Saturday, December 29, 2012

Matriculant...that's me!

Yesterday was quite an odd day. One of those where you're just kind of waiting for time to pass because something epic is happening later on.

My matric results were released last night at midnight. So, in true Mycroft style, we had a braai. We only ate at like 11:30 (also, not abnormal at our braai's). I had all the special people in my life around me. It was so much fun.

At this point, I realised what the time was. I started parrying a smidgen...as can be expected. A while ago, I registered to get my results via sms. That was quite a process, I won't lie. It was at that point when it became real that school was over.

I had my eye firmly on the clock, waiting for midnight to strike. I forgot to keep my phone on my person....rookie error. At 11:45 I realised this and asked Justine to get it for me. She looked at my phone and got overboard excited and shouted "Chaeli, you got your marks!"

I really would have liked to have some more warning, but I guess it's like a bandaid...just do it quickly. Except this one had a more pleasant outcome.

Here it is:
4 B's - Maths lit; LO; English & Business studies
2 C's - Life Science & History
1 D - Afrikaans (really would have preferred this to be better, but you know what, it's not the biggest deal)

So, I have enough points to do what I want to do next year and forever after that. It's weird to think that my key to everything is in a tiny A5 envelope. That one piece of paper has so much power.

Today we all had to go fetch our legit official statements of results. It was amazing being able to celebrate our successes with one another. So good.

This is James and Jess...what can I say about these incredible people? These two have indulged in super, crazy intense conversations with me where we debated the purpose of history and the need for appraisals, looking confused when teachers have analogies that are really hard to follow, getting sent out of class for being disruptive by laughing hysterically when attempting to remove a jacket from my severely stubborn body, keeping life very interesting and entertaining. They've kept me sane when our work was kind of burrying us and actually the majority of the time was spent embracing our own insanity.

It's always good to have people like this in your life. Go and find some!

:)

Wednesday, December 26, 2012

Happy holidays!

This is probably my most random post I've ever written, but hey, it's holiday time...

Christmas is over. Sad to think that all this hype happens and then in one day, people are over it. But, Christmas has been epic this year.  As I have told you, last year this time, we spend Christmas with the Terry family and it's always amazing.

I love the holiday season because it shows people to be kind and loving and giving. Even though you do get the odd miserable soul who is irritated that there is no parking available or there are only three tellers to check out your items, slowing down the entire process. These are things that everybody knows are going to happen in the holiday season. We need to be aware of these things and...rise above. Take deep breaths and just go with the flow. Going into it with this mindset will make it a lot more enjoyable. I, for one, enjoy the chaos of the holidays. It's entertaining that people can get so worked up about small incidents. Chill out, people, let the good times roll!
This time of the year is about being together. It doesn't matter how you celebrate or who you choose to be with, Just make sure you're having fun and trying hard to avoid the rest-of-year drama.
We had an amazing time...just chilling with great people, swimming and so much more. I'm so grateful that it's not snowing. I couldn't deal with that. Snow and wheelchairs are not friends.

I hope everybody had as good a time as we did. I hope you partied it up. I'm actually just realising that this whole post would've been impossible if the world had ended the other day. So, I'm superstoked that didn't happen. Woopwoop, world!

Here's my Chaeli Conquers Cycle Tour update:
- The buggy has been named...Beastie the Buggy.
- Beastie now has a roll bar, which means that we can start training soon. As soon as we sort out Grant's bike with gears and other things that I currently do not understand...and we've figured out how to attach Beastie to the bike.
- I have gotten over my obsessive-compulsive tendencies with regard to the colour scheme of the bike and the buggy. Well, not really, but the red to blue ratio on the buggy is more equal now, so I can deal.

Courtesy of Justine, my bestie...Merry christmas to all, and to all a good night.
;)

Saturday, December 15, 2012

We have it

The buggy has arrived!

It was sent to us from Johannesburg by courier in a huge box. We got excited when Kevin emailed us a photo of the buggy starting its journey to the Mother City. Thank you to Rene and Alistair from Freight Solutions for sponsoring the courier to Cape Town!

there it is....in the back
This happened on a Friday evening. So, we had an agonising wait over the weekend and weren't sure when the buggy was going to arrive.

We are also now in the middle of our 'Socks 'n' Pops' Campaign at Steenberg Village Pick 'n' Pay and on Monday when I was selling RedSocks and Peace Pops I was sent this picture from Chaeli Cottage...


Grant and I opened the buggy box the next day. It was EPIC! After putting the buggy together and figuring out where all the cushions are meant to be - this in itself was a smidgen of a mission...there are a lot of cushions - we immediately organised my body into the buggy and this was the result:



This was much more exciting because now we can actually start doing stuff with the buggy and adapting it so that it is more comfortable for me. We need to change the height of the bar at the back because my head is currently higher than the bar which kind of defeats the purpose of its presence on the buggy. We also need to add another couple of cushions because my legs are a bit long for the seat now. More cushions... but at least we will know exactly where these ones are meant to go ;)

On Thursday, Grant and Gary had organised to sort out the plan for the metal work on the buggy, so I had to be there to sit in it for them to measure the height and stuff (tiring work that, sitting in the buggy. haha). It was actually pretty hysterical because I was in the buggy, with a helmet on, as well as the purple glasses that Grant has. I felt very random being the only person there wearing these things. Then Grant put his helmet on too and I felt a little less random because we were random together :)

Gary was taking photos the whole time. Thanks, Gary!

Here's one of the two of us. Notice the semi-helmet-hair...

This will surely be MUCH worse when we actually do some cycling! haha

We have to wait a while before that happens because, firstly, we haven't exactly mastered how to attach the buggy to the bicycle (crucial aspect!) and we need to have the bar on the buggy sorted out (also crucial, but less...) which can only happen when the factory re-opens.

In the meantime, we are working on bracelets - like the rhino bracelets - to raise awareness around our cycle, but more importantly, the work of The Chaeli Campaign and the abilities of differently-abled people. They are gonna be pretty fricken awesome, so if you want one, let us know, every way possible.

There are a lot of things on the go and we are so ampd that these things are happening. We look forward to sharing more of them with you.

:)

Saturday, December 1, 2012

Getting going...

We left for Johannesburg on Friday morning because I was invited to speak to the Department of Basic Education about inclusive education and my experiences in an inclusive environment. Hilton Langenhoven, Dyan Buis and Tebogo Mokgalagadi were there too to add their experiences to the pshyche of the ministers. Some young people from various special needs schools were there to listen to our life stories. It was really cool to meet all those people and share stories.


After an awesome meeting with these people, we had tickets to see Lady Gaga! Traffic to get there was expectedly horrific with very few people knowing what was going on. There was a man walking to the stadium and he was walking faster than we were driving in the car! The show was unbelievable and there are actually no words to adequately describe that experience.



                       WHAT AN AWESOME REDSOCKFRIDAY!!!!!

Today was quite chilled. I was doing some research around finding a buggy for the Argus and came across Team Garwood. I had read about them before this and thought that they have an amazing story. With deciding to do the Argus their story has gained a lot more intrigue for us.

I saw one of the buggies they had used previously and it looked perfect for Grant and my mission. I emailed them to find out some info on where they had got the buggy and stuff like that. I was prepared to wait a while for a response. This was not the case...

I got a reply within hours and it was Kevin (dad of Team Garwood) saying that they are super keen to help out - this is not exactly the words he used but you catch my drift. Kevin also said that we should come and visit them whenever we can and being in Joburg for Disability Day Celebrations we figured now would be a good time to go and see them.

We went to visit them and we had a fat chat, before they showed us the buggy. The Garwood's are amazing people who have enough gees for the whole nation! I'm so privileged to have had the opportunity to meet them.

I got to sit in the buggy and it was amazingly comfortable. I was slightly more impressed by the fact that I fitted into the buggy. It has a very simple design but it's very snazzy. The Garwood's told us that we can buy the buggy from them.




Now, we will be looking for sponsors to go towards the buggy. For anybody who gives us an amazing sponsorship towards the buggy, we will put your name or company logo somewhere on the buggy and we will be forever appreciative to you for helping us reach our goals and inspire many people to follow their dreams and not let anybody place limitations on your abilities.



We are SO excited about this and are even more excited to get the buggy down to Cape Town and start the epic training!

Here, the journey and the fun begins.

:)

Sunday, November 25, 2012

I am finished.

I am no longer a high school student. Twelve years of schooling has come to an end and it feels amazing. But on the other hand it is really weird and a little scary. It's a pretty complex feeling. I'm not even sure how I am able to have so many different emotions at the same time, but clearly it's possible because it's happening.

I am so excited that I don't have to procrastinate doing any form of scholarly work for three months. I think I have earned a bit of a holiday...but I keep thinking I have something urgent to attend to. And I have nothing.

In traditional fashion, my last day of school had to contain a smidgen of drama. So, here it is:
We left home at 8:10 and my final business exam started at 9:00. We live ten minutes from school so there was enough time to get there and for me to get into my 'business-zone'. That was almost the case but it was not to be.

We got stuck in traffic. Not once, but twice before we got to school. The reason. A military health walk. We didn't move. For like 20 minutes we were stationery. I did get a couple extra minutes of studying time so that was a bonus, I guess, but I was sufficiently stressed out!

When we eventually got to school, our head of academics was waiting for me. Well, not only for me cause there were other people who were late too, so that made me feel kind of better. I got to the exam venue and I misjudged how close I was to the door and hit it with my back wheels and it made a huge noise. Everybody turned and looked at me. I made a public apology.

I wrote my paper and everything was good. Unfortunately, though, this was not the end. We wrote both our business papers on the same day. So, three hours of studying was to follow. Fun times.

BUT...

To make our last Friday at school special I figured we could make it a RedSockFriday. I went to school in my skirt and rocked my knee-highs! Seven of my friends did it too, so the day was redder and radder with new redsockers.

My school career ended at 4:12, Friday 23 November.

Now, to be cheesy...

To infinity and beyond.
haha

:)

Monday, November 12, 2012

Am I Crazy? I think so.

I am doing the Argus in 2013. I know what you're probably thinking....

Are you crazy?

I'm pretty sure that I am. But, I have a crazy buddy, Grant, doing it with me. I love not being the only semi-deranged person in the room. Love you, Grant! Now, you have to understand what a good person he is if he is willing to put up with me for seven to eight hours on the road where we can either be dying from heat, drowning from rain, being blown away by the Cape Town wind OR...

....it could be really chilled and I'm overthinking this.

Let's explain a little more about how the whole situation is going to work because I can imagine the eyes that you are pulling at me right now.

So, Grant is going to be on his bike (still having the mountain bike or road bike debate) and I will be behind the bike in a "buggy". This is not the official name we are going to use but it's under development. We WILL be doing training so that we don't end up falling off the bike and using our faces as landing pads. But Grant is a pro-cyclist so that's definately half the battle won. Then we just have to work on my balance and my core muscles...quite the job but we're up for it!

The things we are working on right now are finding some sponsors as well as sorting out the buggy. The buggy is kind of an integral part of our plan. We will make it work and it will be EPIC!!

You will get updates as soon as things happen so that you can be completely involved in the entire amazing journey that Grant and I are about to embark on.

:)

Saturday, November 10, 2012

Final school exams.

I am now in my last two weeks of final matric exams which is quite scary but exciting at the same time.

I've been writing finals for about three weeks and am only now halfway. My timetable has been pretty chilled with a couple exams a week so I haven't been too stressed out. The stress is definitely building, though.

Next week I am writing only one paper...Woohoo! But we can't get overly excited because the week after that is horrifying. I have six exams that week. Six exams in five days. It's not going to be a fun week. I hope I survive.

The problem I have with it is that pretty much all the exams are heavy learning subjects and they are right after each other. My last exam day is not nice :( I'm writing business studies that day and we do both papers on the same day with two hours in between. That means that we have to study the ENTIRE syllabus for one day. Seventeen long, unrelated chapters have to fit in my brain and more importantly stay in my brain for the duration of the exam. Oh my goodness.

I'm going to stop complaining now. I actually think it's good that I have a free week before the crazy week from hell. It means that I can study my ass of now and then not be so stressed out when I have to write these last few papers.

The 23rd of November is my freedom day - my last day of school EVER!!

:)

Tuesday, October 23, 2012

Paris: the people, the places, and everything else

So.....

We got back from Paris on Sunday morning, exhausted. I have never been so tired in my whole life. We expected to come home tired, because in all seriousness, there was no way that we were going to do any sort of relaxing at all. After all, we were in Paris, and how often does that happen?

Prepare yourself for a pretty lengthy post. A lot happened and we were so busy that we had no time to update anything. Buckle up, it was an epic journey!

When we left Cape Town, we were super excited! My first trip solo. Well, not solo because if I were solo it would be an epic fail because. But, it was my first trip without my mom. What an experience it was, not just for me but for my sister, Erin, too. We learned so many things about ourselves and what we are capable of. I learned that I don't always need people to do so much for me and I can be more independent. And I think for Erin, it was very affirming of her abilities and her contribution as well.

Just getting to Paris was an interesting experience. Our first flight was from Cape Town to London and then from London to Paris. 16 hours or something in total. It was kind of weird travelling with my sister, not because I had any doubt of her abilities, because I didn't, but because my mom wasn't there and I'm used to travelling with her. It was all good. The one thing that we were stressing about was going to the bathroom on the plane. I'm sure that I am not the only disabled person who worries about toilets and things like that when travelling. It worked out well, though. My sister has bigger arm muscles than I thought. Impressive.

Our plane to Paris was delayed by an hour (we only found out about that when we were meant to be boarding). So, we had an extra hour to do....nothing. So much fun. And then, when we arrived in Paris, we went through almost the entire airport in one of the airport wheelchairs because we had to wait somewhere specific for my own wheelchair. This tends to stress a wheelchair user just a tiny bit.

We had to give them some time to get my wheelchair out of the plane and to where we were. So, we went to get our luggage from the carousel. It took forever. Then we had to wait for my wheelchair at a personnel lift. And we just waited, and waited, and waited. When my wheelchair did arrive, I got all excited and then we saw that my table was no longer attached to the wheelchair. Immediately, I started stressing because I use my table in everything that I do. After, communicating that it was missing and them understanding the situation, we waited again, for a while, and then the man came back up the lift, holding my table. Whew! I was just thinking about how I was going to do my speech without my table. It's not like I can just stand behind the podium...nobody would see me. I promise you, I nearly hugged the man!

We had a taxi from the airport to our hotel. Let's just say, our driver was really weird. Can't explain to you how weird. Can't.

It was strange in the neighbourhood where our hotel was because nobody was around and no shops were open at all. Then, we realised that it was a Sunday. And then it made sense. We did find the most amazing pizza place ever. It was so good.

My wheelchair decided to remind us that it is actually the boss of the relationship...again. We were not aware that a European adapter does not work everywhere in Europe. This makes little sense to me, but hey. We had to make a plan because my wheelchair needed to be charged. In the end, we had, I think, four different adapters on our original adapter. And then it didn't work. It was quite ridiculous. The next day, we got a single adapter that worked so that made life a lot easier.

Monday was a lot more alive. There were people around and we went to discover and explore Paris. We had so much fun. We did so many touristy things: We went to the louvre, arc de triomphe, notre dame, the eiffel tower, and of course, we went souvenir shopping for everybody back home. Nothing we went to see was a disappointment. Everything was as amazing as we had built it up to be in our minds.

We went to these tiny, amazing restaurants where we ate actual french fries and inside-out toasted sandwiches. Oh, that thing people say about baguettes being everywhere...no lies. Baguettes are everywhere! It's amazing.

On Tuesday, the conference started and it was time for business. The conference was really really interesting. There were some parts that were slightly out of my realm of understanding. But, it was an amazing learning experience. We met so many young people as well as ministers and others who are committed to making the youth an active participant in society and in education instead of simply being recipients all the time. Wednesday was my speech. I was really excited to present it because there were people there who were excited to hear what I have to say.

Throughout the conference, there were group sessions where we got an opportunity to share our views on certain issues relating to education and young people. It was very interesting to hear what other people think about things. Learn from their individual perspectives as well as the collective perspective they were representing.

One thing that proved very challenging at times, was getting around Paris. The taxi service was, at times, frustrating. We couldn't use the trains because the subways were pretty much entirely inaccessible. So, our only option was to use the bus. Let me tell you, it's really not a simple system. I guess, if you've grown up using them then it's much simpler to understand. But, if you are a tourist, and you don't speak french, it can be incredibly interesting. We learned that taking the wrong bus can add an extra hour to your journey. We took the wrong bus. It took forever.

On our last day we decided that we were going to go shopping. Our mission was to find an H&M. We found it. Eventually. After about four hours. We got SO lost. So lost.

We couldn't find the bus we needed to get on to get to the shopping part of Paris, so we decided to order a cab to get us there. It took 25 minutes to get to us but luckily it cost less than that and our driver was a really nice guy and he spoke english. bonus. We then tried to get our bearings but failed dismally because we walked - well, Erin walked, I wheeled but you catch my drift - for 20 minutes in the wrong direction and then had to walk 20 minutes back to our starting point. Every person that we spoke to told us a different thing and had very different ideas about how long 5 minutes are. Anyway, we got there and had so much fun. We also found a Mango. So good. Erin was suffering with her feet and walking so much. We had to get back to our hotel but we couldn't really find ourselves on our tourist map. We asked a cab driver to order us an accessible taxi because he spoke french. Very helpful in Paris where people don't really speak English. He gave us a card for a company and we were going to ask for the taxi to pick us up where we were. The problem was that we didn't exactly know where that was. While Erin was on the phone trying to get a taxi, I went to a friendly looking woman to ask where we were. She told us that it was easier to take the bus (as well as the fact that the taxi was going to take up to 40 minutes to get to us). The bus was defintely the faster option. We took the 35 bus for one stop, got off, and walked to a 21 bus stop and just had to make sure that the bus was going in the right direction. Simple. Not so much - but the woman was so helpful and offered to walk with us to the right bus stop. I think it was our looks of confusion and utter desperation for help that convinced her to help us. That worked out really well. We were so thankful to her for her kindness.

The journey back home was somewhat less exciting. We were excited to be going home but we were so tired. There's only so much fun a person can take in one week. Our flight was delayed, again, but it was our flight to London which was kind of a problem. We had a connecting flight back to Cape Town and there was only a two hour stopover between the two flights. There was an hour delay. You can imagine how enthralled we were with this news. The airport people told us that if we did miss our flight back, they would have paid for another flight or our hotel. The hotel would have been an impossibility because our visa does not permit us to leave the airport.

 But, all this drama was avoided because our flight was only delayed by 30 minutes and we got to London with time to spare. It did cause a smidgen of hysteria for a brief period.

Some other interesting things that happened were getting stuck in a lift at the HardRock Cafe for 20 minutes or something. I was stressing. I'm not a fan of sharing very small spaces with three other people. The next night, we had just got back from supper and were on the phone to our mom and the electricity went out and an alarm went off. I'm a lot more dramatic than my sister, and I was picturing people attacking the hotel and stealing everything. Real James Bond situation in my mind. We couldn't see anything or talk to anybody because nobody spoke english. Turns out it was just a block-wide power failure. Much less intriguing, but still.
Paris was definitely an incredible life experience and I will never forget it!

Saturday, October 13, 2012

Paris, here we come

I'm really excited to write this post!

I was asked a while ago to be a keynote speaker at the UNESCO/IIEP Conference in Paris. It's all about education and involving the youth in strategising to improve education globally.

I have my speech sorted....although it did take longer than expected. Here's the situation: I finished my speech and everything was cool and then I discovered that my computer decided that it's not important to save anymore, even though I totally clicked save and proceeded to eat my speech. So, after much stress and hysteria, my speech is done. Whew!

We are leaving just after 8 tonight and will arrive early tomorrow morning. Quick stopover in London (most stressful and expensive visa for a 7 hour stay we've ever had, by the way) and then PARIS!

Exciting times lie ahead. I'm positive that Erin and I will have plenty of stories of a lifetime to share when we get back.

Pictures and updates will follow.
See you on the other side.

:)

Tuesday, October 2, 2012

The beginning of the end...

I know I haven't written in a while...my bad. Things have been crazy and I haven't really had time to look sideways. I'm sorry you fell of my radar but you're back on :)

Since my last post so much has happened - I turned 18! WOOHOO!! So I am now legal. How legit? I couldn't celebrate my birthday in typical fashion because I was writing prelims and I wrote English on my birthday, Maths the next day and then History the day after that. History was on a Saturday. We were not happy chappies. It was a bad week.

However, we still went out. Not as bigscale as you would expect. We just went to Banana Jam and had a really rad time with like our family members and friends which worked out to 21 people. So, still pretty epic. The next day (when I was writing my maths paper) our grade head came to me and said "you really shouldn't be going out during exams". You can imagine my surprise. She then proceeded to say that if it was somebody's birthday celebration it was okay. "It was MY birthday!". Then she was chilled. It was really awkward for a while.

To celebrate properly we are having a party on Friday with all my homies. It's circus themed so we are busy making the house a circus. Not much of a stretch ;)

Prelims were a MAJOR thing that took over every second of my life for those three weeks and weeks before. Every time I was doing something to relax, I was thinking that I should have been studying and the amount of work I had to do.

Prelims are over now. Thank heavens. They were really average. But, you know, I'm looking at prelims as a trial run for finals. I messed up some things in prelims and I can learn from those things and not do them in finals and do much better.

That's my theory, anyway.

I'm on holiday now. Well, sort of. I don't have to go to school but I'm doing work at home. Preparing for finals. Fun times.

Some cool things that have happened recently are that I, along with our Lavender Hill Ambassadors, addressed the City of Cape Town Council meeting. It was really interesting to see how things work in those kinds of meetings. The best thing was that I couldn't get to the podium so I had to sit up at the top. I was given the seat where the Deputy Mayor of Cape Town sits. How cool is that? My topic was peace and inclusion and our four ambassadors spoke about their project on gangsterism. It was an amazing experience and when we were finished we got a standing ovation from the councillors.

The next big thing that's happening in my life is that I have been asked to be a keynote speaker at the UNESCO Conference in Paris in October. I'm so excited! I'm going with my sister. It's going to be EPIC! It's the first time I am travelling without my mom. It's an interesting time in our lives and it's the start of my claiming more of my independence.

We are leaving on the 13th of October and getting back on the 21st. It's going to be a crazy and amazing week that we will no doubt remember for the rest of our lives. Now we're just waiting for our visas and then we're all set.

Just because we live the crazy life that we do, four days after we get back from Paris I write my first final paper. It's enough time. I work best when I'm under pressure, anyway. I would have had my awesome experience before finals and then I can knuckle down and achieve what I want to in the end.

:)

Saturday, August 18, 2012

Reunions and weird situations

Last week I went with my mom to East London. I was asked to speak at Mercedes Benz' Graduation of their learnership programme for people with disabilities.

It was a great experience. I met awesome people and had a really good time getting to know some of the people who were on the programme. I even got asked if I would 'consider' one of the graduants. That was interesting....

Going to the airport is always interesting as a disabled person. There are always challenges to overcome, but most of the time it's just hysterical.

I won a bet against my mom about where the Steers is, which was cool.

On this particular occassion, it was pretty normal with a little bit of weird.  When we went through the boarding gates, they searched me, which is normal practice but this time was different. First, I had to wait for them to search another person, a woman who was probably close to 90 years old and they asked her to stand up out of her wheelchair. It took a while....

Then it was my turn to be frisked. All in all, it was a really weird situation. She said hello and whatever, and then she asked me to go into this little room, which was not normal. So I went and they closed the door behind us. It felt very sketchy, actually. I think she was new on the job because she had a supervisor and she was very.....eager to do her job and, rubbed her hands together before she started.

Nothing dodgy happened, it was just a really weird experience.

After that, it was normal. We are kind of frequent flyers and we know every one of the PAU people. It's really cool. It's like a family reunion every time we go.

Wednesday, August 1, 2012

Bloemfontein...

Two weeks ago - I think - I went with my mom to see our Pay-it-forward Ambassadors in Bloemfontein and Kimberley.

Now, being the people we are, clearly there was drama and hysterical situations that we found ourselves in. It started at the airport, when we were 10 hours late for our flight...

haha.

So we had to book another flight. We made the last flight to Bloemfontein for the day. We made it by 10 minutes. EPIC stress session, right there.

After arriving in Bloem we were so hungry and decided that we would go to Debonairs. I know, this sounds like a really boring story that serves no purpose, but I promise, it gets entertaining round about now.

My mom went in to order. Average. It took ages, so she came out to see if I was still in the car and not being stolen. All was good. But....there was this man....he was the car guard. He used a really annoying whistling direction system, which would be effective if anybody knew what the different whistles mean. Keep in mind that I had been sitting in the car for 30 minutes, listening to this idiocy.

I was getting sufficiently frustrated with this man. Especially because I can't get out of the car to clear the earspace. He was having a good time though, so thumbs up to him for having fun at work. What made this situation a whole lot more ridiculous was the fact that he only had one properly functioning eye.

Now, for me, I don't put a whole lot of faith in a partially sighted car guard.

Something else I didn't understand was that he was wearing glasses...

He already has one eye that is covered (probably due to surgery or something), which means that he does not need glasses for that eye, which means that the eye that was assumably 'functioning properly' was, in fact, a lot less functional than initially predicted.

This made me have no faith in the abilities of this man to direct cars. I wasn't even sure if he could see them. I try hard not to judge but looking at that situation, I'm just saying...

The rest of the trip was quite normal. Except for the fact that we stayed with people that my mom last saw 25 years ago - that's a long time because I wasn't even alive then! So naturally we stayed up until the early hours of the morning. We had to catch up. Erica, Chris and Mariet were amazingly welcoming.

Our Ambassador groups are amazing! Yvette (our facilitator) does such an incredible job with these young people. Thank you, Yvette.

After the Ambassadors meetings had finished, we met Kendra, who is six years old, has cerebral palsy and goes to a mainstream school, and her family. They are moving down to Cape Town at the end of the year. I'm so ampd!

I went with Mariet and her friends to the movies. We watched 'Magic Mike'. I'm not sure what we were expecting to see in a movie about male strippers, but our expectations were too high. The only way to deal with the awkwardness of that movie was hysterical laughter. We were pretty good at that. I had fun, though, and now I have memories of that Bloemfontein trip that I will not forget. Even though some I would prefer to forget...

:)

Saturday, July 14, 2012

Just a little bit busy

I know it's been a while since my last post. Okay, a long while, but life has been so busy I haven't really been able to update you guys. I'm sorry.. So, I'm writing now, in my room and its pretty much dark because of the kind of crappy weather we've been having lately. It doesn't inspire much creativity, but hey. Life goes on through the rainy days.

I honestly don't have a lot of exciting news. Quite sad actually. But.....I applied to university (not sure if I've told you but here's to reinforcement) and I handed in my results and other stuff they need and now we are waiting, somewhat patiently, for the verdict...

I also recently did by NBT. That was a mission in itself. I guess I should be used to it by now that being disabled often comes with hurdles, but I'm continuously surprised at how hard life can be. I'm going to put that down as 'positive thinking'. I registered, just as everybody else, and waited for my test day to arrive. Two days before, my mom phoned to ask about accessibility and stuff like that. And she was told that I can't write with everybody else because I need extra time.

Don't freak out.

I did. But in retrospect, it actually worked out better in the end, the way that it was organised. I wrote my test and now....we wait for the results. They say it takes two weeks to get them, so on Tuesday we will see.

The major thing that is on every matric pupil's mind - well, hopefully - is prelims. Oh my goodness, they are very soon and I don't know about everyone else but I am stressing. I have five weeks until they start and we are still getting work to finish. I'm really not sure where to fit it all in.

These 'holidays' have been crazy. Kind of like when people take the day off and end up doing work anyway. We have been given a lot of work and needed to finish it in the holidays. Mostly, projects that we were given a while ago. But I am very good at the whole procrastination thing. I realised a couple of days ago that I can't do it anymore. Result = stress!

I may be overplaying it a little bit, but it's fun :)

My plan is to study for exams from now so I can kick prelims' ass! We'll see how well that plan works out when life starts interrupting again...

:)

Wednesday, May 9, 2012

My speech in Chicago

I thought it would be cool if all of you could see what I said to all the cool people in Chicago. So, here it is:


I’d like to start by saying thank you for giving me this amazing award. It’s such an honour to be recognised for the work I’m doing with differently abled people in South Africa.


I was born in 1994 and in my country we are known as Madiba babies, as this was the year that Nelson Mandela became president of the new South Africa. It’s even more special for me to be getting this award from Mr F.W. De Klerk, who worked with President Mandela towards a more equal society. I am so grateful that I was born into a democracy. I do feel, though, that people with disabilities are still living in our own form of apartheid.

We are segregated from society not by choice but by a lack of accessibility and acceptance. These are issues that I, through The Chaeli Campaign, am working at getting more accessibility in all places as well as changing the attitudes of able-bodied people. It’s also important to educate people about the abilities of people living with disabilities. My main drive is for differently abled people to be included and accepted the way we are, because we cannot change our disability but we can change the way people see our disability.
I believe that we can do it. We can make disability just another trait instead of a reason for exclusion. We need to work together to make it happen. There’s a song by Nickelback that says “What’s worth the prize is always worth the fight” and I know that the prize of inclusion is definitely worth the fight.
Thank you.

Back to reality

I had an amazing time in Chicago with all the incredible people I met there. I told you about them...

But now, we have been back in SA for 2 weeks. It took us nearly a week to recover from our 30 hour travelling stint. I'm telling you, never do anything like that. It's a stupid idea. Especially for a disabled person - it just gets ridiculous.

I'm back at school. And it's as hectic as it ever was. Probably more. We are now a week away from our first matric exams. So, as you can imagine, everybody is pretty stressed out. The situation is pretty much like this:

We get more work, we complain about doing it, procrastinate doing it, then we sometimes end up NOT doing it (some of us do this as a form of protest, at least it links in with the history syllabus). We don't really have a lot of time to study for the exams...

I'll be the first to admit that my most used study method is CRAMMING! It seems to work for me most times...just because it has to. This year I'm trying to be a little more prepared for exams than I usually am, so I am cramming earlier and then going over it slowly, closer to exam days.

Today marks 9 days before we write our first paper.

Wish us luck.
:)

Monday, April 30, 2012

Chicago vibes...interesting times

I better tell you guys some of the awesome things that went along with the wheelchair drama. Otherwise, I wouldn't be a very good blogger.

We only had the Sunday before the start of the summit to do our own thing so we decided that we would go to the baseball - if you're in America, you have to do something American, right? The game was Chicago Cubs vs Cincinnati Reds.

I have never been so co cold in my life. We were totally underdressed for the occassion...my mom was wearing sandals. Bad idea. Our solution was to buy almost every warm piece of merchandise we could find at the ballpark. We got a hat, a jacket for me and a blanket for mom. We were pretty kitted out, I won't lie.

The atmosphere was awesome! The crowd, the people who walk up and down the stands selling things, shouting, the players, the music, everything made the experience that much more of an experience. The Cubs lost, but it didn't really matter to us - we were there to say we had been there.

I even got two of the players to sign my first-timer certificate. So cool!

Then the summit started and it was a whole other level of cool. I took a book with me to get all the cool people that were there could sign it and write a message that I could show my friends that I actually did meet them.

I'm going to do a little namedropping now...

Bill Clinton; Mikhail Gorbachev; Lech Walesa; FW De Klerk; Alfre Woodard; Laura Innes; Trevor Donovan; ANNIE LIEBOVITZ; SEAN PENN! I'm stopping now because I'm starting to freak out all over again.

I also got the opportunity to meet and socialise with the youth delegation of the summit. This was awesome because I was able to interact with like-minded people, which was really cool. I now have a network of awesome young people all over the world. We are already discussing our plans for world domination. It will be legendary!

This summit was the most incredible experience I've ever had. Meeting all these people, especially the young people was amazing and I would jump at the inkling of a chance of doing it again.

One Time.

:)

Sunday, April 29, 2012

Crazy Drama

Sorry about not keeping you as updated as I said that I would. Things have been crazy busy....

I was asked to attend the 12th World Summit of Nobel Peace Laureates' because I was being awarded the first Medal for Social Activism - how cool?

So we left last Friday for CHICAGO!! Again, how cool?

it did take us 30 hours to get there and 30 hours to get back - 2 hours to Johannesburg; 1 hour waiting in the plane; 12 hours to Istanbul; 6 hour layover in Istanbul; 10 hours to Chicago; and then all that in the opposite direction to get home (it's okay, you can say it, ARE YOU CRAZY??!!) I think we were a little bit. But it was totally worth it! Even though we were only in Chicago for four days.

There was clearly drama...

I mean, what would life be without drama. It keeps life a story worth telling.

My drama was wheelchair drama. It's becoming a trend that whenever we travel my wheelchair decides to do something stupid. I'm not sure I like it, but hey, what can you do?

The first thing that happened was in Istanbul. When we arrived, I had been awake for close to 28 hours ( I woke up at 5 on Friday morning to finish some school work to hand it in before I left for Chicago). So, I was a little tired...

We get off the plane and the PAU people put me into a regular 16 inch wheelchair. Not my own chair. This is the point where we should have known that there was a problem because nobody understood what we were saying from the time we set foot out of the plane. They told us that my wheelchair was waiting for me at the 'disabled resting place'. We figured everything was cool. How wrong can a person be?
On our way, we went through customs and they started to wipe down and check the wheelchair...This is when I started wondering. Why would they check the wheelchair if it belongs to the airport? They generally don't do that. When we got to where we were meant to be, there was no wheelchair in sight, mine anyway.

I got a little nervous at this point. We were sent to various people that were supposed to tell us where my chair was. The second information desk was my undoing. The man there asked my mom if the chair was for her...

That was the end of my being in control of my emotions. I started crying. Now, keep in mind that I actually just wanted to be sleeping as that was my 29th hour of being awake, and then you add the stress of not knowing where my wheelchair, my legs, was. It was just too much.

Nobody understood why I was in such a state. REALLY??

Eventually, we got to the Turkish Airlines Transit Desk, where they sort out all problem-passengers. We told them our whole story and the first thing they ask is where we're going. So we told them, Chicago. They informed us that the chair had a tag that said Copenhagen.

They had given me somebody else's wheelchair! What?

This all happened before 6:30 in the morning.

The Copenhagen chair was meant to be on a flight at 8. So we were fighting for somebody else as well as myself. Just imagine the state I was in. I was hysterical in tears and laughter. Interesting place to be emotionally, I have to say.

Then....this amazing man (pretty too) who spoke not one word of English, understood the situation. He told his people to tell us that he knew what was happening and he would find my chair and put it on our next flight. Could have kissed him!

We got another chair for the 6 hours. And the other chair went to Copenhagen. Let me tell you that things like this are the reason that I got the Medal for Social Activism. Not easy stuff. It's super stressful, but in the end it's so worth it.

When we got to Chicago and I saw my wheelchair I had a little party all by myself. Arriving at the hotel, my wheelchair battery had no power. We tried to charge it and it didn't work. So we thought that the chair was damaged. Turned out that it was the charger not working with the electrical current in the US. Crisis averted.

Coming back was less eventful. I got my wheelchair for the 6 hours in Istanbul. But we did nearly miss our next flight because the wheelchair people didn't come to fetch us.

As I said earlier, what's life without drama?

:)

Saturday, April 14, 2012

Almost time for the big people world

So, today I applied to UCT (University of Cape Town). It's a lot simpler than I thought it would be. I applied online...so much easier than doing the whole hand-written thing.

I applied for a Bachelor of Social Sciences majoring in Politics - don't you think it's going to suit me?

They ask you to give your second choice as well, which for me was difficult because I know what I want to study. I went with psychology. I think that would suit me too, but less.

Now all we have to do is wait and see. They say that is simple to do. I disagree. I am probably going to obsess over it until I get the all important letter saying that I made it into politics.

We'll just wait together.
:)

Wednesday, March 14, 2012

Life is crazy...still

This year my life is not really my own. It belongs to Reddam.

Matric workload has really taken its toll - it's like when people say "all I do is work". That saying is totally legit!

Term one is close to its end. I think in three weeks, I'm not sure - I haven't really had any time to look at calenders. But there is light at the end of the matric tunnel...

We are in the process of getting our marks back for the first term report. You know, some are good, some are bad. I choose to focus on the better marks.

I tell the 'rents "they'll balance each other out and come out on the better side of the scale".

People say that it doesn't get any easier. I'm not asking for easier, I'm just asking for a few rest days in between the ridiculously hectic ones. So, I'm also choosing to ignore those people.

As they say, ignorance is bliss.

:)

Saturday, February 11, 2012

I'm Matriccing

This is my last year at school. Oh yes!

We all wait forever for this to happen. People are telling me that I must savour each moment of this year...right.

Right now, I'm just trying to adjust and survive the workload. Matric is no joke. Especially Matric history. Oh my goodness, it really does just get heavier as you go up in the grades. Seriously, no joke.

I have also started doing AP English as an extra subject - so I do eight now. I don't know how smart that is with the afore mentioned epic workload, but I like the stuff we do in the subject, so time will be found somewhere to fit it in.

Hopefully things will become a little more chilled sometime soon. If it does, you'll be the first to know.

:)