Sunday was such an emotional day. I started to pack and sort out what I’m leaving behind and what will come home. It didn’t take long for my room to no longer look like my room anymore. Chelcie and I both wore our Owambo dresses with matching headscarves to church which everyone loved. They are very comfy to wear as they are incredibly loose but with the downside of making you look very large. I cried throughout the service...Gilly said a few words about us at the beginning of the service and we were prayed for. I managed to pull myself together to sing with Chelcie ‘I vow to thee my country’ (this is Gilly’s favourite hymn) as well as ‘From a Distance’ which we have sung together all year. During the Peace we walked up and down the aisle shaking hands with all the children which made me cry again. We had lunch at the Stommels house where we sang ‘Lord of the Dance’ as Reiner had been ill last Sunday so hadn’t heard us. In the afternoon we had all the G7s over for a party and we had a humongous cake with ‘Goodbye’ piped on the top. This was really fun and lovely but Diodores keeps on asking why I have to leave and every time he asks it breaks my heart.
On Monday evening we had our last ever Concert which was brilliant. We had recorders, singing, violins, flute playing, trumpet playing, keyboard playing and it was just a great evening. We then went to sleep in the Girls Hostel which is another tradition. I started off in Protea but then was literally dragged into Sunflower. I slept on the floor on a mattress between Stacy and Theopoldine. The dorms have 20 girls in of mixed ages and I had all of them around me/lying on me while I told them the story of Cinderalla and Rapunzel. I can’t say I slept brilliantly as Stacy and Theopoldine’s idea of snuggling is to lie half on top of you so I had a human blanket!
The last few days as usual were filled with finishing writing the newsletter and folding all the copies and making sure that all the rooms we are in charge of sparkling clean as well as the GAP flat. All the things that I didn’t want to bring home I made up into little parcels that I then gave out to 11 of the children I am closest to. They all came over on Tuesday afternoon with some others for Chelcie and we gave out all our stuff. This turned into the saddest afternoon ever as everyone was crying and it all got far too emotional for my liking. It’s bad enough when the girls cry but when the boys start it gets too much for me.
We spent our last evening at Paul and Sara’s house which was lovely. By then I was feeling quite drained from all the crying and just wanted to have some fun which we did. I also spoke to Mrs Vermaak about Diodores – she said that she was very happy with his end of term exam results but if he stopped working she said she would let me know and then it would be up to me to get him back on track! I’ve made Brenden promise that he will look out for Dankie and make sure that no one bullies him. Desvino is also going to look out for Damian for me and stop people picking on him. I didn’t go to bed for ages as I stayed up writing notes for lots of children to give them the next day.
The last assembly was actually really good fun rather than super sad, which I was glad about. The children were all in their home clothes and it was lovely to see lots of the older ones wearing mine. I don’t think many children in Namibia own an Eton hoodie but Diodores does now! The children sang all our favourite songs and then Mrs Vermaak and Gilly said a few things about us. We were presented with an Otjikondo Book, DVD, t-shirt, baseball cap and a reference. At the end all the children filed out past us and gave us a hug. I didn’t cry until I reached the Grade 7s – knowing that this would be the last time I would see most of them killed me. We said goodbye to Mrs Vermaak, the teachers and then Gilly which was so sad – even made Checlie cry! We then went to say goodbye to the rest of the Stommels; Reiner blessed us and gave us a lucky stone to help us on our way, and then we were on our way to Windhoek.
We got a lift with Fabiola and Rob and after the children had put all our stuff in the Combi we went on our way. The drive to Windhoek was a sad and quiet one. We spent three days in Windhoek trying not to think about Otjikondo and doing lots of present shopping. We met two guys from England who were on their University holidays who were good fun and we went out with them. It was hard being in Namibia but not at Otjikondo and we actually now just wanted to be at home.
Saturday at 12pm we started our long and tiring journey home. I wont dwell on the journey apart from to say it wasn’t fun and it wasn’t amusing when they wouldn’t let us on our plane from Dubai to Heathrow as they had sold our tickets. However, when we walked through arrivals to see our families it was amazing.
It is impossible to try and sum up this year in any way. All I can say is that it has been the happiest and most rewarding year of my life. I have fallen in love with Africa and however cringe it may sound my heart has remained in Otjikondo. The Stommels became my African family, Chelcie became my other half and the children are indescribable. I am so thankful to everyone who made my year possible, everyone who kept in contact with me and the many people who looked after my family while I was away. This year will stay with me for evermore.
love Me xxxx
Thursday, 13 September 2012
Part Thirty Nine: The Beginning of the End (6th – 18th August)
Monday was such a bizarre day – now that Parents Day is over it didn’t really feel like we should be teaching anymore. In Wings Art we got them to draw out of the magazines while we everyone turned everyone’s marks for the term in Art and PT into averages so that we could give them a grade. In the afternoon we had one last performance of The Button Box for the school and we had it recorderd. Mr Schnurr (he wrote the book ‘Namibia Calling’ which tells the story of the Stommels and Otjikondo – it’s fascinating and I would definitely recommend reading it) and some of his friends were visiting Otjikondo and had some equipment and very kindly said they would record it. This means that I will end up with a DVD of the play which is hugely exciting. In the evening we went to climb the water tower to watch the sunset – apparently this is a GAP tradition and therefore something we had to do. However the tower is very, very tall and even more rickety. I got about 6ft of the ground and had to come down again – very scary! Chelcie got to the top and said the view was incredible – she took a quick photo so I could see and came down rather fast!
It has now been totally confirmed that Laurie is arriving to record our girls singing which is very exciting. Mrs Vermaak said that we could watch Olympics in class with the children as she thought it was important for them to see some of it. This meant we had an incredible week teaching and got to see lots of the Olympics! Laurie arrived on Tuesday evening and work commenced on Wednesday. We did all the vocal recording in the Church because of the amazing acoustics but then we went to different locations to video them. We did some of the filming at the most incredible location – Holstein Rocks which is where Paul and Sara had their wedding photos taken. Masses and masses of giant rocks which made a spectacular background especially with the sun setting behind them.
We have made prizes for each of the Drama cast – just a little medal type thing. Each of them have a different award according to what they did best or what we remember them for. Some were quite silly or in jokes amongst the cast but others were more serious awards.
Aune – Best Grandma Rage
Desvino – Most Valued Player
Uapiona – No 1 U18 Wrestler
Diina – Arrum Prize
Damian – Best Impuku Dancer
Sitaleni – Good Egg
Tuhafeni – Most Distracting Face
Ruben – Marvelous Matelot
Paulus – Best Chair
Twasindana – Magnificent Mango Picker
Evangelina – Most Bootylicious Wiggle
Tuyambeka – Miss Otjikondo
Albertha – Triple Threat
Davensia – Most Reliable
Theopoldine – Star Chorus Member
Avihe – Miss Paradise Island
Stacy – Little Miss Sunshine
Robertine – Truly Scrumptions Chocolisious Smartie
Britney – Cheekiest Chocolate Button
Waltraudt – Super Singer
Anna Debs – The award for...8 appearances on stage in the correct costume
Kenisha – Miss Sugar Sweet
Vanessa – Best Knicker flash
Xunta-I – Best Soldier
Emelia – Best Behaved
Joyce and Helena – Star Stage Manager
Carla – Speediest Dresser
I’ve been busy writing the end of term Newsletter as well as my Post Report. The Post Report is to leave for the Stommels and for Gilly to read in her old age to remind her which GAP I was! I could do it in any format that I liked and it was just about what the year had meant to be and what I had gained. Luckily these were all things I had been thinking a lot about recently and it wasn’t too much of a struggle.
Friday was CRAZY. As in really crazy! We set off for Tanigu Kindergarten which is the Stommels Kindergarten in Khorixas. It was their Parents Day and we were going to paint the all the children’s faces while the parents were in the meeting. The kindergarten is an oasis in such a poor area – the houses are one room huts built from corrugated iron and the roofs are weighed down by stones or old car tyres. The children were all so sweet and we had great fun transforming them into lions, butterflies, flags and generally anything we felt like! We then painted each other’s faces – a GB flag for Chelcie and me, a German flag for Carla and we even did Gilly – one side Namibia and the other half Great Britain. On the way home we stopped to buy some lunch in Khorixas and the looks and laughs we got from other customers were brilliant. As soon as we got back to Otjikondo we rushed off to Holstein Rocks with Lauire, Sara and the children. We filmed them in lots of different positions – for one we climbed up a series of rocks and had them positioned scattered over the boulders. As the sun set the children just became silhouettes against the sunset which was stunning. Definitely not a typical Otjikondo Friday.
On Saturday Chelcie and Carla did some more filming for BOOF in different locations and I went to Outjo with the U9 and U12 Football teams and the U8, U9 and U11 Netball teams to play in the finals. We had a very successful day out and returned with three medals. It’s lovely spending time like that with the children outside of school and I also got to see some of the old G7s who came to watch and support. Peterson, who plays for the U12 team but is half the size of most of them, was the star player. Twice he was totally surrounded by five players on the opposition and managed to dribble around them leading to goals which was just amazing. I saw a girl wearing what appeared to be a McDonalds t-shirt – a big red yellow ‘M’ on a red background but when I looked closer under the M instead of saying McDonalds it said Marijuana and then ‘Over 1 billion stoned’ – very inappropriate for a 11 year old to be wearing! In the evening we ended up having supper at Paul and Sara’s house with Laurie which was great fun and we ended up singing to Laurie playing the guitar. Laurie also very kindly recorded Chelcie and I singing together so that we now have a CD. This means that Gilly can also keep on listening to us sing once we’ve gone home.
Sunday was very relaxed – we sang Lord of the Dance in church which has become the Stommels new favourite song. We went with all the teachers to Mrs Vermaak’s house for lunch where we were treated to a meat feast including warthog which is yummy and liver which is less so! In the evening Carla gave me a saxophone lesson which was brilliant. It was the same fingering as the recorder so I picked it up pretty quickly and found it great fun.
Last full week at Otjikondo....Gilly informed us that she was putting a clause in her will so that our flights would be paid for us to fly out and sing at her funeral -she wasn’t joking. We said we’d rather come out for a big birthday so she could actually hear us sing! On Tuesday Gilly drove us to St Michael’s to say goodbye to Sam as he was leaving for Windhoek. I found it quite upsetting as knowing that he was leaving really brought it home to me that in just over 10 days time it would be my turn. We had a resale of the left over Craft bits and then packed up the remaining things. We have left all the boards up with the art work on – feel a bit sorry for the next GAPs as it will all be up when they arrive.
Lessons this week consisted of taking the children for walks and just chatting. At this stage we just wanted to spend the time with them and start to say our goodbyes. In the afternoons we gave parties for our activity groups – this consisted of giving them some food, dancing to music and having water fights in our garden! We had our last music class with the Kindergarten where we went over all the songs we had taught them this term. It’s amazing how much English and confidence they have picked up in such a short period and I have enormous respect for Sara for this. I was sitting next to Sinky who is very enthusiastic about music and kept on bursting into song and spontaneously growling which I found hilarious!
On Tuesday evening we went over to Ms Rachel’s house and she let us dress up in her traditional Herero dresses. These are absolutely brilliant – firstly you have to be wrapped in quilts and blankets as the rounder you are the more fertile you are and therefore more attractive to a husband. You then wear a petticoat and then a Victorian esq dress but with massive shoulders and hat which is triangular. When we got undressed again I suddenly felt so light and tiny – a good feeling! On Friday morning we went to school dressed as Hereros and got the best reaction from the children and the other staff. They all thought we looked beautiful (actually I looked about 8 months pregnant!) but they see it as a massive compliment that we went to be involved in their culture and experience a part of it. We walked down to the farm yard and the farm workers found it hysterical. The Stommels also loved it and there was more than one conversation about marrying us off to a Herero!
On Thursday evening we finally got round to having Paul and Sara to supper. We had been meaning to have them all year as we have been frequent guests at their house but only just got round to it. I cooked curry and they brought champagne and wine and we had a lovely evening. Although this week has been really fun, everything we have been doing we have been doing for the last time and therefore been tinged with sadness. I’ve cried less than I thought I would but I have been on the brink of crying most of the time! I love these children and place more than I can possibly describe and I honestly can’t imagine leaving them and not seeing some of them again and the others not for a year. Just writing this I’m starting to tear up at the prospect of having to say goodbye.
Friday break time we had a goodbye party with the teachers. Over Carrot cake and tea we were presented with beautiful chunky copper bracelets as well as a massive card from the teachers with messages inside from them all. The reality of having to say goodbye hit me and I cried. I can’t imagine what I’m going to be like next week saying goodbye to the Stommels and the children. How do I explain to Dankie that when he comes back after the holidays that I won’t be there anymore.
On Friday evening we had the cast party for The Button Box and it was one of my best evenings at Otjikondo. At 3pm we set off for Oenitzaub (the Heritage Centre) laden with tents, sleeping bags and an enormous amount of food not forgetting 27 children! Nearly crashed on the way there when a warthog came running out into the road but we got there safely! We set up camp and then had a sort out of all our things. We sat talking and listening to music before giving the children a tour of the heritage centre. As tradition calls we all signed our names with the date on one of the doors inside. We started cooking quite early as had a lot of borevors to cook and only a small braai. Supper stretched out as I could only cook 10 borevors at a time and everyone had 2 so that was 60 to cook! As it got dark everyone got changed into their pj’s and it was very cosy. As Desvino got into the buggy I asked him if he had a jumper – the answer was no but he’d be fine as he had brought a blanket. As soon as it started to get cold – ‘Ottilie I’m cold’, luckily I’d brought two jumpers and being the nice person that I am, I gave him one of them! By now it was pitch black and we only had two torches....luckily I’d brought 10 light up balloons and 4 glow sticks which Mummy had sent out for my birthday. These were absolutely perfect – thank you Mummy and the children loved them. We gave out all our prizes and gave a little speech saying thank you for all their hard work before having the promised talent show. We had singing, dancing, rapping....
We then sat around the camp fire roasting marshmallows on sticks. I had Damian curled up on my lap and it was idyllic. Damian whispered in my ear how I was the best GAP in his life and that I was perfect and just the best. It meant the world to me to hear this and broke my heart just a tiny bit. They wanted to hear a ghost story so I made up a story about the Ghost of Oenitzaub complete with sound effects done by Chelcie. It wasn’t particularly scary but it was very jumpy and they were terrified – but in a good way! Carla thought it was true at first as she didn’t believe that I could have made it up on the spot like that! I told them that the way to pacify the ghost if you saw her or heard her crying was to sing ‘Twinkle, twinkle little star’ and throughout the night we heard little burst of ‘twinkle, twinkle’ which was highly amusing! It was then time for bed but said they could talk and be in each other’s tents for a bit. In England the tent would be a four man tent but with five its fine but 6 is pretty squishy. I was in a tent with Stacy, Avihe, Emilia, Robertine and Tuyambeka however we were quickly joined by Desvino, Sitaleni and Damian, making nine of us which wasn’t much fun! We sat talking, telling stories and singing. They got me to teach them ‘Lord of the Dance’ which they loved and Desvino said that Chelcie and I were better than Rihanna which was very sweet of him!
Chelcie came and collected me for a loo run and we both decided that we would quite like to go to sleep now so very cheekily we got into one of the boys tent – it was empty as they were spread out amongst the other tents, made a bed and tried to get some sleep. However, it didn’t take long for the children to miss our presence and come looking for us and we were discovered but allowed to stay put! At midnight we told them they had to get some sleep and we made Desvino and Damian come join us as 8 children in one tent was not going to be conductive for sleeping. I don’t think Chelcie and I got any sleep at all – when we had escaped our respective tents we had left behind our pillows, duvets and blankets meaning we were left with one sleeping bag between the two of us and it was FREEZING! Desvino is also a very, very loud snorer and windmill was incredibly loud- it sounded like a clock chiming but it was continuous! The children woke up and started talking about 5 and we were joined by various children who came to snuggle! At 7 we gave up the pretence of trying to sleep and decided to feed them much to their delight. We played two games of pass the parcel and gave out the ‘2012 Button Box’ cup for the best performance at the Talent Show last night – Damian won this for his medly of all the songs that he knew ranging from ‘How many times do you read your Bible?’ to his rap from The Button Box, which was incredibly amusing.
After some much needed sleep in the afternoon we went for a Braai at Paul and Sara’s house – the first evening braai in months. Summer is on its way! I also found out that my remedial Maths classes had done really well in their maths exam which made me so happy. Stacy got 70%, Brenden 72% AND Diodores 75% so I was extremely proud of all of them.
Four days left at Otjikondo....not sure where the time has gone and I don’t know what to say. I’m excited to go home but I don’t want to leave here. I miss it already
Lots of love Me xxx
It has now been totally confirmed that Laurie is arriving to record our girls singing which is very exciting. Mrs Vermaak said that we could watch Olympics in class with the children as she thought it was important for them to see some of it. This meant we had an incredible week teaching and got to see lots of the Olympics! Laurie arrived on Tuesday evening and work commenced on Wednesday. We did all the vocal recording in the Church because of the amazing acoustics but then we went to different locations to video them. We did some of the filming at the most incredible location – Holstein Rocks which is where Paul and Sara had their wedding photos taken. Masses and masses of giant rocks which made a spectacular background especially with the sun setting behind them.
We have made prizes for each of the Drama cast – just a little medal type thing. Each of them have a different award according to what they did best or what we remember them for. Some were quite silly or in jokes amongst the cast but others were more serious awards.
Aune – Best Grandma Rage
Desvino – Most Valued Player
Uapiona – No 1 U18 Wrestler
Diina – Arrum Prize
Damian – Best Impuku Dancer
Sitaleni – Good Egg
Tuhafeni – Most Distracting Face
Ruben – Marvelous Matelot
Paulus – Best Chair
Twasindana – Magnificent Mango Picker
Evangelina – Most Bootylicious Wiggle
Tuyambeka – Miss Otjikondo
Albertha – Triple Threat
Davensia – Most Reliable
Theopoldine – Star Chorus Member
Avihe – Miss Paradise Island
Stacy – Little Miss Sunshine
Robertine – Truly Scrumptions Chocolisious Smartie
Britney – Cheekiest Chocolate Button
Waltraudt – Super Singer
Anna Debs – The award for...8 appearances on stage in the correct costume
Kenisha – Miss Sugar Sweet
Vanessa – Best Knicker flash
Xunta-I – Best Soldier
Emelia – Best Behaved
Joyce and Helena – Star Stage Manager
Carla – Speediest Dresser
I’ve been busy writing the end of term Newsletter as well as my Post Report. The Post Report is to leave for the Stommels and for Gilly to read in her old age to remind her which GAP I was! I could do it in any format that I liked and it was just about what the year had meant to be and what I had gained. Luckily these were all things I had been thinking a lot about recently and it wasn’t too much of a struggle.
Friday was CRAZY. As in really crazy! We set off for Tanigu Kindergarten which is the Stommels Kindergarten in Khorixas. It was their Parents Day and we were going to paint the all the children’s faces while the parents were in the meeting. The kindergarten is an oasis in such a poor area – the houses are one room huts built from corrugated iron and the roofs are weighed down by stones or old car tyres. The children were all so sweet and we had great fun transforming them into lions, butterflies, flags and generally anything we felt like! We then painted each other’s faces – a GB flag for Chelcie and me, a German flag for Carla and we even did Gilly – one side Namibia and the other half Great Britain. On the way home we stopped to buy some lunch in Khorixas and the looks and laughs we got from other customers were brilliant. As soon as we got back to Otjikondo we rushed off to Holstein Rocks with Lauire, Sara and the children. We filmed them in lots of different positions – for one we climbed up a series of rocks and had them positioned scattered over the boulders. As the sun set the children just became silhouettes against the sunset which was stunning. Definitely not a typical Otjikondo Friday.
On Saturday Chelcie and Carla did some more filming for BOOF in different locations and I went to Outjo with the U9 and U12 Football teams and the U8, U9 and U11 Netball teams to play in the finals. We had a very successful day out and returned with three medals. It’s lovely spending time like that with the children outside of school and I also got to see some of the old G7s who came to watch and support. Peterson, who plays for the U12 team but is half the size of most of them, was the star player. Twice he was totally surrounded by five players on the opposition and managed to dribble around them leading to goals which was just amazing. I saw a girl wearing what appeared to be a McDonalds t-shirt – a big red yellow ‘M’ on a red background but when I looked closer under the M instead of saying McDonalds it said Marijuana and then ‘Over 1 billion stoned’ – very inappropriate for a 11 year old to be wearing! In the evening we ended up having supper at Paul and Sara’s house with Laurie which was great fun and we ended up singing to Laurie playing the guitar. Laurie also very kindly recorded Chelcie and I singing together so that we now have a CD. This means that Gilly can also keep on listening to us sing once we’ve gone home.
Sunday was very relaxed – we sang Lord of the Dance in church which has become the Stommels new favourite song. We went with all the teachers to Mrs Vermaak’s house for lunch where we were treated to a meat feast including warthog which is yummy and liver which is less so! In the evening Carla gave me a saxophone lesson which was brilliant. It was the same fingering as the recorder so I picked it up pretty quickly and found it great fun.
Last full week at Otjikondo....Gilly informed us that she was putting a clause in her will so that our flights would be paid for us to fly out and sing at her funeral -she wasn’t joking. We said we’d rather come out for a big birthday so she could actually hear us sing! On Tuesday Gilly drove us to St Michael’s to say goodbye to Sam as he was leaving for Windhoek. I found it quite upsetting as knowing that he was leaving really brought it home to me that in just over 10 days time it would be my turn. We had a resale of the left over Craft bits and then packed up the remaining things. We have left all the boards up with the art work on – feel a bit sorry for the next GAPs as it will all be up when they arrive.
Lessons this week consisted of taking the children for walks and just chatting. At this stage we just wanted to spend the time with them and start to say our goodbyes. In the afternoons we gave parties for our activity groups – this consisted of giving them some food, dancing to music and having water fights in our garden! We had our last music class with the Kindergarten where we went over all the songs we had taught them this term. It’s amazing how much English and confidence they have picked up in such a short period and I have enormous respect for Sara for this. I was sitting next to Sinky who is very enthusiastic about music and kept on bursting into song and spontaneously growling which I found hilarious!
On Tuesday evening we went over to Ms Rachel’s house and she let us dress up in her traditional Herero dresses. These are absolutely brilliant – firstly you have to be wrapped in quilts and blankets as the rounder you are the more fertile you are and therefore more attractive to a husband. You then wear a petticoat and then a Victorian esq dress but with massive shoulders and hat which is triangular. When we got undressed again I suddenly felt so light and tiny – a good feeling! On Friday morning we went to school dressed as Hereros and got the best reaction from the children and the other staff. They all thought we looked beautiful (actually I looked about 8 months pregnant!) but they see it as a massive compliment that we went to be involved in their culture and experience a part of it. We walked down to the farm yard and the farm workers found it hysterical. The Stommels also loved it and there was more than one conversation about marrying us off to a Herero!
On Thursday evening we finally got round to having Paul and Sara to supper. We had been meaning to have them all year as we have been frequent guests at their house but only just got round to it. I cooked curry and they brought champagne and wine and we had a lovely evening. Although this week has been really fun, everything we have been doing we have been doing for the last time and therefore been tinged with sadness. I’ve cried less than I thought I would but I have been on the brink of crying most of the time! I love these children and place more than I can possibly describe and I honestly can’t imagine leaving them and not seeing some of them again and the others not for a year. Just writing this I’m starting to tear up at the prospect of having to say goodbye.
Friday break time we had a goodbye party with the teachers. Over Carrot cake and tea we were presented with beautiful chunky copper bracelets as well as a massive card from the teachers with messages inside from them all. The reality of having to say goodbye hit me and I cried. I can’t imagine what I’m going to be like next week saying goodbye to the Stommels and the children. How do I explain to Dankie that when he comes back after the holidays that I won’t be there anymore.
On Friday evening we had the cast party for The Button Box and it was one of my best evenings at Otjikondo. At 3pm we set off for Oenitzaub (the Heritage Centre) laden with tents, sleeping bags and an enormous amount of food not forgetting 27 children! Nearly crashed on the way there when a warthog came running out into the road but we got there safely! We set up camp and then had a sort out of all our things. We sat talking and listening to music before giving the children a tour of the heritage centre. As tradition calls we all signed our names with the date on one of the doors inside. We started cooking quite early as had a lot of borevors to cook and only a small braai. Supper stretched out as I could only cook 10 borevors at a time and everyone had 2 so that was 60 to cook! As it got dark everyone got changed into their pj’s and it was very cosy. As Desvino got into the buggy I asked him if he had a jumper – the answer was no but he’d be fine as he had brought a blanket. As soon as it started to get cold – ‘Ottilie I’m cold’, luckily I’d brought two jumpers and being the nice person that I am, I gave him one of them! By now it was pitch black and we only had two torches....luckily I’d brought 10 light up balloons and 4 glow sticks which Mummy had sent out for my birthday. These were absolutely perfect – thank you Mummy and the children loved them. We gave out all our prizes and gave a little speech saying thank you for all their hard work before having the promised talent show. We had singing, dancing, rapping....
We then sat around the camp fire roasting marshmallows on sticks. I had Damian curled up on my lap and it was idyllic. Damian whispered in my ear how I was the best GAP in his life and that I was perfect and just the best. It meant the world to me to hear this and broke my heart just a tiny bit. They wanted to hear a ghost story so I made up a story about the Ghost of Oenitzaub complete with sound effects done by Chelcie. It wasn’t particularly scary but it was very jumpy and they were terrified – but in a good way! Carla thought it was true at first as she didn’t believe that I could have made it up on the spot like that! I told them that the way to pacify the ghost if you saw her or heard her crying was to sing ‘Twinkle, twinkle little star’ and throughout the night we heard little burst of ‘twinkle, twinkle’ which was highly amusing! It was then time for bed but said they could talk and be in each other’s tents for a bit. In England the tent would be a four man tent but with five its fine but 6 is pretty squishy. I was in a tent with Stacy, Avihe, Emilia, Robertine and Tuyambeka however we were quickly joined by Desvino, Sitaleni and Damian, making nine of us which wasn’t much fun! We sat talking, telling stories and singing. They got me to teach them ‘Lord of the Dance’ which they loved and Desvino said that Chelcie and I were better than Rihanna which was very sweet of him!
Chelcie came and collected me for a loo run and we both decided that we would quite like to go to sleep now so very cheekily we got into one of the boys tent – it was empty as they were spread out amongst the other tents, made a bed and tried to get some sleep. However, it didn’t take long for the children to miss our presence and come looking for us and we were discovered but allowed to stay put! At midnight we told them they had to get some sleep and we made Desvino and Damian come join us as 8 children in one tent was not going to be conductive for sleeping. I don’t think Chelcie and I got any sleep at all – when we had escaped our respective tents we had left behind our pillows, duvets and blankets meaning we were left with one sleeping bag between the two of us and it was FREEZING! Desvino is also a very, very loud snorer and windmill was incredibly loud- it sounded like a clock chiming but it was continuous! The children woke up and started talking about 5 and we were joined by various children who came to snuggle! At 7 we gave up the pretence of trying to sleep and decided to feed them much to their delight. We played two games of pass the parcel and gave out the ‘2012 Button Box’ cup for the best performance at the Talent Show last night – Damian won this for his medly of all the songs that he knew ranging from ‘How many times do you read your Bible?’ to his rap from The Button Box, which was incredibly amusing.
After some much needed sleep in the afternoon we went for a Braai at Paul and Sara’s house – the first evening braai in months. Summer is on its way! I also found out that my remedial Maths classes had done really well in their maths exam which made me so happy. Stacy got 70%, Brenden 72% AND Diodores 75% so I was extremely proud of all of them.
Four days left at Otjikondo....not sure where the time has gone and I don’t know what to say. I’m excited to go home but I don’t want to leave here. I miss it already
Lots of love Me xxx
Part Thirty Eight: Countdown to D Day (30th July – 5th August)
Monday turned out to be an incredibly productive day. Chelcie’s throat wasn’t very good and she had lost her voice so she stayed at home. Hannah and Carla took the lessons while I continued with preparations for Parents Day. I managed to get all the people made and finished which was very satisfying and I was really happy with the end result. The Europe board has been transformed into a 3D state and everything is staying up touch wood! The asia board is now also complete. The bottom half of the board has ‘bamboo sticks’ on it – made from green paper, and on the top half we have displayed G7’s work on Chinese Symbols. Hanging from the bottom of the board is all the origami work and down the sides I stuck all the paper lanterns. It’s a really bright and colourful board now. In the afternoon with the help of Jacky and Marvelous (G7 boys) we managed to get the world and people stuck up on the board. So happy with what it looks like. Big Ben is also now completed and up on top of one of the cupboards.
I spent the evening preparing lessons as Mr Hawaxab was away on Tuesday and Wednesday so I got to return to the class to teach English and Social Studies. Tuesday started with double Social Studies with G6 in which we did a revision quiz which I’d written the night before for topics four and five. They really enjoyed this and hopefully it was helpful. I then had G7 English and we were looking at comparatives. They were in a good working mood and we had a fun productive lesson. After break it was double social studies with G5, they were less fun to teach but not too bad. Then BIS with G6 and they just had a study period and lastly double English with G6 which was brilliant. We were looking at adjectives and the eight different kinds;
1. Descriptive 2. Proper
3. Quantative 4. Order
5. Demonstrative 6. Interrogative
7. Possessional 8. Compound
I attempted to tell them the story of ‘The Three Little Pigs’ without using a single adjective, so of course the story became ‘The Pigs’ and not only was it really difficult not to use any adjectives but the story was deathly boring. It’s easy to remember not to say the pink pig but remembering not to say the second pig was challenging! I then told it again using lots of adjectives and they loved it.
During Remedial with my G7 boys they made me promise that if I marry a footballer or someone really rich that my husband would fly them out for the wedding. They were being very serious! Afterwards went and finished the last bits and pieces for the Art Room – cut out the Eiffel Tower and stuck it up, did the last name tags and then placed the boards. The Art side is now all complete and we just have to get ready all the craft things. We started sorting out some of the jewellery and some of it is HIDEOUS! Hopefully the children will disagree and think that it’s lovely as otherwise we aren’t going to make any money at all!
In the evening we had our last supper with Hannah as she was leaving the next morning – I made pasta with bacon and leeks in a cheese sauce and we had a good last night with her. Chelcie and I each made here a friendship bracelet to start her collection and we made here a little book called ‘Question Time with Kicks and Dimps”. It was for her to write all her unanswerable questions on as she proceeds on her travels. We filled in the first page for her… “Why do men have nipples?”, “If people from Poland are called Poles, why aren’t people from Holland called Holes?”, “Why are weathercocks often cockerels?”. On the back cover we wrote “What do you call a donkey with 3 legs?” (a wonky) as this is one of two jokes in my repertoire! We then went over to Paul and Sara’s for a drink and to watch some of the Olympics.
I cannot, cannot, cannot believe it’s August. How can it be August? It can’t be August, as I leave in August, but somehow it is. That means that July is over so records for the month…..I read 15 books, wrote 9 letters and received 10, cried twice, completed month 10 away from home, got into Holland Halls, took my 5th course of antibiotics in 10 months, made friends with a 2 week old Baboon, said goodbye to Glenn, discovered Desert Island discs – thanks Hannah, turned green and red (at different times!) and had our first performance of the Button Box.
We had a goodbye assembly for Hannah and I had a little cry when the children sang one of the goodbye tunes – it gets to me every time. I am going to be totally hopeless when a) it’s time for me to have to say goodbye and b) listening to them sing that song but this time to me. The day started with G6 English and lesson on Adverbs, this time only five kinds to remember thankfully. Then Social Studies where we did another quiz but this time with them working alone to see how much they really knew – luckily they all got nearly full marks. Spent p3 saying goodbye to Hannah, it was sad but I am sure I will see her again and we had a really fun three weeks which I have to remember. After break I had quadruple G5 which was a test, a real test. Started with an individual social studies quiz which went well and they were all listening and then double English where we looked at adverbs and comparisons. Lastly BIS, which was just a study period. When they are quiet they are fun to teach and they actually ask intelligent questions but I find it deeply frustrating having to stop the whole time to ask some people to be quite as it always makes me lose my thread. There is nothing worse than standing at the front of a classroom and knowing that people aren’t listening to you. Luckily, ended on a high by teaching adjectives to G7. It was also Desvino’s birthday today, who is another person who is very special to me and he had a good day which made me happy. In the afternoon we continued setting out the craft things ready to be sold and finishing off bits which the children hadn’t quite completed.
Chelcie and I decided that we don’t spend enough time together (!) so she has moved into my room. We have made a double bed on the floor of my room where we are now both camped out. Franzelle and Aune scared the living daylights out of us by coming at 8:30 and asking for selotape just outside my window. We hadn’t heard them coming and suddenly there were just voices outside my room. Franzelle also has a very low voice so actually sounded like a man in the dark!
Our month 11 ‘anniversary’ was a day of real highs and lows for me. We had just discovered at break time who the new GAPs are so we spent the time checking them out on their Facebook pages! In G7 art we decided to take them to the Zebra Pan which is just the other side of the road from the school gates. It’s a big stretch of open countryside where lots of animals go to water and then around the edges there are rocks and trees. I went off with Brenden and Diodores exploring which was great fun and later we were joined by Milla. They kept on talking about us as the Damara 5 – not really sure why, because even if I was a token Damara, there were definitely only four of us and these are the boys I teach remedial maths to! Occasionally we would bump into other people but if they were girls we had to leave as they don’t like girls! When I asked ‘what about me?’ they informed me that I wasn’t a girl but a chick and that makes me cool! Glad I have their seal of approval. We finished the lesson by eating Namibian figs – they are bright purple and the outside has thorns on so we got the boys to de-thorn them for us. You end up with bright pink lips and fingers from where ever the juice has touched you but it’s worth it. A really fun outing. With the G6s we went for a walk along the air strip which was also fun. We tried Bush Gum which looks like honeycomb/resin but it was disgusting. It’s supposed to be really sweet and the children were fighting over it. At first it tasted like rice cakes and then it was just REVOLTING!
In the evening we performed The Button Box to the school and all the teachers. We had to wait for all the children to eat supper before we could set out all the costumes. I went outside to wait and I heard Ruben shouting at Brenden and Diodores, so I went over to see what was going on. I didn’t want Ruben to get all upset before he had to perform. Bradley was sitting down crying his eyes out and Ruben was saying it was because Brenden and Diodores had been mocking him and it wasn’t the first time they had made someone cry. I knew it was serious as Ruben isn’t someone to lose his cool over nothing so I said that they should apologise straight away but they refused saying they hadn’t done anything wrong. I said it didn’t matter what they thought, they should be the bigger person and just say sorry as something they had done had obviously really upset Bradley and I didn’t want to hear details, I just wanted them to say sorry. They went over to Bradley and were trying to pull him to his feet, laughingly saying sorry but it was very clear that it was a joke and they didn’t mean it. I then totally lost it; I really can’t remember feeling that cross before. I’m sure I have before but I can’t remember it. I felt so let down by them – I have stood up for those two numerously and I won’t let anyone criticize them in my presence and I felt that they had really let me down. I got so riled up and upset by the way they were acting – they wouldn’t listen to me properly and were just playing the clown. I know that they are teenage boys but I felt so personally let down by their behaviour and the way they chose to act. I was so close to crying so I just left them and went and ranted to Chelcie who fed me fudge to calm me down!
I love those boys so intensely and just writing this is upsetting me again. I can see both of their potential’s, Breden’s is more obvious which is why he was appointed Deputy Head Boy but I can also see how Diodores could succeed if he makes the right choices. Seeing them like that really made me question whether at High School they will make the right choices especially without someone like me to protect and care for them. Once they leave here, they are basically going to be on their own and I really can’t bare it.
It was then time for the performance which was FANTASTIC. I was so, so, so, so proud of all them, they really were amazing. From the moment Diina and Uapiona ran on stage to the end of the last song it was full of energy and life and I was just so unbelievably proud of all of them. For the first time Paradise Island was great – they don’t enjoy singing this one, but you would never have guessed it. Damian was amazing and I was just so happy for him. Xunta-I and Vanessa sang their duet in tune which was just incredible and quite unbelievable to be honest! The main four were acting the whole time and I enjoyed watching them so much. Once again Desvino was our star player and he was stupendous. He got so many laughs from sneaking biscuits and sticking his tongue out at Grandma behind her back and at one point I had to go out as I was laughing so hard! Ruben panicked at the beginning of his second verse, slightly forgetting his words and ended up singing the rest of his solo which was just brilliant but shocked me so much. The best thing was the grin on his face once he’d finished. The teachers and Mrs Vermaak were very complimentary and it was clear how much they had enjoyed themselves. I was only sorry that Gilly was away so didn’t get to see it.
The last day before Parents Day, otherwise labelled D Day, was actually quite relaxed and we weren’t running around like headless chickens, luckily! Finishing touches were made to the Art Room and we set all our rubbish on fire. I nearly set Otjikondo alight as I filled the Rubbish bin to full and some fell out only centimetres away from a heap of dried grass. Luckily, I managed to cover the fire quickly in sand and the school was saved! At break time it was lovely to hear the feedback from the teachers; Mrs Vermaak was particularly impressed with Waltraudt’s voice and Vehonga said that it was the first musical she had enjoyed! They unanimously commented on how brilliant the main four were. Gilly returned bringing our passports with our visas stamped in. Finally with less than a month to go I am legal in Namibia.
Parents Day! Never really thought this day would actually arrive – just like leaving for Namibia but it has and it was a brilliant day. From 8:00 to 11:30 Chelcie and I were in the Art Room selling all our craft things and talking to Parents. We had to regulate how many children came in at time as it was very tempting for them to take something. It was lovely to see the children with their parents and astounding as to how similar they looked to each other. The tombola was next door and we had great fun wasting our money and getting rubbish prizes! I ended up with a belt, a little blue jug, two toothbrushes and a packet of biscuits. Chelcie won a wooden spoon which turned out to be made from plastic! Diodores’ parents didn’t come but I met his older sister, who is a year younger than me, and her son who was very sweet. It was nice to meet part of his family. It was then time for the Drama production which went very well – there wasn’t quite as much energy and buzz as Thursday night but it was still a very good production and once again I was immensely proud. The tickets cost N$4 (roughly 25p!) and we were a total sell out, even having to send people away! It was lovely to talk to some parents after the performance who said how much they had enjoyed it and to meet some of the cast’s parents who were as proud as I was. We then returned to the Art Room where we did face painting for the children and a couple of adults! The Parents all went to their meeting where at the end a Raffle was drawn. Aune’s Mummy won a traditional Owambo dress which she then gave to me! This was so lovely of her and it was so unbelievably kind and made me incredibly happy. It was the teachers’ lucky day in the Raffle with Mrs Vermaak winning N$1000, Ms Laurencia N$500 and Ms Shituleni winning the goat! By the end of the day we were absolutely shattered and just collapsed into bed. At the craft fair Reiner bought each of us a necklace so that we went home we wouldn’t forget him. When we told Gilly this she cried.
No rest for the wicked....Sunday was the day of first Communion. All the first Communion children looked so smart all in white. The girls where in white dresses with matching capes, gloves and shoes and they had all had their hair done. The boys were in suits and the twins, Tunga and Tangi, were in matching white three piece suits with bow ties! We sat at the front with the choir and sang with them – we had taught the choir ‘Shine Jesus Shine’ specifically for this occasion but they weren’t very confidant so it ended up being an unintentional duet between me and Chelcie. Father Heinz did the communion for the candidates first and the first one was Desiree. She put the wafer in her mouth straight away just as he said to wait and that all the candidates should take it together. Desiree then fished her wafer out of her mouth and held it again. Everyone who saw this took place lost it and got the giggles so to everyone who couldn’t see what was going on it looked like we were behaving very badly!
The whole community with the parents then had lunch together in the Dining Room. We went up to help the Kitchen Staff and had great fun serving the food. We had a competition between the Rice serving team against the Coleslaw team as to who could serve the quickest. Obviously mine and Chelcie’s rice team won! In the afternoon I went for a ride through the farm. Paul has found me a horse to ride and when Hannah was here we tried it out. It’s quite a crazy African horse but it was lovely to be back in the saddle. I asked Tate Johannes if it had a name which the answer was obviously no so I called him Donkeyba meaning Donkey in Damara.
Totally crazy that Parents Day is now finished. This was one of the few things we were told about on Training that we knew we would have to do. Throughout the year we have heard about it and how important the day was. There was a lot of pressure on us to put on good displays as well as to produce a good Musical. I had so much fun doing the art displays as well as doing the play and luckily the day wasn’t a huge anticlimax.
As usual love to everyone
Ottilie xx
I spent the evening preparing lessons as Mr Hawaxab was away on Tuesday and Wednesday so I got to return to the class to teach English and Social Studies. Tuesday started with double Social Studies with G6 in which we did a revision quiz which I’d written the night before for topics four and five. They really enjoyed this and hopefully it was helpful. I then had G7 English and we were looking at comparatives. They were in a good working mood and we had a fun productive lesson. After break it was double social studies with G5, they were less fun to teach but not too bad. Then BIS with G6 and they just had a study period and lastly double English with G6 which was brilliant. We were looking at adjectives and the eight different kinds;
1. Descriptive 2. Proper
3. Quantative 4. Order
5. Demonstrative 6. Interrogative
7. Possessional 8. Compound
I attempted to tell them the story of ‘The Three Little Pigs’ without using a single adjective, so of course the story became ‘The Pigs’ and not only was it really difficult not to use any adjectives but the story was deathly boring. It’s easy to remember not to say the pink pig but remembering not to say the second pig was challenging! I then told it again using lots of adjectives and they loved it.
During Remedial with my G7 boys they made me promise that if I marry a footballer or someone really rich that my husband would fly them out for the wedding. They were being very serious! Afterwards went and finished the last bits and pieces for the Art Room – cut out the Eiffel Tower and stuck it up, did the last name tags and then placed the boards. The Art side is now all complete and we just have to get ready all the craft things. We started sorting out some of the jewellery and some of it is HIDEOUS! Hopefully the children will disagree and think that it’s lovely as otherwise we aren’t going to make any money at all!
In the evening we had our last supper with Hannah as she was leaving the next morning – I made pasta with bacon and leeks in a cheese sauce and we had a good last night with her. Chelcie and I each made here a friendship bracelet to start her collection and we made here a little book called ‘Question Time with Kicks and Dimps”. It was for her to write all her unanswerable questions on as she proceeds on her travels. We filled in the first page for her… “Why do men have nipples?”, “If people from Poland are called Poles, why aren’t people from Holland called Holes?”, “Why are weathercocks often cockerels?”. On the back cover we wrote “What do you call a donkey with 3 legs?” (a wonky) as this is one of two jokes in my repertoire! We then went over to Paul and Sara’s for a drink and to watch some of the Olympics.
I cannot, cannot, cannot believe it’s August. How can it be August? It can’t be August, as I leave in August, but somehow it is. That means that July is over so records for the month…..I read 15 books, wrote 9 letters and received 10, cried twice, completed month 10 away from home, got into Holland Halls, took my 5th course of antibiotics in 10 months, made friends with a 2 week old Baboon, said goodbye to Glenn, discovered Desert Island discs – thanks Hannah, turned green and red (at different times!) and had our first performance of the Button Box.
We had a goodbye assembly for Hannah and I had a little cry when the children sang one of the goodbye tunes – it gets to me every time. I am going to be totally hopeless when a) it’s time for me to have to say goodbye and b) listening to them sing that song but this time to me. The day started with G6 English and lesson on Adverbs, this time only five kinds to remember thankfully. Then Social Studies where we did another quiz but this time with them working alone to see how much they really knew – luckily they all got nearly full marks. Spent p3 saying goodbye to Hannah, it was sad but I am sure I will see her again and we had a really fun three weeks which I have to remember. After break I had quadruple G5 which was a test, a real test. Started with an individual social studies quiz which went well and they were all listening and then double English where we looked at adverbs and comparisons. Lastly BIS, which was just a study period. When they are quiet they are fun to teach and they actually ask intelligent questions but I find it deeply frustrating having to stop the whole time to ask some people to be quite as it always makes me lose my thread. There is nothing worse than standing at the front of a classroom and knowing that people aren’t listening to you. Luckily, ended on a high by teaching adjectives to G7. It was also Desvino’s birthday today, who is another person who is very special to me and he had a good day which made me happy. In the afternoon we continued setting out the craft things ready to be sold and finishing off bits which the children hadn’t quite completed.
Chelcie and I decided that we don’t spend enough time together (!) so she has moved into my room. We have made a double bed on the floor of my room where we are now both camped out. Franzelle and Aune scared the living daylights out of us by coming at 8:30 and asking for selotape just outside my window. We hadn’t heard them coming and suddenly there were just voices outside my room. Franzelle also has a very low voice so actually sounded like a man in the dark!
Our month 11 ‘anniversary’ was a day of real highs and lows for me. We had just discovered at break time who the new GAPs are so we spent the time checking them out on their Facebook pages! In G7 art we decided to take them to the Zebra Pan which is just the other side of the road from the school gates. It’s a big stretch of open countryside where lots of animals go to water and then around the edges there are rocks and trees. I went off with Brenden and Diodores exploring which was great fun and later we were joined by Milla. They kept on talking about us as the Damara 5 – not really sure why, because even if I was a token Damara, there were definitely only four of us and these are the boys I teach remedial maths to! Occasionally we would bump into other people but if they were girls we had to leave as they don’t like girls! When I asked ‘what about me?’ they informed me that I wasn’t a girl but a chick and that makes me cool! Glad I have their seal of approval. We finished the lesson by eating Namibian figs – they are bright purple and the outside has thorns on so we got the boys to de-thorn them for us. You end up with bright pink lips and fingers from where ever the juice has touched you but it’s worth it. A really fun outing. With the G6s we went for a walk along the air strip which was also fun. We tried Bush Gum which looks like honeycomb/resin but it was disgusting. It’s supposed to be really sweet and the children were fighting over it. At first it tasted like rice cakes and then it was just REVOLTING!
In the evening we performed The Button Box to the school and all the teachers. We had to wait for all the children to eat supper before we could set out all the costumes. I went outside to wait and I heard Ruben shouting at Brenden and Diodores, so I went over to see what was going on. I didn’t want Ruben to get all upset before he had to perform. Bradley was sitting down crying his eyes out and Ruben was saying it was because Brenden and Diodores had been mocking him and it wasn’t the first time they had made someone cry. I knew it was serious as Ruben isn’t someone to lose his cool over nothing so I said that they should apologise straight away but they refused saying they hadn’t done anything wrong. I said it didn’t matter what they thought, they should be the bigger person and just say sorry as something they had done had obviously really upset Bradley and I didn’t want to hear details, I just wanted them to say sorry. They went over to Bradley and were trying to pull him to his feet, laughingly saying sorry but it was very clear that it was a joke and they didn’t mean it. I then totally lost it; I really can’t remember feeling that cross before. I’m sure I have before but I can’t remember it. I felt so let down by them – I have stood up for those two numerously and I won’t let anyone criticize them in my presence and I felt that they had really let me down. I got so riled up and upset by the way they were acting – they wouldn’t listen to me properly and were just playing the clown. I know that they are teenage boys but I felt so personally let down by their behaviour and the way they chose to act. I was so close to crying so I just left them and went and ranted to Chelcie who fed me fudge to calm me down!
I love those boys so intensely and just writing this is upsetting me again. I can see both of their potential’s, Breden’s is more obvious which is why he was appointed Deputy Head Boy but I can also see how Diodores could succeed if he makes the right choices. Seeing them like that really made me question whether at High School they will make the right choices especially without someone like me to protect and care for them. Once they leave here, they are basically going to be on their own and I really can’t bare it.
It was then time for the performance which was FANTASTIC. I was so, so, so, so proud of all them, they really were amazing. From the moment Diina and Uapiona ran on stage to the end of the last song it was full of energy and life and I was just so unbelievably proud of all of them. For the first time Paradise Island was great – they don’t enjoy singing this one, but you would never have guessed it. Damian was amazing and I was just so happy for him. Xunta-I and Vanessa sang their duet in tune which was just incredible and quite unbelievable to be honest! The main four were acting the whole time and I enjoyed watching them so much. Once again Desvino was our star player and he was stupendous. He got so many laughs from sneaking biscuits and sticking his tongue out at Grandma behind her back and at one point I had to go out as I was laughing so hard! Ruben panicked at the beginning of his second verse, slightly forgetting his words and ended up singing the rest of his solo which was just brilliant but shocked me so much. The best thing was the grin on his face once he’d finished. The teachers and Mrs Vermaak were very complimentary and it was clear how much they had enjoyed themselves. I was only sorry that Gilly was away so didn’t get to see it.
The last day before Parents Day, otherwise labelled D Day, was actually quite relaxed and we weren’t running around like headless chickens, luckily! Finishing touches were made to the Art Room and we set all our rubbish on fire. I nearly set Otjikondo alight as I filled the Rubbish bin to full and some fell out only centimetres away from a heap of dried grass. Luckily, I managed to cover the fire quickly in sand and the school was saved! At break time it was lovely to hear the feedback from the teachers; Mrs Vermaak was particularly impressed with Waltraudt’s voice and Vehonga said that it was the first musical she had enjoyed! They unanimously commented on how brilliant the main four were. Gilly returned bringing our passports with our visas stamped in. Finally with less than a month to go I am legal in Namibia.
Parents Day! Never really thought this day would actually arrive – just like leaving for Namibia but it has and it was a brilliant day. From 8:00 to 11:30 Chelcie and I were in the Art Room selling all our craft things and talking to Parents. We had to regulate how many children came in at time as it was very tempting for them to take something. It was lovely to see the children with their parents and astounding as to how similar they looked to each other. The tombola was next door and we had great fun wasting our money and getting rubbish prizes! I ended up with a belt, a little blue jug, two toothbrushes and a packet of biscuits. Chelcie won a wooden spoon which turned out to be made from plastic! Diodores’ parents didn’t come but I met his older sister, who is a year younger than me, and her son who was very sweet. It was nice to meet part of his family. It was then time for the Drama production which went very well – there wasn’t quite as much energy and buzz as Thursday night but it was still a very good production and once again I was immensely proud. The tickets cost N$4 (roughly 25p!) and we were a total sell out, even having to send people away! It was lovely to talk to some parents after the performance who said how much they had enjoyed it and to meet some of the cast’s parents who were as proud as I was. We then returned to the Art Room where we did face painting for the children and a couple of adults! The Parents all went to their meeting where at the end a Raffle was drawn. Aune’s Mummy won a traditional Owambo dress which she then gave to me! This was so lovely of her and it was so unbelievably kind and made me incredibly happy. It was the teachers’ lucky day in the Raffle with Mrs Vermaak winning N$1000, Ms Laurencia N$500 and Ms Shituleni winning the goat! By the end of the day we were absolutely shattered and just collapsed into bed. At the craft fair Reiner bought each of us a necklace so that we went home we wouldn’t forget him. When we told Gilly this she cried.
No rest for the wicked....Sunday was the day of first Communion. All the first Communion children looked so smart all in white. The girls where in white dresses with matching capes, gloves and shoes and they had all had their hair done. The boys were in suits and the twins, Tunga and Tangi, were in matching white three piece suits with bow ties! We sat at the front with the choir and sang with them – we had taught the choir ‘Shine Jesus Shine’ specifically for this occasion but they weren’t very confidant so it ended up being an unintentional duet between me and Chelcie. Father Heinz did the communion for the candidates first and the first one was Desiree. She put the wafer in her mouth straight away just as he said to wait and that all the candidates should take it together. Desiree then fished her wafer out of her mouth and held it again. Everyone who saw this took place lost it and got the giggles so to everyone who couldn’t see what was going on it looked like we were behaving very badly!
The whole community with the parents then had lunch together in the Dining Room. We went up to help the Kitchen Staff and had great fun serving the food. We had a competition between the Rice serving team against the Coleslaw team as to who could serve the quickest. Obviously mine and Chelcie’s rice team won! In the afternoon I went for a ride through the farm. Paul has found me a horse to ride and when Hannah was here we tried it out. It’s quite a crazy African horse but it was lovely to be back in the saddle. I asked Tate Johannes if it had a name which the answer was obviously no so I called him Donkeyba meaning Donkey in Damara.
Totally crazy that Parents Day is now finished. This was one of the few things we were told about on Training that we knew we would have to do. Throughout the year we have heard about it and how important the day was. There was a lot of pressure on us to put on good displays as well as to produce a good Musical. I had so much fun doing the art displays as well as doing the play and luckily the day wasn’t a huge anticlimax.
As usual love to everyone
Ottilie xx
Thursday, 16 August 2012
Part Thirty Seven: Party, Baboon and Performance (23rd – 29th July)
We had a ‘long weekend’ in that Carla and Hannah
taught our Monday lessons so we could continue with the Art Displays. For the
Europe board background (also two boards) we drew out a map of Europe and then
painted the countries different colours. Chelcie copied the map from an atlas
but then ‘Chelciefied’ it; this means that the countries size depended on how
much Chelcie liked it (massive England and Ireland) and some countries like
Kazakhstan seemed to mysteriously disappear and don’t feature on our map. I
tease her about this but we all know what would happen if I had to copy out the
map – I would probably still be doing it now I’m such a perfectionist!
The Art Room now longer looks like a classroom – all
the chairs have gone into storage with a couple of the tables and the rest have
been rearranged to create a shop. This means that all our Art lessons for the
next two weeks will take place outside or in other locations. For G3 this was
just too much excitement and the lesson was pretty chaotic. Luckily lots of
picnic tables have come out of storage and we have created a classroom outside
the art room so lessons shouldn’t be so unruly from now on.
At lunch time I went for a walk on the tar road
(meeting four warthogs) and was stopped by a tourist bus who was very concerned
about me. They seemed to think I was trying to walk to Outjo and wanted to give
me a lift and couldn’t understand that I was just walking to go for a walk as
opposed to trying to get somewhere!
We have started working in the Art Room after supper
in order to try and get everything completed. We stuck up all the children’s
Europe work on top of the map and started on the Australasia boards. One has a
black background with lots of Koru art work stuck on and the other one we have
created an Ayres rock on which we have stuck turtles and lizards which have
been done aborigine style. The Ayres rock has been made with literally sand
paper – paper covered in glue which we put in the sand outside the art room to
create authentic sand paper! Also very busy making and printing off name tags
to display next to the children’s work. I have started making the people for
the world – we painted a giant world on a piece of fabric in bright, block
colours which is going up on one of the walls. We are making 7 people to be
stuck up around the world; one representing each continent and they will be
wearing clothes traditional to a country from that country.
Europe – Greece (a toga
and green garland)
Africa – Namibia (body
paint and an Ovambo skirt)
Asia – China (a kimono)
North America – Hawaii
(sequin bikini, grass skirt and flower garland)
South America – Rio
(carnival outfit – sequin top, feathered skirt and mask)
Australasia – Australia
(t-shirt, shorts, cork hat and surf board)
Antarctica – Arctic
(snow suit)
All
the clothes are made from Material and so actually took ages to make. I painted
the body of the person the same colour as the continent was painted on the map,
so when they are stuck it will be really obvious where they come from. (Europe
– lilac, Africa –yellow, North America – orange, South America – light green,
Asia – dark green, Australasia – red and Antarctica – pink)
The Africa board is now completed as well. For the
background we stuck up loads of red African patterned material which looks very
effective. We then displayed G6’s silhouette work – sunset background with a
black tree or animal in the foreground, and G7’s charcoal drawings of African
trees. We decided that the Europe board didn’t have quite enough WOW factor so
subsequently some of it is becoming 3D. Each country has various drawings stuck
on to it and now some of the drawings are attached to half a loo roll so they
stick out. This was an absolute nightmare to achieve but the whole thing looks
a lot better. I had to use a mixture of glue, masking tape and selotape and
they still all repeatedly fell down until I thoroughly lost my sense of humour
with it all!
Matilda posted a picture today on Facebook of her
diary with 26th of August marked as ‘O coming home’. All very
exciting but can’t really believe it’s so soon. Flu has now hit Otjikondo and
most of our cast seem to be suffering – aghhh. Uapiona one of the four main
parts has lost his voice which isn’t very conductive to successful rehearsals! So
now we are trying to look after all the cast in order to make sure that they
all stay healthy and happy!
Friday was a bit weird – all of the teachers apart
from Mrs Vermaak, Ms Fabiola and Ken were away at workshops, meaning that we
had responsibility for Grades 1 to 4. We did PT for two Grades at a time while
the other two Grades watched a film, so it worked out quite well. In the
afternoon we had a dress rehearsal in front of Gilly - this was to determine
whether we were ready to perform and subsequently whether our first performance
to St Mike’s on Sunday would happen….or not. Despite Uapiona being unable to
sing, Paulus being in bed and a couple of out of tune songs we were deemed ready
for performance. Button Your Lip (Damian’s rap), Crow’s Button (Wlatraudt’s
solo) and the Irish Leprechaun Dance were absolutely brilliant and we were both
ecstatic. This was the first time that we had actually allowed Desvino
(Granddad) to eat on stage – we supplied him with a packet of biscuits and
sweets and he was marvellous. We also realised that we hadn’t yet worked out a
bowing sequence of an encore song which is customary so that was quickly
remedied. They will repeat the second half of ‘The Pgyama Button’ (the last
song) to bow to and then the encore song is ‘Button Your Lip’ with everyone
joining in on the chorus rather than just the three backing singers. This is a
risk as Damian still tends to rush but everyone enjoys singing the Chorus so much
that hopefully it will work out. Gilly rated us 95% ready however we are going
to change our set….
Just before TV started Byron arrived at our flat
with a two week old baby baboon! It was so, so, so, cute. He had called it
Thomas Philemo. When out hunting he had seen a lone baboon which means that it
is a male one so he shot it (they have way too many baboons here so this is a
form of population control) however, it turned out to be a female and there was
Thomas. Byron was giving it to a conservation trust and was just waiting for it
to be picked up. Thomas was like a really ugly little old man with a lot of
hair. He was really sweet and we would just cling to you- he was fascinated
with the collar of my jacket. His hands were amazing and he was just like a
little baby but apart from the fact that he was a baboon! The children did not
except our excuse for being late for TV and wouldn’t have believed us if a
couple of children hadn’t also met Thomas.
After TV we joined Paul, Sara and Byron (now minus
the baboon) to watch the Opening Ceremony of the Olympics. I can’t say I was
overly impressed. Despite everything being executed amazingly and the lighting
design being incredible, we all thought it was a bit random. I’m not sure if it
was just because we were watching from Namibia but the commentator was awfully
dull and much too quiet. The highlights for me were Mr Bean and fire beacons
right at the end which did make it worth staying up for, just. What were the
Germans wearing?
So, on Saturday morning it was time to redesign the
set. Before we had our window on the backdrop stage right and stage left we had
two ‘armchairs’ in fact two chairs draped with duvets. In between the chairs a
table and on the wall behind some photos and a painting Chelcie did. Gilly has
now given us two wicker chairs and a matching coffee table, a little desk and a
book shelf. We have hung a painting over the desk and Chelcie’s painting
(although amazing now doesn’t fit in with the rest of the set) has been
replaced with a lovely wooden clock. The bookshelf has been filled with books,
some DVDs and board games on top. The stage now looks a lot more filled and
much more like a home. I only hope the children like it….
On Saturday evening Hannah and Carla returned from
their Etosha trip where they had spent two days with Aileen, having had a great
time, and we had Hannah’s leaving party. We decided it was time for another
fancy dress party and Chelcie and I became matching Aborgine people/African
warriors, Carla was an African witch doctor and Hannah was a clown complete
with an Elephants head! I made a curry and Chelcie a syrup cake and we had a
great evening.
On Sunday both my Intermediate and Advanced
Recorders played in Church and they performed really well. They usually get
quite nervous and it never sounds that good but I played with them both and it
worked really well so I was extremely happy. In the afternoon it was our
opening night of……The Button Box! We were starting at 3:00 but the lorry with
St Mikes aboard turned up at 2:00 which momentarily through us until Sara sent
them all to watch TV. Our first hurdle was to discover that we were missing two
cast members. Firstly Tuhafeni who declared he was too ill to perform, the
children all said there was nothing wrong with him but when I went to talk to
him he said he was ill and couldn’t perform. Frankly, it was his loss not ours.
The second person missing was Robertine. In the holiday she was bitten by a dog
so she has been going to have lots of injections this term. She had gone to have
one and hadn’t bothered to tell us. We were both seething. Luckily, Waltraudt
said she knew all of her parts and she managed to fill in beautifully twice.
Tuhafeni’s absence we just had to ignore. We then opened the curtain to show
the cast their new set and the ‘wows’ from the children confirmed it clearly
that they approved of our decisions. St Mike’s were a hard audience to perform
to as they didn’t particularly respond to us but for a first performance I was
very proud of them. It was completely flat but nothing major went wrong. The
main four weren’t really acting which meant that the whole thing lacked life.
Damian forgot his words at the start of the rap but then recovered brilliantly.
The Uncle Tom Duet was horribly out of tune but luckily that was it. Kenisha
sang her solo the best she has ever done it and it was stunning and once again
the Crows Button and Irish Leprechaun dance were brilliant. Damian was really
reluctant to do his song as the encore and bless him was totally petrified but
I managed to persuade him that he could do it and he proved me right. I really,
really love that boy.
We came back to the flat and just collapsed –
totally exhausted. Home in four weeks. This time next week Parents Day will be
over – aghh, lots to get done still before then. Once again a very busy week
which seems to have flown by. I could really do with a time machine at the
moment just to slow everything down as everything seems to be speeding up. Love
and hugs to everyone
Love Ottilie xxxx
Wednesday, 15 August 2012
Part Thirty Six: Preparations (16th – 22nd July)
Monday morning started with Finger Painting with
Wings Art which they really enjoyed; when we sent them back to class not only
were faces, heads and shoes covered in paint but we were exhausted! It was
absolutely freezing so as the children played football Chelcie and I walked
laps up and down the pitch, much to the bafflement and amusement of the
children, in order to keep warm.
With the G3’s, G4’s and G5’s lessons we did Origami
in Art to add to the Asia board – with the G3’s whales, G4’s penguins and the
G5’s birds. They all enjoyed it although the G3s were significantly better (I’m
sure nothing to do with the fact that the whales were a lot less complicated to
make!). They all started off on a practice piece of paper and then they made
their real ones on different brightly coloured paper. With the scraps of paper
they then made little animals so at the end of the class we ended up with
families of animals! With my boys craft group we made Chinese Lanterns which we
hang underneath the Asia board and they look really good. Figo (G4) turned up
to my Craft group for the second week running which was incredibly impressive –
these are the only two times he has come in the last two terms; I think he has
heard rumours of a craft party at the end of term!
Our G3 music class was very lively and we taught
them 3 new songs – “She sat on her hammock and played her guitar”, “I’m taking
home a little baby bumble bee” and “John Brown’s body lies amouldering in the
grave” which they loved. I’m very aware that all the songs I have taught them
involves someone or something dying and there are a lots of worms featured! Not
really sure what this tells you about my childhood and what my parents taught
me! The new GAPs are going to find the children’s repertoire of songs very
bizarre and maybe slightly inappropriate?!
My G7 boys turned up to Remedial definitely not in a
conductive working mood and were much more interested in the laptop in the next
door room where Carla and Hannah were making our 3D Big Ben. They were very
un-amused at the boy’s behaviour; luckily I am more used to them and could see
the funny side of it. At the moment they are being pushed so hard for their exams
that they are exhausted and I don’t feel the need to push them quite so hard in
Remedial and am happy to relax a little bit. I also know which battles aren’t
worth fighting!
I have now also worked out the perfect sleeping
arrangement to keep me properly warm at night; I have a blanket under my sheet,
I’m sleeping inside a silk sleepliner with a blanket on top, then my duvet and
then another blanket. Also when necessary I can add a jumper and hot water
bottle. I think it’s going to be a real shock to my body when I come home and
it’s not sunny every day. Going to need to invest in some warm jumpers!
On Thursday, while collecting the Irish Sashes from
the Costume Room I managed to fall of a stool and ripped my black jeans all the
way down the inside of the right thigh which was a bit of a disaster. All my
clothes are dying on me and not really sure what I’m going to wear for the rest
of this term!
On Thursday afternoon we had the G7 behavioural
meeting which was very entertaining. All the hostel staff, teachers, Mrs
Vermaak and Gilly met in the staff room after lunch to discuss the G7s. Between
us we had to fill in a form about each child which would be sent to their
prospective high schools. This included things like their behaviour in class,
in the hostel, respect for teachers, and compatibility with other learners…For
each category we had to stay whether they were excellent, above average,
average, below average or awful. It was a very amusing meeting as everyone had
their favourites who they stuck up for fiercely and there were a number of
disagreements. Certain people dismissed the child if they weren’t academically
capable and others who could see past this were fighting their cause. We also
had to decide which High Schools they were going to apply to. The children had
already indicated schools that they were interested in but we had to check that
they were financially viable as well as if they were academic enough to get in
and if not make other suggestions. Out of all the children Diodores caused the
most controversy and disagreement. Ken and Rob were very pro him even going as
far as saying he could have been Head Boy (even I think this is going a little
far) but Mrs Vermaak and a couple of other teachers were very down on him – he
isn’t bright and at the moment his average is only 43% so he will really
struggle getting a high school place. I am so protective over him and won’t let
him go undefended if people are criticising him. I ended up going bright red
and very hot fighting his cause and Gilly and Chelcie were laughing at me.
Luckily he has ended up with a very good behavioural report which should help
his High School application. I really want to get him into Outjo High School as
Brenden (his best friend) is going there and is sensible as well as lots of
other people from Otjikondo so there will be people to look out for him. His
best friend, Sagittarius, from last year is also there along with other boys so
lots of people to look after him. It also means when I come back I could visit
him!
We were very cheeky and during G3 music and Wings PT
we got the children to clean the bid display boards which we would use to
display the children’s art work for Parents Day. On Friday and Saturday we
spent the whole day camped out in the Art Room working on the North and South
America boards. We have one board for North America and two for South. The
North America board is a city sky line (New York) and it will have the G7’s
collages displayed on top. It’s all done in black and white except some of the
windows that are painted colours and it looks really effective. The South
America boards have become a rainforest. We dyed tissues light and dark green
which we stuck over balls of tissue to make a 3D background. We didn’t have any
dye so we mixed paint and water together and used that to dye the tissue which
worked really well, the only issue was it worked rather too well and we ended
up green too. We then added vines and giant leaves before displaying flowers,
butterflies and frogs which the G1’s and G2’s coloured in. The butterflies are
attached to pipe cleaners so it looks as if they are flying away. I’m uber
happy with how these two have turned out as they are just how we pictured them
in our heads when we planned it all. We have now also stuck up the ‘hello’
words in different languages upon the walls which looks good – they are either
orange, yellow, purple or red and really pop out on our cream walls.
Friday is keyboard lesson day – as usual Theopoldine
progressed really well and we learnt a new piece. Revonia on the hand seems to
have gone backwards again. I have made the decision to give up on teaching her
to read music and teach her by heart – this is how she learns the recorder and
I think she will enjoy it more if we give up the reading music battle.
The norm here is that various children end up
wearing my jumpers when I’ve taken them off. Friday night was no different and
Damian was curled up in my lax jacket – it looked slightly like a dress on him.
The only difference to normal was that I was wearing Diodores jumper – he had
given it to me after the matches at St Michaels to wash as it was black (it’s
supposed to be white) and then I put it in the kitchen to give back to him.
However, this meant that when I was leaving the house without a jumper I would
see it and just end up wearing it. It is a really comfy fleece and to be honest
I think he quite likes me wearing it although he pretends to be outraged!
Having promised to sing weekly until we leave
Chelcie and I sang ‘Lord of all Hopefulness’ in Church accompanied by Hannah on
the piano, which went well. My Intermediate recorders played ‘Amazing Grace’ on
the recorders, which was interesting. At the end of the service Chelcie, Hannah
and I sang outside for ages. We made Gilly nostalgic for her school days as we
were singing lots of different English hymns from my Marlborough hymn book. We
have also started to teach the children ‘Shine, Jesus Shine’ which was an
instant hit and is now going to be used in the First Communion service. Before lunch I went for a run and on the way
back to Otjikondo I got clapped by a group of tourists who had got out of their
car on the road side. Quite embarrassing! We went for a braai at Paul and
Sara’s and Peter and Byron were also there which was really fun. We haven’t
seen Peter since we stayed at Ohorongo in October! Everyone was on really good
form and it was great fun.
I really can’t believe this brings me to the end of
another week at Otjikondo. Time really does seem to fly when you most want it
to slow down – not only do I not want my time here to finish but there seems to
be an inordinate amount of things to do before Parents Day. Sundays are now
very scary days as the each week it is one less week until we fly home. At the
start of this year Wednesdays were very special days as we would exclaim “I
can’t believe that we’ve been away for three whole weeks!” it seems ages ago
since we started counting in months rather than weeks! Love to you all as
usual, soon you can be talking to me in person rather than reading blog to hear
all my news, can’t wait!
Love Me xxxx
Thursday, 9 August 2012
Part Thirty Five: Rehearsal, rehearsal, rehearsal and St Mike’s (8th – 15th July)
Having said that now we have internet I would be
able to post my blog more regularly, I feel slightly awful only sitting down to
write this now (today is the 9th of August), my only excuse is that
I have been incredibly busy. Luckily I write my diary in great detail so
hopefully you won’t miss out on anything. And better late than never?!
Luckily, the antibiotics worked very quickly and I
soon started to feel more like myself (I was about to write feel more normal
but I can’t say I ever feel normal!). On the afternoon of the 8th we
had our much anticipated full run thorough of the play in front of Sara. This
would determine whether rehearsal would continue or whether all our hard work
would be scrapped. Luckily we got through without any major mishaps and it was
deemed a success, a much lacking energy and pizazz success but still a success.
Hannah and Carla (who the children call Miss Colour!) also watched and wrote us
an objective list of things to work on to add to our already lengthy one! Much
to my delight Glenn also made it back in time to join in with the performance.
This week I worked with Damian daily in order to
improve his Rap. When he speaks naturally he has a bit of a stammer and he is
very under confident but I love him dearly. I was working with him especially
as everyone who has watched the play says that his song is the weakest and I
could no longer make excuses for him. I was getting him to slow down so that
the audience would have a chance of understanding what he was saying as well as
keeping the energy up so that it was interesting to watch. Suddenly, something
clicked and he got it. Not really sure how or why but I couldn’t have been more
proud of him. Ruben who sings the solo in ‘Uncle Jack’s Button’ is now going to
say his solo rather than sing it which is a shame. He has a lovely voice which
is why we cast him originally but he can’t project it and suffers dreadfully
from nerves. At least when he says it we get some life to the song – this is
the other one that lets the play down. Hopefully it will work better this way. Xunta-I
and Vanessa have always struggled with the tuning of their duet – we have
admitted defeat on this one and are going to have Evangelina and Tuyambeka
singing behind Vanessa in the Wings and Albertha and Waldraudt behind Xunta-I.
Not having any armchairs we have made big normal
chairs into armchairs by covering them with a duvet each which surprisingly doesn’t
look too bad. We have borrowed some cushions from Gilly and Granny and Grandpa
should be rather comfortable! On Friday’s rehearsal Damian showed the rest of
the cast his huge improvement and he was my star player. I ended up throwing a
glass of water in Diina and Uapiona’s face. During the first scene they run in
having been in a downpour and they weren’t doing it well so I thought it might
help them to be actually wet! It did help but they didn’t appreciate it!
The preparations for Parents Day were still full on –
during Wings’ art lesson we drew out words in bubble writing saying ‘Hello’ in
lots of different languages – Bonjour, Hola, Privet, Saalam, which they then
painted. With the G3s we carried on with the Europe work – they all had different
pictures of things that European countries are famous for. For example a pizza
for Italy, the Eiffel Tower for France and a cauldron full of goulash for
Hungary! We have also finished our painting of the world map ready for the wall
and now we just need to make the people. With G7 we started doing collages for
the North America board – Brendon and I worked together on a baseball cap with
L.A on the front. This put Diodores in a foul mood as Brendon got to sit with
me alone (it was because everyone else had a partner and he was the last one
and the odd one out so he became my partner) and he had to work with Milla.
Bless him, he was acting like a 3 year old but luckily I saw the funny side of
it!
I had a very amusing conversation with my advanced
recorder group. I mentioned how I had heard from Mummy saying that she was tidying
my room and all the children said how much they missed her and could they skype
her, which was really sweet. Kenisha (the head girl) then asked me “What if she
finds condoms?” which made me laugh a lot.
This week has been absolutely freezing and on Monday
morning and I had to do a lot of running around in PT in order to feel my body!
The bitter wind was really unappreciated. Luckily my lacrosse jacket has now
arrived which I have pretty much lived in since. It wards off the wind and
makes me very cosy, unfortunately Diodores has also discovered this. If I take
it off even for a moment, it disappears and before I know it Diodores is
wearing it! I had a great game of football with the G7s and took an inordinate
amount of exercise – I’m good at getting to the ball but then I struggle to
kick it!
Chelcie and I joined our craft groups together to
get lots of hammer bead coasters made for Parents Day. The children made them
and then we ironed the ones which looked good! Neither of us can understand the
children’s fascination with the colour brown – it is really rather
unattractive! Hannah then used up all the brown colours and made me a beautiful
brown heart with a yellow x on which is now stuck on our fridge! With my Boys
playgroup I made bookmarks and their colouring in was a lot better than the
girls had done the week before.
On Wednesday we decided to have a music day and
instead of during Art with G1 and G2 we did singing. We sang all the songs we’ve
done with G3 and G4 in music as well as ‘Old Macdonald’, ‘If you’re happy and
you know it’ and ‘The Wheels on the bus go round and round’. In between these
lessons we had music with Kindergarten, with my voice rapidly disappearing, which
once again was great fun. We took along the bells again and taught them all ‘I
am the music man’ which they all enjoyed. They are all really sweet and it’s
great fun teaching them.
On Wednesday night Glenn had another episode and
Gilly took her home to her Father in Khorixas on Thursday morning. We only
found this out after she left and I was devastated to hear this as I never had
a chance to say goodbye. On Monday she had made me a card saying how much she
loved me and asking if I would still be her pen pal when I went home. I reassured
her saying that of course I would and I would give her all my details before I
left, and I never got a chance to. The school have decided that she should live
at home and go to school in Khorixas until she is totally better. If this
happens she is welcome to come back for G7 but only if it is totally sorted.
Gilly told us in confidence that Glenn’s father had told her that in the
holidays he had finally got her birth certificate from her Mother (they are separated)
and is name wasn’t on it. Glenn subsequently found out that her father wasn’t her
birth father and they think the stress of not knowing whether he still loves
her or not is causing these attacks. Hopefully living with her father for a
while will reassure her and she will get better.
Did some rehearsing for the BOOF song (Build Our Own
Future) and selected some solosists. We don’t know if Laurie will be able to
use them but we need to have 2 for soprano and 2 for alto just in case. We
selected Joyce and Kenisha for the sopranos and Albertha and Debbie-Debs for
the alto one.
Hannah went on Facebook and discovered that she and
Matilda have about 60 mutual friends and she is really good friends with Hugo
Cod which is so bizarre! Hannah, Chelcie and I played the dictionary game using
my Kindle dictionary, which is very lengthy, which was brilliant fun. There was
no TV this weekend as the children had been noisy in Friday night supper and
Sister Cornelia punished them. Little bit mean in my opinion but it meant we
ended up playing a great game of ‘Who’s in the Bag’ which was very entertaining
– mostly as I hadn’t a clue about who most of them were much to the amusement
of Chelcie and Hannah.
Saturday was an absolutely incredible day. Happy
birthday to Sam and Zim! We left at 7:30 for St Michaels on the back on the
cattle truck along with the U11s, U12s, and U13 netball and football teams as
well as an overage football team. This was the ‘second half’ of the match that
we played at the start of the term. We played full matches but the score was
continued (this meant that we were start off at a loss for all the matches
apart from the U12 football and the overage which hadn’t been started yet). The
drive there was absolutely freezing and it was very difficult to stay upright.
Chelcie and I ended upstanding in the middle of the truck hugging each other
with Johannes (G4) nestled between us and his blanket wrapped around us. I held
the blanket up and Chelcie held on to the top rail to balance us – it was a
successful way to remain standing until we turned into the drive. St Mikes have
an 8km drive which is filled with pot holes. I had Marvelous clinging on to me
to balance (not a good idea) and as the whole truck lurched everyone would just
grab whoever was nearest to try and remain up right. I failed. I ended up on
the floor with various children on top of me and I decided it was easier to
stay that way! The atmosphere on the truck was brilliant- everyone was raring
to go and singing at the top of their voices. I was confident it would be a fun
day out.
The Netball matches were all very tense and exciting
to watch – did I just say that about a netball match?! The U11s played
brilliantly and won their match qualifying for the finals at Outjo. The U12
match was so tense – we were on form and soon we were drawing, today the teams
seemed to be very evenly matched and as soon as one team scored the other team
would draw even again. We ended up having two lots of extra times as they kept
on drawing, sadly we just lost out losing 22-21 but they fought well. Let’s not
mention the U13 team… By now the boys were raring to go and we started off well
however they were better and the U11s just missed out. However our U12 team vanquished
St Mikes and everyone was happy. Once again better not to mention the U13s – to
be fair to us there team included 8 regional players. In particular John played
incredibly – he captains the U11 team but then went on to play for the U12s and
U13s without a break. We then had the overage match with the likes of Brenden,
Diodores, Abner and Tjirondwauvi playing along with the help of Ken and Rob.
Luckily they made us proud and we won easily.
We also went to see where Sam lives (the Project
Trust volunteer at St Mikes), it wasn’t as nice as where we live but we are
jolly lucky. While we were watching the football we had little St Mike’s girls
playing with our hair. They were talking about us as if we couldn’t speak
English and it was very funny. They were calling us ‘boers’ which is an
Afrikaaner, and they were saying how if they were at Otji they would come and
play with our hair every day. They said we should just stay at St Mikes but
then all the Otji children would cry! It was very amusing. It was then time to
go home….what I hadn’t reckoned for as we left in the freezing cold was that
the sun would eventually come out. I returned resembling a lobster. Not a good
look. By now I was absolutely exhausted from all the cheering and the sun and I
curled up at the back of the truck between Diodores and Chelcie. Everyone was
in extremely high spirits and it was another great journey.
In the evening we went for supper at Paul and Sara’s
– there were lots of jokes made at the expense of my face: “Do we need to take
a torch with us?” “No, Ottilie’s face will guide us through the dark”! Not amusing
at all. Sara made lasagne and chocolate mousse which made me very happy and
made up for all the jokes. Lasagne is one of my favourites and I haven’t eaten
it in the last 11 months. This will be my first meal home with peas – please Mummy!
On Sunday I read in Church, luckily my face wasn’t too
red due to the vast quantities of after sun I had smothered on during the
night. I spent the rest of the morning writing out recorder music which is not
one of my favourite activities but it is necessary. In the afternoon we had a
great run through of The Button Box with Ms Laurencia watching who was very
impressed. It was a really fun weekend overall and a very busy week.
Time to say goodbye now and I shall fill you in on
the next week as soon as possible. I am sitting outside the classrooms on a
picnic bench at the moment and Dankie has just come running over to give me a
big hug which was sweet. He is looking rather interesting in a bright yellow
hoodie and his Matilda green cords! I love him none the less.
Lots of love to everyone
Me xxxx
Saturday, 7 July 2012
Part Thirty Four: Out Weekend and tonsillitis; the best of combinations! (29th June – 7th July)
Definitely the least planned Out Weekend of all time but turned out to be an amazing weekend nonetheless. I had planned to go home with Glenn but obviously due to her illness this wasn’t an option anymore. Chelcie and I decided to hitch to Outjo on the Friday and then spend the rest of the weekend finishing everything else that we needed to do for the Button Box – finish costumes, props and backdrop.
As we were walking out to the road we watched three cars drive past and thought we wouldn’t have much trouble hitching a lift. As soon as were at the road there was obviously no traffic but we started walking towards Outjo rather than just stand there and after about 15 minutes we got a lift. We got into a cab of a lorry with two guys who were driving from Oshakati to Windhoek and had been driving since 5am. It was one of our more comfortable rides although Chelcie managed to rid the inside of her jeans as she got into the cab! We saw so many warthogs on our journey so we started to count – on the way to and from Outjo (1h 45m in total) we saw 91 warthogs! Apparently you always see lots in winter but this is a crazy number!
We went straight to the Bank where we had to queue for ages as it was the end of month and therefore everyone was taking money out. We then went to the Post Office – Gilly had given us 110 letters which she had asked us to buy stamps for and post. To send to Europe you need $5.40 stamps however they only had 56 of these and therefore the rest of the letters needed 3 stamps to make the right amount of postage not forgetting the air mail sticker on top. This meant that between us we licked 332 stamps! Our tongues were soooo dry by the end of us and we rushed to buy drinks to recover! We went to print off photos and I asked the man to look at my camera. This is the one I bought a month ago to replace my stolen one – for some reason last night when I tried to upload my photos or charge it nothing happened. He told me that the bit inside the camera was in broken so I’m back to square one again without a camera and more money down the drain – very annoying.
It was very weird being in Outjo and not totally overexcited about using the Internet. Also probably the last time that we will be here....agh! We ended up in The Farmhouse for lunch and all of last year’s Grade 7 boys walked past. It was so lovely to see them and it was so sweet that they were all together especially as two were wearing Otjikondo t-shirts! They were such a wonderful year and it was great to catch up as we had missed them. We then started walking back to Otjikondo via the Garage to buy a calypso which was very welcome in the midday sun. We were passed by the Swiss Teachers and we stopped for a chat with them before saying our Goodbyes again.
We managed to get a lift to the turning towards Kamanjab pretty much straight away. We were picked up by a lovely Afrikaans couple – he had been to school with Mrs Vermaak at Outjo and had lived at Otjikondo with his wife for two years when it was still a police station. They were really lovely and invited us to come and stay with them for a night and said if we didn’t get another lift just to ring them and they would come and pick us up. This was all without giving us their name or number but they were really lovely. I get bored of just standing by the road waiting for a lift so we started walking and walking and walking some more without a car in sight. We got passed by a couple of cars containing the children who were leaving school and were extremely excited to see us. (On Monday we got asked if we walked the whole way back, obviously we lied and said yes and the children now think we walked the 90km home!) Luckily, we managed to get a lift in the end on the back of a combi. It was pretty comfortable as were sitting on some tyres but that made us pretty high up and as a result I had tears running down my face the whole way home because of the wind! I say down but I actually mean sideways as the wind was so strong. When we got to St Michaels we stopped in a stopover for a bit and it turned out that one of the guys in the front was Amor’s, from G3, father. We got talking to him and he was asking where we had been in Namibia. He was shocked that we haven’t been to Epupa Falls, somewhere be both would love to go, and said he was going to take us. When we got back to Otjikondo he took my number so we could keep in contact and arrange a time when he would take us. I’ve now had various texts and calls from Harry which I’ve ignored as I feel weird texting someone’s who I teach father and according to Paul we would have to pay in some way or another for the trip!
Reiner has been awarded the equivalent of an MBE from Germany which is absolutely incredible. He deserves it so much as all the work that he has done is absolutely incredible. Apparently it’s even more special as Reiner is actually a Namibian citizen and therefore it’s much more complicated for him to be awarded this as it has to go through loads of different things to be approved. I’m so glad that he’s getting the recognition that he deserves.
On Saturday morning we managed to get everything done that we wanted which was a first. I finished making the costumes which was a massive relief as I seem to have had a needle permanently attached to my hand this term. Chelcie finished the window for the backdrop which looks absolutely amazing and I’m really exciting to get it up. I also made a table, sorted Grandma’s costume with Aune and glued the handle onto the Button Box.
We decided to go for a Picnic bicycle ride at lunch time. We borrowed Paul and Sara’s bikes and set off with a rucksack containing a blanket, ipod and speaker, salad, yoghurt and water. Chelcie was on Sara’s bike which had Helena’s baby seat in front and therefore she could only pedal with her legs sideways and looked hilarious. I was on Paul’s bike which was MASSIVE for me and my arms could hardly reach the handles so it wasn’t the most comfortable of rides. We went on the tar road towards Kamanjab and stopped under a tree for our picnic. It was really nice and good to be outside and away from the school and then we came back again.
Roland came over at 4 with Max. Although we’ve been in contact we haven’t seen Roland and Max (his dog) since Oktoberfest which was eight months ago. Max who was just a puppy then has tripled in size at least and they were both in brilliant form. It was really great to catch up and we had an amazing time. We had organised to stay in the girls hostel that night as some of the children hadn’t gone home and they wanted us to come for a sleepover. We said that we would come over at 9 as we thought that Roland would just stay for an early supper, sadly we had to let down the girls as Roland was here until 4am! We had a really fun night and it was great to chill.
The first day of July was very relaxed, I spent the morning in bed before having a clear up and clean of my room. We went for a very relaxed braai at Paul and Sara’s who quickly discovered how hung-over we were and found it very funny that as Roland was leaving Helena had woken them up! Can’t say we got much done in the afternoon either but we watched Harry Potter 2 and our lights were out by 8:30 having planned lessons for the upcoming week. Didn’t think that the weekend would be that spectacular but it was very enjoyable.
I really can’t believe that June is over; I said that May had gone in a flash so June must have gone in a flicker. Chelcie pointed out that it was half way through the year, I said we were half way months ago but she said half way through 2012. That is the craziest thing ever and really sure how it’s happened but it has. At the end of 6 months I did ‘Best Sister Writing Award’ and the outcome was 1st place: Cluny with 6 letters, 2nd place: Lou Lou with 5 letters and 3rd place: Matilda with 3 letters. Matilda has since requested that I re-award this so as of today.....
1st Place: Cluny with 11 letters (I’ve sent 15 letters)
2nd Place: Matilda and Lou Lou joint with 6 letters! (I’ve sent Matilda 10 and Lou Lou 8 letters)
Other records for the month are I cried once (has to be an all time low – Chelcie note The Wanted reference!), read six books, wrote 34 letters and received 8 (dismal effort from you guys! Although to be fair we’ve only got post twice this month so not sure whether you’ve all stopped writing to me or whether they just haven’t been collected), saw 91 warthogs in a day, became legal in Namibia with two months to go, went running with two giraffes and generally did way too much sewing!
HAPPY BIRTHDAY STAIGHTY! I really can’t believe that this time last year we had just got back from Tenerife, was going to Leavers Ball and actually leaving school. So much has happened in a year, it seems totally crazy that it wasn’t longer ago.
All the children returned from the Out Weekend full of beans, actually as if they were full of magic beans. They had SO much energy but all were very happy as well which was lovely. I spent Monday morning erecting the Backdrop with the help of Ivan. We nailed our ‘wall’ to the actual wall and then stuck the window to our ‘wall’ and then hung the window frame over the top. Later Chelcie and I glued the border to the ‘wall’ and it’s now complete and I’m really happy with how it looks.
Sadly Tuesday arrived with the onset of tonsillitis which really didn’t make me happy at all. I really think I’ve had enough illness this year and not sure I can cope with any more. Gilly returned from Swakop on Wednesday evening and brought me some antibiotics after I’d talked to the doctor on the phone – my fifth lot in 10 months. Definitely think I could do with having my tonsils removed once I’m home.
Spent the week in Art starting to cut out work and mount it ready to display which is actually very time consuming but strangely therapeutic, maybe that’s just because I’m feeling quite out of it at the moment. I had the idea of making a huge world map on a piece of fabric which would go up on one of the walls above the cupboards. Chelcie drew it out using her own scale and with the help of Diina and Paulus we have painted each continent in a different block colour which looks really good. It looks a bit like a giant risk board. We just need to paint the sea and then we are going to make some people to go around the edge which we are going to make clothes for – one or two to represent each continent. So for example the Asia people might wear a kimono or have one for Europe in top hat and tails. I think it will look really effective on the wall and the G7s will have fun helping us to do it.
On Wednesday afternoon we had a full run through of the Button Box in preparation to showing Sara and.....it went REALLY WELL! There is still plenty to work on but the energy was heaps better, they remembered the dances and most of the time when to come in and generally it was just a success. Very happy. Afterwards we tried their costumes in which had mixed reactions from them – they weren’t very keen on the Indian clothes but loved the African ones we had taken from Impi Ntombi. The boys refused to wear waistcoats without tops underneath to be sailors so we’ve comprised and let them wear little vest tops. Ruben who is Uncel Jack the Sailor Captain cried when he saw his sailor top as for some reason he thought he was going to be dressed as a pirate?! Luckily the next day I took him again to try it on and he has said he will wear it and I managed to find a sailor cap to go with it which he likes.
Swiss Family Robinson arrived in the post which was SO EXCITING. This is one of my all time favourite films and I was so shocked that Chelcie hadn’t watched it that I asked Mummy to send it out! We had a great evening enjoying it and both agreed that with the right person we could quite happily live there.
Thursday afternoon I retired to bed and I awoke on Friday sounding like Darth Vader. Spent the day in bed reading and feeling generally miserable L! Luckily on Saturday woke up feeling slightly more human and the drugs seem to be kicking in. On Friday evening Hannah and Carla arrived....Hannah is 24, from Northumberland and is taking a year off from work to travel and has come to Otjikondo for a couple of weeks. Carla is 18 from Germany and is here for 6 weeks which brings us to the end of term - AGHHHHH. They are both really nice and it will be fun having people here with us again.
I have finally heard my accommodation for next year and after much anticipation I’m going to be living in Holland Halls which was my first choice so that’s very exciting. The most exciting thing is that Hen is also going to Holland so there will be a friendly face about. Chelcie and I spent a break time looking at our respective University websites (she is studying Marketing at Durham) and freaking out. Seems very frightening so just trying not to think about it all! Sending love to everyone in my beautiful Darth Vader voice!
Love from Me xxxx
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