You Need to Call Tyrone But You Can't Use My Phone, Cape Town

My recent trip to Cape Town for the Cape Town International Jazz Festival (where I worshiped the queen, Erykah Badu and discovered the amazingness of Haitus Kaiyote) has made really, like, lax and chill about everything. Including putting together several posts, especially this one. I don't understand how anyone gets anything done in Cape Town, it's so easy to have turn down nights and stroll around.

Cape Town was so good to me. The people, the weather and the scenery (oh my god, we even did one of those city bus tour things that tourists love) were perfect. I finally understand the allure of that Los Angeles/beachy/boho life where everyone drives at 60km/h in the CBD, knocks back drinks on Sunday afternoons with not a care in the world, where you can walk everywhere and cabs are ridiculously cheap because everything is so close together.

I'm so conflicted as to whether I want to remain the city girl I like to pretend I am or just pack it up, take a twelve hour bus to Cape Town and wear sandals every day. 

Cape Town is like another world. Another world where the sun sets at 8PM and the CBD isn't busy on a Sunday.

 Cue My So-Called Life voice over by Angela: "My parents keep asking how school was. It's like saying, 'How was that drive-by shooting?' You don't care how it was, you're lucky to get out alive."
Oh, I have braids in now. In case you haven't noticed.

 This is me not having time for anybody.

I went to the Cape Town Jazz Festival with my family because I'm a loser and I haven't been to Cape Town since 2009 so I have no friends there. I was sleepy, there weren't any young Turkish guys who wanted to whisk me away to the Caribbean to just watch reruns of Rugrats and eat mangoes. I ran into the above photographed cool cats on my way to cab and it turns out that not only are they, like, my type of people, they also go/went to the Cape Town board of my school. It was hella. Hanging with them is like in Perks of Being Wallflower when Charlie's in the car with Sam and Patrick and feels infinite. It was like they were showing me the world. It was intense and the best.

I woke up at 4AM the day after the Jazz Festival and took a long shower and sat on the balcony of our hotel room and took photos and painted. This was the better of my paintings. I felt so at peace with the ocean on the horizon and the smell of my poster paint and the warmth of a long, hot shower on your skin.

That same day I got to meet my Internet frrraann, Zipho, from Tony Gum. She is my absolute favourite South African blogger. It was so strange because talking to Zipho was like talking to an old friend. It's scary when you've fan-girled over someone for so long and meeting them could either be the very best thing or horrifying. What if you've idolised them, what if they're a catfish, what if they're not in a position to reciprocate your energy? It was the very best thing for me.

Forever,
Khenzo xx

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Meeting David Tlale Thanks to Elle

I'm ready to die now.
Not even joking.

You know how you read or hear about really amazing competitions in fashion magazines/websites/Twitter and you think to yourself, "Man, how cool would it be if I won?" But then you turn the page or look at one gifs of Dylan O'Brien on Tumblr and forget about it. A week or so later you see you one of the winners and you sigh because you wish you could be one of those people that always win these things.

Well, that is not a reality for me anymore.

The Elle Magazine blog ran a competition recently where a lucky reader and a friend would receive the chance to go to a day of Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week (fuh free), get dressed by David Tlale and meet Minnie Dlamini. All that the hopeful inviduals had to do was describe how they would dress Minnie.
And I won. (Here's my entry if you don't believe me.)
Like, me: the girl who's never so much as won an unsalted raisin in a packet of peanuts and raisins.
Obviously the Universe has grown tired of its Pick on Khensani game and granted me such a gift. To quote another cool Khensani (whose blog you should check out), I've "won at life."

I took Josh as my valuable friend and for the first part of the prize we got to go to David Tlale's studio in the Maboneng Precinct (the coolest place in the whole province - I've blogged about the Musuem of African Design that's located there) and have a dress fitting. I know. We're getting dressed by David Tlale - David Tlale whose slayed at every fashion week since ever, David Tlale who killed it at New York Fashion Week this year, David Tlale whose show in 2012 was the first fashion show I'd ever attended.

Unfortunately I showed up forty-minutes late (everything cool in Jo'burg is placed ridiculously far apart and no one in the CBD understands what a green light is) and as soon as I ran into the studio, I was shocked speechless. It was literally the most glamourous, minimalistic thing ever. Sheena, the assistant Elle fashion editor was really nice and accommodating and reduced my nerves right before she went to get David.

Does that man fill a room. He had such a presence to him and I felt like I was presenting a speech for assembly in grade five all over again.

"Hello, I'm David." He said and held out his hand.

I know, I thought but instead I said, "Hi, I'm Khensani. Iamsosorryforbeinglate."

"I could slap you." And in a cloud of soothing, musky cologne he was already onto the next thing.

BEST. MOMENT. OF. MY. LIFE.

After getting to touch the prettiest, well-constructed clothing and fell apart a little inside because I wouldn't be allowed to keep any of it (it was straight off the runway!) (I did, however, reconstruct myself when I realised that I was sample size), we took a walk around the precinct before retiring to Pata Pata for a snack.

The Maboneng Precinct is the best place to be mostly because it's all the amazing feels of being in the city but without the scary folktales of Melville and Parktown where people are "constantly" get hijacked, robbed and who knows what else. There are also really funky restaurants with live performances, local artwork and things like cheese boards. As well as really love independent stores with "so tumblr" items. If I could move there <sighs and looks off into the horizon>.

My crop top and boyfriend jeans are from Cotton On, trainers from Pull and Bear in Istanbul, Mr Price bag, jacket and hat. And of course Josh looked like a sweg trap.

We got a cheeseboard (which we split because we're broke and being in the city makes one want to pretend to be on some fad diet from the 1940s).

I'm preparing a eulogy for my friends to give at my funeral because I AM SO HAPPY I COULD DIE.
Forever,
Khenzo xx
*Watch my Instagram and Twitter for a ridiculous amount of updates about fashion week.

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South African Fashion Week A/W 2014 - Day 3 (October 5th)

Saturday night at The Crowne Plaza, Rosebank was something out of a flashback in Gossip Girl or a faraway adventure a wanna be Upper East Side socialite would've stepped into after a pair of Marc by Marc Jacobs stilettos landed into her lap in the kind of way that makes you believe in good karma.

If I had to choose a soundtrack for the whole night - which I should really get around to - it would have to be something like Flashing Lights or New In Town by Little Boots or maybe, uh, I don't know, something that makes you think of twinkly lights, sparkling wine swishing into crystal glasses and the clickety-clack of expensive shoes. You feel me?

I bounded in like a Power Ranger with my well-dressed girl gang of three, and this may be presumptuous, but we were the life of every room. Our heels were higher, our laughs were bigger, our smiles were brighter and our jokes were just a teeny bit more funny than yours.

Well, at least, that's what it felt like. Everyone else must've thought we were lip smacking, giggly weirdos sticking our tongues out for more photos than in any Miley Cyrus video.

While I could try and tell you more about how amazing the night was, the 18th century brought us the convention that is film.

Yours,
Khenzo xx

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