Two New Roommates and a Potjie

On Friday afternoon, when I came home from work, I heard some voices and movement upstairs.  I assumed it was my housemate, Freida, and her friend who had been on holiday and that they had decided to come  back early.  Well, I was very wrong, instead of my housemate and her best friend, I was greeted by two young guys from Finland.  Earlier in the week, Freida, had gone into the International Office and asked if we were getting anymore housematess.  The response was no, it will only be the the three of us in the house until maybe September.  Obviously, they were mistaken (or one side did not know about the other, as is the case at Universities), so you can imagine my surprise to see two guys walking out of the rooms across the hall from me!  Pekka and Andre, the new housmates, are here for three months studying Environmental Management.  Both really nice guys who are just very interested in learning about Potchefstroom and South Africa as well as having a real college experience. Where they attend school, there is no campus or organized social life (which, is what NWU prides themselves on to make sure that their students are engaged and part of the university--retention).  They both appear to be really nice and easy to get along with and I was shocked and happy to hear that they were complaining about the cold (more than me) and they are used to way worse weather than me!

On Saturday night,  Noelia and I went to a potjie at Sari's house.  A potjie is directly translated as "pot food" or food that is prepared in a pot (http://funkymunky.co.za/potjiekos.html).   You place it over a wood fire and slow cook the ingredients inside (see pics).  Just like the braai, a potjie is an event and takes a couple hours so you settle in front of the fire, enjoy some wine, and wait for your food to cook.  There are several different size pot's that can be used, but because there was just four of us last night Sari used the pot 3 that serves 6-8 people (but there is one that serves up to 20.Sari began by placing the chicken in the pot first because it would take the longest to cook.  After, about an hour she added the potatoes, and an hour later she added the vegetables (one of which is a flower that you can eat called, see picture).  The slow cooking process took about four hours ( we got there at 5:15) so we snacked on nuts and chips, talked, and drank until the food was ready.  I will admit waiting that long for your food makes you even more excited to eat (as well as hungrier and colder) so I was thrilled when it was ready.  The food was delicious and sitting by the fire eating, created a camping atmosphere (which is good enough for me).  We returned home around 11, with tons of leftovers and some boerewurst (kudu meat in a sausage style) that Sari told us we had to try.  

Sunday, we were supposed to have the power turned off  from 6 am to 6 pm (the entire town got a notice that said that they had to turn the power off because they needed to fix something), so I was worried about not getting work done, being freezing, and eating.  However, most of the restaurants (as well as the mall) have generators so eating would not have been an issue.  But much to our surprise, we woke up to find that we had power and we didn't lose it throughout the entire day!  From what I understand, the grid the house is on (not the campus) always has to have power (as most of you know this is a first because I never had the luxury during hurricanes . . . I always lost power) so I was very appreciative of where we live. Yet, I did take advantage and met my friend Shan for lunch at a local restaurant called Beef Boys, whose speciality is meat (shocker) and since it is cheaper to go out to eat then to buy food and make it yourself, I thought I might enjoy.  The food was good and as for my weekend, no complaints!