And It's March

Happenings of the past couple weeks:

Last Monday, my friend Matt was hit by a car on the way to school!  He was walking to the Jammie stop (the shuttle bus up to campus) and apparently he looked the wrong way.  He shattered his tibia, broke his ankle, and chipped a few teeth.  He was actually in ICU for a couple of days after getting a tissue clot in this throat, but he has been stable for about a week now.  Both of his parents have flown in from Virginia and are staying the week with him in the hospital- we're expecting him back tonight and we're having a springbok party in his honor. (Springbok are antelope like animals that he's obsessed with - both living and on his dinner plate - so there's talk of dressing up like them  We'll see how that one goes.)

Classes continue to be good and I'm actually doing a fair amount of work.  My Natural Resource Economics professor is scary as hell - she will actually tell people to "stop wasting her time" when they ask silly questions or can't answer hers.  The material itself is very cool though and it's the first class I've taken where I've actually been able to use econ (or ecos as they call it here) theory for anything - cool stuff.

I'm still running with Athletics and I'm actually racing for UCT tonight in a 10k.  I'm psyched despite the 90 or so degree weather!  I've been getting some beautiful and hilly runs in here, although I've been experiencing more leg pain than I'm used to.  I talked to the coach to make sure that I didn't have stress fractures, and he basically told me that I probably wasn't in very good shape (weak calves was the way he put it, to be exact.)

In other news, Mustache March has officially begun, meaning my friends Bart and Evan are going to be very unattractive very soon.  As of day 5 nothing too alarming has happened yet on the facial hair front, but check back in a couple weeks.

This weekend, I'm renting a couple cars with 7 friends and we're going to Namibia!  I'm a little worried about the amount of driving we'll be doing (about 6 hours a day) but the scenery should be great and there's talk of sandboarding!

Good times to check Skype: weekdays from 9:00 - 10:00am or 3:00-5:00(E.T.), weekends from around 11:00am to 1:00pm.  My username is carolineott and I'm under the South Africa network (of course).  Also I'm now using my gmail (carolineott@gmail.com) primarily, although my Columbia mail should be forwarded.