Back and loving it!

On December 23rd I bid farewell to a snowy and frigid Toronto, and made my way back to South Africa, arriving on Christmas day -- just in time for a big party at my Serbian family's place. After spending a few days with them I was soon on the move again, this time to meet a group of friends (some whom I had not seen in quite a while) down in the Cape area. It was an amazing holiday. My second New Year's party on a beach (the first had been about 3 years ago in Thailand) and really, that is the best way to do it as far as I am concerned.

I finally got to see the Garden Route as well, and it definitely did not disappoint! I could totally see myself living in the Knysna area -- gorgeous large beaches, warm sea, majestic forests, amazing food and a high population of hippies and artists. My kinda place. Minus one incident of near death via oyster, I was generally just stunned by the beauty of it all.

Returning to Joburg I contacted my new employer and we made arrangements for a pick-up. I was on the move again, but this time to the place where I knew I would spend the next year. It is amazing how much I have started to measure my life on a yearly basis. I have had so much change in the past few years that a year seems like a crazy long time to me!

I am happy to report that I absolutely love my job by the way. I will write more about it soon. I have been in Rustenburg for a week now, and I am enjoying it a fair bit. Despite warnings that it would be highly conservative and small, I have found friendly and interesting people and feel quite happy. My commune is in a nice area of town (yay for jogging myself back into shape again!) and we even have a pool. Of course, having a car again helps -- because either Pretoria or Joburg will be seeing me at least twice a month when I need an injection of culture, wildness, and just the comfort of familiar faces!

The Story Continues......Watch This Space

Great news! It is now confirmed....I am heading back to South Africa on Dec. 23rd and will be working in a research position for a community development foundation with a really innovative approach! I cannot wait to go back!! I hope my poor student loan will somehow, someway get paid off as I am choosing to follow my heart rather than the bankbook but I feel it will all work out. I heard a great quote the other day: the best service that anyone can do for mankind is to find something that they are truly passionate about and pursue it. I think that's gonna be my MO for the next little while.

So it's Christmas with the new found family in Jozi, and NYE with some old and new friends in Cape Town and in the meantime, amazing times in Toronto with some of the best people ever (whom I wish I could kidnap and take with me). Could life get any better?? Well...I could win the lottery....but hey, let's not push it!

Keep the braai warm, South Africa

So the time is nigh. Today is my last day in Groblersdal, and my last week in South Africa – well, at least this time around! What an amazing, crazy, stressful and rewarding few months it has been though. I’ve met so many wonderful people and seen all sides of the country – from rich to poor, city to nature reserve, bush to coast, and everything in between. It feels like I’ve been here forever, except that forever is not long enough!

Next week I have a series of meetings with various people from international NGOs and UN agencies. I am hoping that someone somewhere will have a connection to a permanent position in this field. There are so many exciting things going on here in the field of economic development that I feel like this is the place to be right now. Because of the crisis though, many are not hiring non-South African citizens and so that is a large hindrance. Whatever happens though, I know that soon I will be back – whether it’s in a few weeks or a few months though, only time will tell.

On my final morning run today I was thinking about all the things I am going to miss – the children running alongside me on the jogs, the beautiful sunsets, the animals, the climate, and most of all the multitudes of amazing people that I have met while here. I will even miss the taxis and their crazy, death defying driving on narrow dirt roads with gospel music blasting in my ear.

It was also a happy coincidence that on my last weekend in Groblersdal the son of the family that I am staying with got married, and there was a huge traditional African wedding at the house. That was one hell of a party let me tell you. I had to fight off all kinds of chauvinistic men (including the Pastor in church pointing to me and asking “Is it also not true in your culture, that a man is master of the house?”. It was only my respect for the family I am staying with that kept me from telling him exactly what I think of that comment so I just fixed him with a sarcastic look instead and kept my mouth shut. There were quite a few drunken old men that got to hear exactly what I couldn’t say to the Pastor later on that night though, so I guess the universe balances in its own way). Ruth’s friends were great though, and once I finished serving food and making sure the guests were taken care of, I joined their little group, where the guys were thankfully normal, polite and quite fun! The highlight of the night for me was a beer run to the local shebeen which also serves as a brothel! Now THAT was an experience. I really wish I could have taken pictures of that place but it wasn’t the kind of place you want to flash anything of value around, especially when you’re already half in the bag. In any case, the whole affair was a wonderful, rich, cultural experience in national geographic terms – and one crazy ass romp in my terms.

This week I had to finish the odds and ends at work while also sending out multitudes of CVs and setting up meetings for next week. I have networked my ass off. Sometimes I have no idea how I got from geeky, reserved science kid to the person that I am today. I know it surprises my family, but it often surprises me even more. Especially on those days when I wake up and temporarily forget where I am and what I have done, only to have it all come back in a flash and slap me awake to say “right, get up, this is your life!”. I sort of find that I love everything that I have seen and done in my (almost!) 29 years. The memories alone could likely sustain me through a Siberian prison sentence, although I do hope never to test that. Instead, I hope to keep doing more of THIS. Travelling, learning, experiencing, meeting more amazing people, helping more amazing people and loving the world and life, despite all its unpredictability and the wide multitudes of things to worry about or dislike, because I know there are many more things on the other side of those that tip the scales into the realm of endless, beautiful, possibilities. So on that note, South Africa, I shall see you again soon. Keep the braai warm, and the beer cold.

As for the rest of the world – get ready, because there is a lot of you I haven’t see yet, and that is something that simply will not stand.

Hungry, Hungry Hippos

What a wonderful, relaxing, nature reserve weekend I just had. Just thinking about it makes me feel like someone slipped me a mild tranquilizer, or if am being less cynical, like I just got a really, really big hug from a magical creature of some sort.

Seeing as my time at Groblersdal is coming to an end and I had not managed to visit the nearby Loskop Dam Nature Reserve, I managed to convince Fleur and Phil to come up for the weekend so we could rent a cottage and look for hippos and crocs while relaxing next to a firey braai. We found a wonderful place (which by my Geneva skewed standards I find amazingly cheap) that had us mere meters from a river and surrounded by bush. The sound of birds and other animals was everywhere – which during the day and evening was magical, but early in the morning it made me realize for the first time why people enjoy hunting.

The weekend went by luxuriously slowly, and most of the activities revolved around eating, drinking, walking a few meters around our cottage, flopping ourselves into the pool to cool down, and lots and lots of nature in all its glorious, African glory. Followed by more eating.

Our nearby company was mainly Afrikaaner families so I think this made us reluctant to go out and make new friends – looking as we did, like pale, decadent city folk. A brief, brave sojourn into the lodge’s bar resulted in fancy looking cocktails and awesome views, but also meant a steady supply of Afrikaans country music, which made us quickly retreat back to the safety of our cottage.

We did manage to rent a boat at one point (well, more like homemade floating metal platform but it did the trick) and go on a “booze cruise” at around sunset. I was keeping my eyes peeled for all exotic and dangerous animals but the most I got was some surly looking birds, with rather cool nests overhanging the water. That night, I got one of the best views of the stars that I have ever seen though. The night was so clear that you could see not only stars but nebulae! I had never seen the Milky Way in such stark relief. It put me into that good kind of philosophical mood where you feel thoughtful and reflective but not so much so that you friends try to avoid talking to you. Unless Fleur and Phil were just too tired to run away from the conversation at that point. Even though I hate having stereotypical conversations, I think under that kind of a night sky, it is acceptable to have the same sort of conversation that billions of others have had under similar circumstance: about feeling both small and insignificant and yet somehow so connected to everything in the face of the vastness of the universe. Ok, so I may have been in the more annoying category of conversationalist after all. What can I say? Take me as I am.

The next day we headed to the dam itself, hoping to see more animals on the actual nature reserve. We saw warthogs in addition to the usual suspects (giraffes, impala, kudu) but 4 hours of driving yielded naught a hippo nor a rhino, except for one questionable blob seen from a great distance which had vaguely hippo-esque features. Of course, it could also have been a low bush. Or a rock. I think I might go with the hippo story however, if I ever find myself telling this to my grandchildren. Apart from the lack of large dangerous wildlife however, it really was a perfect day. The area at Loskop dam is mountainous and surrounded by water. The vistas were stunning (I know I say that a lot, but come to Africa and you will understand) – and this formed a perfect backdrop to eating mussels from a can (which
I don’t say a lot, but you gotta keep things interesting.

When Fleur and Phil dropped me off on Sunday night I was at complete peace, despite all the reasons I have for being a nervous wreck. I am determined as hell to enjoy the time that I have left here. I know I will be back, but who knows if it will be in this area and how much free time I will have to enjoy the gorgeous views next time around. I love it here, and as a friend pointed out to me ironically this morning, I seem to love it for the same reasons I fall in love with people – South Africa is complicated and filled with both amazing beauty and troubled darkness, and though it has never, and will never ask me for help, I desperately want to save it from itself. Of course, given the way my love life has been, perhaps I really should trust that everyone and everything is responsible for saving themselves, and just enjoy the crazy, unpredictable, and surprisingly wonderful experience that is my life for what it is -- an adventure!

There is no I in TEAM...but there should be one in NERD.

I realized today that doing an MBA has in fact made me into a slightly annoying form of nerd. This realization came from two recent observations: I now get ridiculously excited for debates on international economics (I was just flipping channels this weekend when I saw the World Bank President, Robert Zoellick together with Paul Collier, the UK writer and head of the Center for Studies of African Economies, participate in a debate on the financial crisis and what policies need to be undertaken internationally to help the world move forward, and I almost wet myself with excitement – but this could also be a result of my limited net access). The second observation came from a friend: it seems I now have an overfondness for acronyms – which I apparently use without explanation, expecting that everyone will understand what I am talking about. Right. Thank you for that, MBA. I am gonna have to work twice as hard now to keep friends.

In any case, it is Saturday and I am sitting now in post-financial-crisis-debate glow and enjoying the African sun. Just three weeks to go before the end of my internship and there is still so much to do! I have been so into what I am doing that I haven’t been able to devote as much time to job applications as I would have liked, though I have in fact networked my ass off. I have been looking for microfinance and small business development posts in international NGOs and IOs (Kara, that’s Non-Government Organizations, and International Organizations, i.e. the UN) and focusing on posts in South Africa. It seems that jobs are scarce though. I have also been debating with myself on whether to consider applying to a major consulting firm and finally decided to look into it more seriously. After some research I found that I actually really like the McKinsey model. They are of course one of the biggest consulting firms in the world but I like the fact that they encourage you to move around and allow you to apply to work anywhere in the world, regardless of work permits and so forth. A little more research revealed that two of their offices in fact have a high focus on social sector consulting: Geneva and Johannesburg! That sold me. I am hoping I can visit the Jo’burg office before I head back to Canada but I will definitely apply. The process is a long one, and they are very picky but I think I have a lot of the things they are looking for. Now I just have to convince them of that. It would be nice to work as part of a team again, as I find I am starting to miss the intensity of IOMBA. Wow, I never thought I would say that, but there ya go.

I am still completely unsure what will happen next month! This is probably the longest I have gone without knowing what the future will bring. As the cash starts to run out, I am getting a little more stressed. I have always known that I can get some sort of job if push comes to shove, at least in Canada. However, I really don’t want to just do any job anymore. I am now far pickier than I have ever been but I also believe in what I am doing much more than I ever have. Surely that counts for something? I feel like I am on the right path, despite the stress and uncertainty. I am sure that one way or another it will work out! And if it doesn’t, well, I am not too proud to bartend for a few months while I continue the search.

All this thinking made me want to stop writing and do something more social. I think I will go inside and join the company that’s visiting. I should point out that watching sesame street in SA is a bit of trip. Tumi and her parents are over so they are watching kiddie programming. On sesame street they keep switching languages without subtitles! Pretty cool. Tumi can keep up no problem, but as for me I am mostly lost, though I did just learn to count in Afrikaans. Cool.

Oh, and this coming weekend I am going to Loskop Dam for a water safari! So that's something to look forward to. Apparently I can expect to see hippos and crocodiles among other things. The chalet we rented is right on the river as well, and it looks like it's going to be another amazing weekend in South Africa. *Sigh*

As for my Canadian friends, I will see you in 4 weeks! I don’t know yet for how long, but be sure there will be a party or two! Korean karaoke anyone??

Of reunions and coincidences.

Sometimes, life can really surprise you with its coincidences. When I first told my parents that I was going to South Africa on an unpaid internship, my mother told me (after some incoherent screaming on the dangers of Africa and the size of my loan, which then dissolved into pleading to the heavens to tell her why it was SHE that had to have such a difficult child) that we in fact had some family in the area. She had no contact with them but advised that my aunt had gotten in touch as she had been trying to piece together the family tree.

The story is this. My maternal grandmother (who was a tough, intimidating and passionate woman – and therefore easily my favourite grandparent) was Serbian, as was my maternal grandfather. She had several siblings, most of whom stayed in Serbia while my grandparents moved to Croatia probably around 50 years ago. My mother and my aunt were therefore raised in Croatia, though they went back to Serbia often as kids. When I was young I went to Belgrade with my grandparents a lot as well, and met a lot of the Serbian side of the family (my father and his side are Croatian). However, because there had been some big falling out amongst the Simic (my grandmother’s maiden name) siblings, my mother rarely got to see her cousins. In fact, the last time she saw Bosko (the name of her first cousin who is now in his 50s and lives in Johannesburg) she was my age!

When the war hit, the Serbian and Croatian sides lost pretty much all contact. Many of both sides of the family moved abroad to Canada, the US, Australia, and as I now came to find out, to South Africa. In any case, I spoke with my aunt and asked her about this part of our family. She said they seemed eager to get in touch and so I figured why not? After all, they were the relations of my favourite grandparent!
In emailing Bosko I found out that he and his wife Melita have two kids, Ivana (21) and Nikola (20) and that they were quite eager to meet me. We arranged to meet up on the long weekend so that I could spend some time with them at their place in Johannesburg, as well as go on a safari or two.

Last Thursday I waited in anticipation as Bosko made his way up to Groblersdal to pick me up. Quite nice of him actually, since it’s a 2 hour drive! I had had a crazy week, because we had a big deadline at the MFI that day and so the past two weeks had been spent working from 8am to 8pm each day. As I watched Bosko pull up to the office and step out of the car, I found my excitement overtaking my tiredness however. Bosko is a tall man with a calm and friendly air. I searched for some evidence of my grandmother in his features, but I knew I was pushing it. He for his part said that I look exactly like my mother, which I get a lot.

Climbing into the car, I was a bit on edge. Who knew what my family would be like? With our people it’s always a bit of a wildcard, and you don’t know if you will get amazing or a little nuts. I was reassured by the two hour drive however. Bosko is an airplane engineer, and his wife a interior designer. He told me they were into healthy living and grew their own aloe and other health foods. We talked about our histories and our families and how we had gotten to where we were now. It was not a boring car ride!

Arriving in Johannesburg, I met Bosko’s wife and their children and was immediately surrounded by hospitality, thereby dissipating the rest of my worry. I found out they like spicy food as well as enjoy their liquor, like any good Serbo-Croat should, and from there on it was truly like family. Even though I could not see the physical resemblances per se, I could definitely sense a similarity in attitudes and beliefs. It felt like home, and it was great!

The rest of the weekend was a flurry of activity. From an accidental visit to a Chippendale party with Melita (it really was an accident! We were trying to go watch a movie when two women just came up to us at the theatre and gave us free tickets to a movie premiere—we didn’t realize there was a pre-show, but hey, bonus!), to a hike in a nearby game resort (where we saw giraffes, zebras, kudu, iland, etc.). There was of course a lot of eating and a lot of catching up as well. It was nice to see the SA braai tradition merged with the Serbian grill traditions to delicious result. Did I mention SA is making me fat?

Melita and Bosko were also nice enough to introduce me to the sons of some friends of theirs (it’s kind of a funny thing that our people do, and akin to setting up play dates for adults) but the two guys turned out to be really fun. They showed me some of the more mainstream Jo’burg party spots. My only regret of the night was the fact that I didn’t bring nicer shoes and had to sneak around in flip-flops. A few Jager-bombs later though I was not as bothered. We partied till the wee hours and by the end of the night I had to try really hard not to keep losing my hat, as the men at the club we were at seemed to think that stealing a girl’s hat was a good way to get her attention. It felt a tad like grade school really. I was half-expecting one of these boys to shout “girls smell!” and then run away. Still, the guys I was with were great and it was a good night overall.

The next day we headed to the bird park in Monte Casino, which is this big entertainment complex in Fourways, the suburb of Johannesburg in which Bosko and family live. The birds were beautiful, but a little cheeky, and I have to admit their constant aggressive approaches towards us left me a little skittish. Especially since I was wearing my going out shirt and didn’t want it to get pooped on by a random bird, regardless of the beauty of said bird. We were also supposed to do the balloon ride but ran out of time. I will put it on my list of things to do next time I am there!

Of course it wouldn’t be a weekend in Jozi without a visit to Fleur. When I told her I was in town again, she told me that her and Phil were heading to a party and invited me along. She didn’t tell me it was a costume party and by the time I met up with her it was too late to put on an “army theme” so I just zipped up my black hoodie and tried to act tough. I was not in a really frat party mood though (and that was sort of the atmosphere of the place we went to) but luckily neither were Fleur or Phil so after a few quick drinks we snuck out and went to get a few more on a street called 7th avenue, in Melville. It was much more my style than most of the areas I had been out to so far in Jozi, because you could hop from one bar to the next without having to get into your car for a change. It reminded me a bit of Long Street in Cape Town (or for Torontonians, think Queen West but a little rougher around the edges).

Clearly, it wasn’t going to be a long night though, and at some point at the mention of new episodes of “Weeds” we made a hasty retreat back to Phil’s place to watch the new season, ice cream in hand. A little bit of heaven as far as I am concerned.
Getting back to Bosko’s place the next morning I found breakfast already in the works. As we spent our last few hours together before Nikola and Ivana drove me back to Groblersdal, I felt like I had known them for ages. We also found out through Facebook that one of my brother’s good friends was one of Melita’s closest relatives and was like a son to her when growing up! It was completely random but thus the weekend ended, as it had begun, with a coincidence. It kind of reminds me of a book I read a long time ago, which talked about how there were no coincidences, and that if they happened it meant just that you were on the right path. I know it sounds a little new-agey, but it somehow makes sense.

Despite the fact that I have no idea what will happen with my job or future, I hope I can see them all again soon, and maybe we can have a big reunion at some point as well. It just reminded me what an interesting, wonderful world it is and even if I cannot stay in SA right now, I have a strange feeling that I will be back at some point soon!

TIA: This Is Africa.

Just as I was getting comfortable here, and starting to let my guard down, I was suddenly reminded that I am in fact in a developing country with a high crime rate and if I want to stay safe, I am going to have to be a little more careful. This realization came to me last Friday as I stood in front of an abandoned rent-a-car office in a small town that I had travelled two hours by taxi (minibus) to get to and incidentally in the hottest, slowest taxi ever. As I made angry and desperate calls to try to remedy my situation, it was starting to get late and as far as I knew there was no other rental car in the small rural town in which I found myself. I was now quite far away from Jo’burg (where I was heading) and couldn’t go back to Groblersdal as the family I am staying with had also left for the weekend and I didn’t have the keys. Despite my ease with travelling alone and in places others consider dangerous I generally take reasonable precautions. I hadn’t really done that this time and South Africa is not the kind of place you want to wander around alone, on foot and in the dark with no place to go.

At first I was livid. I looked down at my printed voucher – the location was confirmed and I had even had a map. I had called the office earlier but the number had been busy. When I called head office they had confirmed the address and the phone number. It took several more angry calls from a street corner of Middleburg (the town that I was now in for the first time) to get someone at the travel place to finally admit that they had made a mistake. Luckily I found a garage nearby where the man was very nice and helpful as he listened to my situation. He said that there was a rental place in a town about 30 minutes away and he called them to see if they had cars. By some small miracle they did and I arranged with the booking place to cover the drop off fees for the car. Finally, about 4 hours after I was supposed to have been on my way, I got into the car with much relief (if I hadn’t been able to get the car, I honestly don’t know what I would have done. A bit of fool’s luck as it were). It was a good reminder to me, and next time I am going to be a lot more careful.

I now had a second challenge to face however. I had been in Johannesburg twice before, but each time in only very specific areas and I had never driven around the city at night (well I had been “driven” around in a semi-coherent state but I could hardly recall the streets I saw in my post-party blur). I had a few printed Google maps but it is a huge city and also one of the most dangerous in the world at night (Mom, if you’re reading: it’s not that bad. Really.). I had expected to come into the city early in the afternoon so that I could drive around at leisure and afford myself the luxury of getting lost. But now it was pitch dark and I was a woman, travelling alone. Thankfully for me, I don’t panic easily in such situations – I have seen enough in my life that for the most part it is incredibly hard to scare me (though large spiders seem to be one of the few things that still do the trick, but more on that later).

Also thankfully, I am good with maps and have a fairly decent sense of direction. With the exception of one major wrong turn which almost took me into the most dangerous part of town, I arrived reasonably close to where I needed to be and Fleur came to meet me at a gas station so we could go to her friend’s place nearby. I was pretty proud of myself, when all was said and done.

In any case, I was in town for Fleur’s birthday and so that night the festivities started with the usual pre-party followed by going to some random club that seemed to be playing all the hits from my high school days. Red bull became my best friend, as did some weird Turkish guy, his brother and his possibly mail-order bride girlfriend, when Fleur and company temporarily disappeared elsewhere. Or perhaps I had abandoned them at some point? Not really clear on the chronological sequence of events. The night is mostly a blur but it was a nice change from my little town life. The next morning I couldn’t sleep much, and it seemed that no one else could either so we decided to start the day off with some mimosas and rugby. A winning combination.

Most of the day was spent in the Jo’burg botanical gardens with Fleur’s friends making the rounds to wish her all the best. All together it was an interesting mix of people but I was starting to feel rather rough from the night before and spent most of the time chillin in the sun (aka, trying not to throw up). Luckily by late afternoon I was starting to bounce back. Right in time for a pool-side braaii, more red bull, and some absinthe (which will forever remind me of one Ms. Lori Stuckless: a good friend who, despite being famous for wearing country-club type debutant outfits as a matter of course, can and will get down and throw her posh body over a pile of suitcases at a dodgy British airport because she thinks shadows are after her underwear. That also is a story for another day.). There was however, no jumping into a pool this time. It’s now too warm to make it a crazy thing to do and so has temporarily lost its appeal to me as a party trick. In any case, I knew the next day would have lots of swimming in store.

On the Sunday I got to hang out with Fleur and family and eat the best meal I have had in a while. Of course, after stuffing yourself silly there is nothing like stripping into a bikini and jumping into the chilly pool to remind you why you wake up at 6 am to go jogging just to keep the lovehandles at bay. I have to stop eating the damn starch in this country! I miss my vegetarianism but damnit, the animals in South Africa just taste too good. Also to my fellow Croatians, you’ll be happy to know that there is yet another country that still revels in the goodness of MSG. It seems to be a key ingredient in half the sauces and seasonings here. Heading towards a slow painful death may just be worth the tasty ride though. Ah, MSG.
In any case, there is still no news in the job department though I am constantly pursuing opportunities and networking my ass off. IOMBA would be proud. I am also trying to accept the fact that there are some things I cannot control and I will have to deal with whatever happens in the end. At least I will have the comfort of knowing that I tried my damnedest to escape once again the icy clutches of Canadian winter. Seriously. I actually started to look for posts in Afghanistan to try to avoid the eventuality. In the end I know I will make the best of whatever happens though. Which is amazing. It means I’ve actually started to become an adult in there somewhere.

Incidentally, it is now full blown summer here in Groblersdal. For some reason it seems to be the hottest place around, and driving 20km in any direction means a drop in temperature of about 10 degrees. It’s not a bad thing but it makes me miss the sea. Walking through sand and palm trees in 30 degrees seems odd when there is no swimming at the end of it. It also means that the bugs have started to come out. Sadly I have already encountered two quite large spiders. Not as big as what I saw in Japan but still, enough to scare the crap out of me. I hate spiders. Luckily the family I live with doesn’t share my fear and the spiders were quickly dispatched via shoe bludgeoning as I stood by blubbering. They didn’t understand why I was scared, since as Ruth pointed out, “they are not poisonous ones”. Arachnophobia really is an inconvenience when one loves to travel to warm countries like I do.

As a non-sequitur I have now also seen most of north-eastern South Africa. For work I had to drive across Gauteng, Mpumalanga and Limpopo provinces extensively and went as far up as the Zimbabwe border. It just confirmed what a beautiful country this is as I drove through endless African vistas, with various animals running alongside the car at times. Sometimes I feel I am in one of those nature shows living here. Nature gets me a little too excited at times. In trying to guess what all the animals are I at one point spotted something smallish, orange and cat-like to a friend who was with me, and asked her excitedly if it was possibly a baby tiger or something. She looked at me flatly as she responded “Lana. It’s a cat. A regular cat.”. I have to remind myself to keep my childish excitement at seeing animals in check lest I start looking like a complete tool.