The word “whirlwind” comes to mind when I think of this weekend’s events.
Family reunions, life-endangering bus rides, birthdays and special requests make up the bulk of what turned out to be a three-day birthday experience for Pearl and her friends.
From Thursday afternoon to Saturday night a bunch of us (Pearl’s mom and her old friend, Frank included) went absolutely crazy celebrating Ms Pillay’s 20th.
Twenty is quite a daunting number- I’ll admit it- but I think we rang the new year in with style.
First, there was the now-annual Amphitheatre Photoshoot.
Jumping (and bailing), negotiating with the weather, posing (and more posing) and just general madness ensued when the Samsung ES10 came out…
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| Spot the potential bikini model. Lol. |
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| The weather wasn’t playing along, so Thandi and Pearl tried some Ninja/Tai Chi tricks on it |
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| This looks like one of “those” ads, for, like, vitamins or insurance or something. |
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| Laughing hard after I landed flat on my bum. Jump fail. |
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| Pearl has an afro, and I look like I’m leaping to get away from a dog that’s chasing me. We finally got it right. |
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| Shem. So sweet! 😉 |
Then we all squeezed into Frank’s car to go to dinner at Nando’s.
A whole lot of extra basting sauce, some current affairs talk, a bit of “where do you see yourself in…” banter and a (really sweet, but also kind of cheesy) birthday song later, and we’d gone totally into Birthday Mode.
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| Mother and daughter smile for the camera at dinner. |
We had planned on going to a party after dinner, but the weather failed so we stayed in instead.
People did go, though: a little (gale force, icy cold) wind never stopped a Witsie party animal from going out in shorts for a foam party before! 😉
Saturday night, was dinner at Koi. The fact that it was so upmarket that Pearl had to make a booking there before we could show up, showed that we were all gradually moving out of the pizza-and-speckled-eggs-for-supper phase of our lives.
While I was excited to dress up a bit for once, I was apprehensive about the pricing of the food at this “contemporary Asian cuisine” place.
I was right-for the price of a bowl of noodles and a drink at this place, I could get a bucket meal from KFC, with a drink, and be sorted for the whole week.
I must admit, though, that while I wasn’t completely in love with the Passion Iced Tea I ended up ordering (coconut is an ingredient for Tennis Biscuits, not for anything else, I don’t care how “refreshing” the chef thinks it’s supposed to be), and I found myself wondering “what am I doing?” each time I crunched on some peppers (which I usually do my best to avoid), Koi has a cool vibe.
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| Thandi and Chiara being fancy with their “cranberry coolers” |
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| Pearl trying to figure out the whole “coconut tea” thing |
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| Sushi Vogue |
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| Wonder if Oliver is laughing at a chopstick joke that Dotto made…? 😉 |
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| The ice-cream Pearl hustled from the waiter… |
The weather was absolutely foul, howling winds and pouring rain, but I was having too much fun to really be bothered.
One day, when I’m rich (and famous, of course!) I’ll eat in places like this, sans coconut juice, as often as I can.
Nkhensani Manabe 