Dorm Livin'

The first week of being here I lived in two UCT dorms, one with all the other students on my program, so 130 Americans, and one with mainly South African students. I was living in a single for both, and both rooms were nicer than my dorm rooms back at Villanova. Housing here is based on grades, so the better your grades are, the closer you are to campus. .  I spoke with a black UCT student, who said that most students live on campus when they are freshman and sophomores and then a few students live there when they’re upper classmen. The on-campus dorms then are given to the incoming freshman who had the most impressive high school performances and for the most part these are white students. There’s no such thing as a clean slate when you start college here.  The on-campus dorms are old, ivy covered buildings that look straight out of a British novel, and look out over the city of Cape Town. Every morning when students open their shades, they can see the sun rising over the city.

An on-campus dorm.

View of the sun rising from an on-campus dorm

Where I lived, however, was far from campus, and in talking to some of the students who lived there, I realized that many there had failed classes. Interestingly, during my stay there, I didn’t see a single white person besides the other study abroad students with my program. 

The courtyard of the dorm where I lived at dusk.

The dorm was huge, housing probably 700 students, yet most if not all of the students there were black. This is unusual because the demographic of UCT is 50% white students. 

  

My room in the dorm. 

This was my dorm room. It was the biggest room in the four bedroom flat, and was about three times the size of the dorm room I shared in Sheehan Hall at Villanova. 

Another view of my room. 

The apartments in the dorm were composed of 4 bedrooms, all singles, a small kitchen lacking a kitchen table, and two bathrooms: one with a bathtub and no shower, and one with just a shower. One of the bathrooms in mine had no electricity, and the shower was clogged. Apparently complaints to maintenance take a long time to fix because the apartment complex is so large. However, the bedrooms are beautiful, and there are hardwood floors,and its only a 15 minute bus ride away from campus. It was a great place to live, but i was just surprised at the lack of white or colored students there. Also, housing is a great incentive to study hard and do well in school. 

Balcony connected to my bedroom!

View from my balcony!

Overall, I was happy with my living situation, but I didn’t feel at home in that big empty room. It was a little lonely and I was overwhelmed by the idea of living on my own for the first time in a big city and a foreign country. So many changes were happening at once. So, I spoke to the home stay coordinator who placed me with a home stay family, and I am so incredibly happy with my choice. I haven’t looked back. Its a much more immersive experience, my family is so welcoming and friendly, and I immediately felt at home. More on the home stay later!