March 10th 2012,
So, today I am going to talk about
my golfing experience here in Stellenbosch. So me and my crazy friend Chris
Moskal decided that we wanted to go out golfing while we’re here in South
Africa. So I called the Stellenbosch Golf Club and signed us up for a tee time
on Saturday March 10th at precisely 12:16pm. We had to rent clubs
obviously, so I called to make sure they had ladies lefty clubs (because they
are not common) and they did, so we were all excited and really for Saturday to
arrive. So we met at 11 and called a cab to take us to the Golf Club, and our
cab driver was fantastic and he wanted to talk all about America and what was
worth seeing there, he was also impressed that young, American students wanted
to go golfing while we were in South Africa.
We arrived at the
golf course and went to the Pro Shop to check in, but right before that Chris
had been eating a Sweet Chili Chicken Wrap and proceeded to spill it down his
pants, therefore justifying the “American Slob” stereotype. As the manager was
checking in our tee time he told us that he had entered us into the Saturday
competition and asked if that was fine. I looked at Chris and he looked at me
with both of our mouths hanging open in disbelief and pure fear, and of course
Chris being a good sport as he always is said “Yeah, that’s fine” as I was
shaking my head “no” furiously at him. Then the manager proceeded to tell us
that we were to be paired with the Club’s financial managers, and after that I
felt the need to cry/faint/run whatever people do when they are told nerve
racking news. Of course, Chris being the jovial sort was quite excited to play
with them as I was not. Then, the manager informed us that we could not partake
in the competition because we did not know our handicaps, but that we were
still to be paired with the financial managers of this pristine golf course. Then
we were asked as to whether we wanted a buggy or a trolley, with common sense,
and being used to walking I asked for two trolleys, and Chris agreed. When they
brought the pull carts to us, Chris gave the guy a weird look, and then leaned
over to me and said disappointedly “I thought trolleys were golf carts.” We
exchanged for a buggy and Chris was content.
Finally 12:16pm
rolled around and it was time to tee off, we met the financial managers, Andre
and Evert who loved to speak Afrikaans to one another, so Chris and I could
only assume they were saying bad things about us. They also asked us to keep
track of their scores *(and this will come into play later in the story).* They
asked Chris to tee off first, and of course being the first hole and under
stressful circumstances Chris whiffed the ball. After the men teed off, Andre
and Evert looked at each other and decided that they needed a drink before straying
too far from the clubhouse. Chris and I assumed it was because it was going to
be a long game judging from his first shot. As we started getting into the
match, Chris and I quickly realized that they were very good and we were very,
very bad.
On the 2nd
hole I was using my 5 wood to get up to the green and I accidentally hit a
goose and went into the water. On many chip shots Chris and I often almost hit
Andre or Evert. On the 6th green as we were waiting for the group
behind us to pass, Chris and I were making small talk with Andre and Evert and
Chris proceeds to ask them what they do for a living, as I slap my hand to my
head, they give each other confused looks and tell Chris that they are the
financial managers of the course, which we had already been told by the Pro
Shop manager. On the 9th hole a bar maid was waiting at the tee to
send in drink orders to the clubhouse, Chris ordered a water and the waitress
asked “still or sparkling” and seeing that her Afrikaans accent was quite
strong, Chris didn’t understand and replied with a firm “YES” and after getting
confused looks from all of us, I leaned over to him to repeat the question. By
that point, we assumed that Evert and Andre thought we were mentally ill. On
the 11th hole, Chris and I looked down at the scorecard to realize
that we hadn’t kept track of their score for seven or eight holes, I casually
asked Evert if I could borrow their score card because I missed the eighth hole
scores, they proceeded to tell us that they weren’t keeping their own scores
and that we were supposed to have them. Chris and I were so horrified, over the
course of the next two holes we plotted dozens of different ways to get rid of
the score card, and here are a few of the plans…..
1. Chris:
Let’s pour water all over the golf card and say that the scores are illegible.
2. Emily:
Throw the card out of the golf cart and say the wind blew it away.
3. Chris:
Hide it in my backpack and say we lost it.
4. Emily:
Hide the pencil in the golf cart and say that we had no way of keeping track of
the scores without the pencil.
5. Emily:
Rip it up and throw all of the pieces out of the golf cart.
What I ended up
doing was that I wrote down fake scores and we made sure to keep track of the
rest of the game in hopes that they didn’t remember their 5th hole’s
score and so on.
On the 13th
hole, I grabbed an iron in hopes to lob my ball over the large stumpy tree that
sat in front of me; Chris was sitting in the cart behind taking photos of the
course, the mountains, and the beautiful landscape that lay around us. I
smacked my ball and it proceeded to bounce off the tree, back into the cart
where it hit the roof and then hit Chris smack in the shoulder, Andre and Evert
definitely got a good laugh out of that. When we finished the game, we went to
the clubhouse so we could buy Evert and Andre a drink for having to play with
such poor players such as ourselves. After buying them a drink, Chris and I got
up to leave and Chris casually asked Evert if he needed anything from us, and
he said no, so Chris and I called the cab and ran as fast as we could out of
the clubhouse without ever giving the men their scorecard back.
Never will I ever be allowed to be put in a competition with financial
managers in a foreign country, because not only did we make Americans look bad,
we embarrassed ourselves and crushed our thoughts of thinking we were “good
golfers”. But, otherwise it made for a great story!
Totseins,
Em
Love this story!
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