report writing and visit to Kalk Bay

Today I have been working very hard on the report of the PANUSP conference again. The report of Day 2 is almost finished now, and Day 3 isn’t a lot of work, so I hope to finish it all tomorrow. (and then I still have to review the WHO tool too, but I may ask to give me more time). I have been working for hours and hours, staying inside in the house all day, but it is satisfying me. I’d like to make a good report, not just a few notes. It’s for the cause. It needs to be done.

I’m staying at Annie’s place from Saturday on, and it is really nice and cosy here. I’m sleeping on the couch, which is really comfortable. Yesterday and today Annie was out during the mornings, and I was able to work very concentrated. In the afternoons she was here at home too, and we shared the internet-USB-stick while we were both working. That was also nice. In the evenings we rented some DVD’s and generally Annie passes out on the couch every night during the movies :) . I don’t. When she has gone to bed I often stay up for a while and go on facebook for a quick chat or some photo uploading, or writing a blog such as I am doing now.
Yesterday I haven’t really been out, we only visited a friend of Annie and got some DVD’s, but today just after 5 PM we left the house and went to have dinner at the Kalk Bay, which is a really stunning place, just a little past Muizenberg (how funny all those Dutch names, I explained what it means to Annie: mice-mountain). Kalk Bay is on the other side (eastside) of the peninsula, and the water is warm there, it comes from the Indian Ocean, unlike the west coast at cape Town, which has cooler water from the Atlantic Ocean. You will only see sharks and seals in the warm water on the east side. And we did see seals!! They were so lovely, tumbling over, hanging upside down in the water, diving deep, and sometimes sticking their heads above the water, breathing loud. I really loved to watch them from so close by (2 metres!!, they were just near the jetty where I walked on). And they were natural wildlife. It was really awesome. And the water was so incredibly clear, you could look straight to the bottom. The ocean was so wide, and so peaceful. It really made me relaxed and let peace into my head. I could have stayed there for hours and hours. Feeling the wind go through my hair. But when the sun went down it got colder, and we had a nice fish and chips at the bay, looking out over the water. I made a lot of pictures. I was really a tourist for a moment, which was really nice after another day of hard work, typing reports.

This morning I had also managed to make some appointments for trips to psychiatric hospitals nearby. I succeeded!!
At Thursday 27 October, 12.00, I will visit Valkenberg psychiatric hospital for 1 hour. I will be led around, get to see a psychiatric ward, and talk to a social worker, but no photographs allowed.
Also I will visit Lentegeur Psychiatric hospital for giving them a free consultation. I get to see the psychiatric ward(s?), and talk to the specialist (psychiatry) at Wednesday 26 October, 14.15
I’m actually looking forward to that, to learn more, and to share my knowledge.
And tomorrow we are probably going to visit Shuaib Chalklen, the Special Rapporteur on Torture, who lives in Cape Town. At the PANUSP conference I hadn’t had much time to talk to him, but I really want to talk to him about human rights issues, and my own case which I never really got going. But I’m having new hope now, because Gabor Gombos also offered me to look into it, and bring it under the attention of the UN. Shuaib might also understand how this needs to be addressed.

Last Friday, when I was on tour with the World Federation of Mental Health, visiting several facilities, we were also visiting a protective workshop for people with intellectual disabilities. The irony was that they were folding and packing rubber gloves as their paid job in a protected area. But how ironic, those gloves symbolize the forced body cavity searches for me, which can be seen as institutionalized rape. It was really absolutely ironic to see them packing the gloves as a form of mental health support...
I will write a report on the facilities later this week, after I have been to Valkenberg and Lentegeur, because with the tour we went in and out of Lentegeur so quickly, that I feel like I didn’t get a good view of it. And also these personal ironic issues were a bit in the way. I needed to ventilate that first. But right now I can kind of laugh about the irony of the gloves.. It’s quite bizarre, and bizarre things suit my life, it’s very typical. I couldn’t have made that up myself. But now I can think that at least some persons benefitted when the gloves were used on me… but it remains ironic. What a crazy life :)

But the ocean was very nice. I might go see the ocean again soon. I still hope to see whales, sharks and pinguins, they just live here! The ocean is so lovely, and the coast with beaches and mountains was also beautiful, and the coloured fisher boats, and the fishermen cleaning the fish directly after catching it. It was a great evening. I enjoyed it very much.