we've ever been, and we're surprised that it feels so familiar. The city, the weather, the landscape, the harbor... it's very west coast: San Diego or San Francisco, with maybe a little Seattle thrown in for good measure. We've visited picturesque towns along the coast here that easily conjure up Half Moon Bay, Mendocino or Monterey. Vineyards and whale-watchers everywhere!

There are parts of Cape Town proper that somehow, strangely, remind me of Honolulu... maybe its the matronly black women strolling in their brightly-colored mumus... the quaint little churches framed by palm trees... the cinderblock schoolhouses... the neighborhoods that slope their way up the foothills of the mountains... the sudden rain showers that are quickly replaced by sunshine... the low clouds that obscure the top of Table Mountain... and of course there's the familiar presence of surf shops and sushi restaurants.

Jacqueline and I have been joking: "So... when does Africa start?"

It's achingly beautiful here, but I don't mean to paint some naive picture of the place-- We've seen the shanty towns, we know to be cautious, and we've been lucky enough to spend time with people and have long discussions about the local politics etc... but Capetonians will readily admit they're living in a first-world island.