Oh say can you see...

Happy 4^th of July everyone!!! I’m happy to report that everyone survived our party, but will go ahead and make the claim that it was the most epic party in the history of South Africa (at least the most epic 4^th of July party). I think I will take this time to describe our party in chronological order.

6:45pm: We got the KFC and pizza. What kind of party celebrating America’s independence can you have without greasy KFC? The answer is, a really crappy one. We, on the other hand, did not have a crappy party, but an effing epic one. It should be noted that, even though Michael ordered three buckets on Thursday night, our order was not ready when we got to the KFC. Luckily for us, but no so much for the customers behind us, KFC had exactly 63 pieces of chicken made up (that’s 21 pieces per bucket, in case you were wondering the significance of the 63). After we cleaned out KFC for the second time since we’ve been there (that’s another story for another time), we went back and the party began in full.

I think people started showing up around 7pm or so, and around 7:30pm the rooms were packed. We had a wide assortment of party guests: Notre Dame abroad students, Univ. of Florida law students, townies, and even a few coworkers. All in all, we had enough people to get through two kegs and all the food.

The party went on from around 7pm until midnight, at which point many of us made our way down to the roof (down to the roof? Yes, down to the roof.) to shoot off fireworks. After about twenty minutes, we heard sirens. Despite the fact that we live in a large city with a lot of crime, we just knew the cops were coming after us, so we booked it back inside and back up to our floor.

This is when things fell apart. One of the other denizens of the apartments (an 8^th floor resident who was quite drunk himself) was on our floor yelling and calling the cops. At this point, the party ended and everyone went home with no real fuss.

This morning, we all woke up and, not feeling as liberated as our ancestors must have on the 4^th of July, we pulled ourselves together and made our way to the beach at Camp’s Bay. After lying out and getting some sun, we all returned back to the hotel for a relaxing night in. As today is July 4^th, we are watching Independence Day. Enjoy the fireworks my friends!!!