Monday morning started with me giving a drugs talk! Once again I was teaching for Ken on Monday and Tuesday as he sat the last of his exams – the Police Inspector had kindly left his colourful poster and it was up to me to take the Grade 6s through it. I won’t lie....I definitely was learning new things as I was teaching them, for instance did you know that all cannabis plants have an odd number of leaves. The children took this piece of information to mean that a green plant with an odd number of leaves is cannabis and I was brought various specimens of cannabis throughout the day! Mondays mean triple Grade Five which is always a struggle. By the third lesson they had way too much energy to be conductive so I sent them out to do 3 laps of the football pitch and they returned with slightly less energy. Grade 6 agriculture was really satisfying – I started with a test on everything that we had covered last week and they had remembered it all which made me very happy. Grade 7 agriculture was a slight shambles as they knew they had a test in science next with me and were panicking about it so I did a quick recap for them. I really wanted them all to pass as the test was on Scientific Processes which is what I had taught them and therefore their marks would reflect my teaching.
Monday afternoon as incredible weather and I decided it was too nice to waste on sitting inside playing the recorder. Instead we played hide and seek and this crazy African game where one person has a stick and tries to hit everyone else with it on the bum?! Not really sure I got the finer details of this! Glenn is one of the girls in G6 and in my advanced recorder group. She asked me before to go home with her for the Out Weekend and we talked again about it properly and I said I would love to go. I really excited about going home with her as she is so lovely and it will be fascinating to stay with a Damara family. On Monday evening I stayed in the Art Room and skyped Staighty which was lovely. She is the only friend that I’ve actually managed to talk to out here and that was on New Years Eve. It was so great to be able to talk ‘face to face’ with her, being able to have an actual conversation is so much more satisfying than just communicating through leaving messages for each other on the internet or writing letters or texts. It was brilliant to hear what has been going on at home and to be able to share some of my news with her. I was also talking to Zim which was brilliant although he was in a ‘Grahamstown funk’ which I had to get him out of. As he knows I only have one joke which he doesn’t find funny – “What do you call a donkey with three legs?”..... “A wonky”! So I was googling jokes to try and amuse him. I then felt really sad sitting in a dark art room by myself in the middle of Africa, freezing cold and laughing out loud at jokes such as “Why does the elephant wear red shoes?”.... “Because his white ones were dirty”! So thought it was time to go back to the flat – a perilous journey without a torch!
Tuesday was brilliant – having nearly turned into an icicle last Tuesday I literally put on most my wardrobe in order to survive another three double periods of agriculture. However, it turned out to be a lovely day so I shed my layers and switched my hoody and cashmere gloves with Diodores in exchange for his cap so I wouldn’t get burnt! I sat on a bench sewing costumes for the drama while talking to the boys who would take it in turn to go and do some work and then come back to chat. A really lovely morning. In the evening after study we had an extra drama rehearsal for the Belly Button Boogie – the children really love this song as the music is so energetic and the dance is great fun. I always get such a high when we practise this as it makes me so happy and gives me a buzz.
Wednesday was Mrs Vermaak’s and Ms Laurencia’s birthday so at break time we had a celebration with the BEST carrot cake ever. It was absolutely incredible and cake at 9:00 is always very welcome! Thursday was a day of sewing for me and painting for Chelcie as Catherine and Jordan took our lessons so that we would have the time to try and get some things finished for the play. We also got a new kettle as we’ve worked out that it was our kettle that kept on fusing the electricity when Catherine and Jordan took it to the art room and managed to cut out the electricity all over the school! Our new one is very smart and lime scale free but we will miss our old one which used to just turn itself on randomly which we always considered a prompt for a tea break – if the kettle realised we needed a break it must be time for one!
HAPPY BIRTHDAY to Granny Paul today (22st June) – really hope that she’s doing something amazing to celebrate her 80th birthday. Wish I could spend the day with you or at least talk to you on the telephone but my thoughts are with you none the less.
On Friday afternoon we had the most DISASTROUS drama rehearsal ever which produced tears in my eyes and great frustration from the both of us. We wanted to have a run through of the first half which would give us an indication of how much work we had left to – the answer was everything. I have never been so bored watching a performance, the main four gave dismal performances needing to be prompted every other sentence and Aune, who plays Grandma, had a two year old temper tantrum and refused to put any effort into anything. No one remembered when to enter or what the dances were and the whole thing was a shambles. Sara arrived and gave them all a pep talk and said that the weekend after the out weekend she would be coming to watch a full run through and expected great results – more pressure. The children just aren’t taking it seriously enough at the moment; they are acting like there is lots of time left rather than just a few weeks. There’s not much more that Chelcie and I can do, at some point the results have to come from them and they have to realise that they have to put the work in if they want to have a good show and not get it cancelled. After this Chelcie and were very downhearted and the last thing we felt like doing was TV for the kids so we went and organised to switch with Alberthina would cover for us and we would do it on Saturday instead. We went to the shop and bought chocolate and then made a picnic of egg and bacon rolls, popcorn, cut up apples and oranges and chocolate! We made a massive bed on my floor where we then curled up and watched Disney films. A very fun night and an effective way to cheer ourselves up!
Saturday was a really unexpected lovely day. There was no official cleaning today but with the help of my girls we managed to turn the Art Room back into an acceptable state in 45 minutes and sharpen all the pencils and colours ready for next week. The reason there was no cleaning was that St Michaels were arriving at 9:00 to play football and netball matches against our U11, U12 and U13 teams. We looked incredibly smart in our green and white sports uniforms....unfortunately although we looked better turned out than St Michaels they had the talent! We lost every single match apart from the U12 football. Our only excuse is that they have double as many children in those grades so more children to pick from but it was pretty dismal and I think they will now be training harder from now on. At lunch time we did our May face painting (I know it’s nearly the end of June but things have got a bit delayed for one reason or another) – we each had an “S” on our face and we had a piece of paper in between us saying “O”. So we spelt out SOS as we were thinking of May Day in the ship sense! We did Bank and shop in the afternoon and then watched Duma with the children during TV. I was reading my book at the back amongst a couple of the G7 boys and looked up at the part when a boy is fighting of crocodiles trying to get out of a lake where he was swimming and I embarrassingly ended up clinging to Bredon’s (deputy head boy) arm in fright! Luckily, he didn’t seem to mind and is by now thoroughly used to me being scared of everything.
On Sunday I ended up having to read in Church as Ken didn’t turn up. I had helped Brendon with his reading during the week but obviously hadn’t looked at Ken’s so ended up reading it for the first time out loud in Church but thankfully it went okay. It was Sara’s birthday so we ended up there for a birthday lunch which was lovely. We had Indian which not only was scrummy but also a very welcome change. We both had wine hoping that it would relax us sufficiently for the drama rehearsal at 3.30. It wasn’t quite as disastrous as Friday but not much better. In that we now have one person who is taking it seriously – Desvino who plays Grandad, love that boy so much at the moment. However, at the end of the rehearsal we were just mucking around singing along to the backing track and it sounded really good. When we first chose the play we really wanted to use the backing track as it’s brilliant but there isn’t a speaker system in the Dining Room where the stage is. Also we have had to put a lot of the songs down as the music is written for English voices which tend to be a lot higher than the children’s voices out here. However, we have decided to use the backing track for a couple of songs. The music isn’t incredibly loud but you can hear it and it gives the children an instant boost of energy which is what the play needs. It’s lacking pizzazz at the moment. We can’t use it for all the songs as the majority of them are just too high for the children to sing to but it has worked out for six of them. Hopefully, this will really make a positive difference as we are starting to run out of ideas and time to improve the play.
This week in PT I took all the boys in each Grade while Chelcie took the Girls. I did penalty shooting practice with them and put it into practice by playing little games. This was good fun especially as they all really enjoy it and therefore are a pleasure to teach although I lack much football skill! In G7 PT I took Desvino, Aune and Diina to do some extra acting work with them. I managed to inject some life in to their performances and we worked on talking slowly and clearly but still having energy. I still have hope for them....!
G5 Art on Tuesday was a total nightmare from beginning to end. They arrived full of energy and never really settled down. It took us 40 minutes to complete their spelling test which consists of 20 words which they all failed miserably having not learnt it – 8 people scored 1/20. This doesn’t amuse me at all as I always write out their corrections for them and that’s a lot of corrections to write out in a class of 34 with the highest mark being 12/20. After the spellings we got them to line up outside in silence before we would continue with Art but they were being so disrespectful and would not stand quietly so after a while we took them to Mr Hawaxab and left him to deal with them. This was our final resort as this term there have been quite a few lessons when they have been playing up with us and we needed them to realise that they couldn’t behave like that. That afternoon, I had a craft session with my girls which includes a girl called Liezel from G5. None of us were feeling creative so we just went and crashed in the Grass Hut and they were giving me the low down about all of the teachers. I asked what the G5 punishment had been, expecting a bad class punishment such as no bank/break/vet cookies for the whole class......however, it turned out that the class had chosen eight members of the class who they considered responsible and they were beaten. Liezel was saying how she hated how her class were such snitches on each other and the G6 and G7 girls were saying how their classes always stuck together and would much rather take a whole class punishment then rat on each other. I felt so guilty that a decision I had made had resulted with eight children being beaten. The worst thing was that although I knew that Mr Hawaxab hit the children and it’s something I openly disapprove of I thought it was just with his hand however I discovered that he had a piece of metal that he hits them with them. I felt such shame and guilt that the children had been punished like this because of me and I have vowed that I will never send another child ever again to Mr Hawaxab.
Tuesday was Catherine and Jordan’s last night at Otjikondo so we had a special supper. I cooked I between the electricity cutting out a sausage and vegetable pasta bake and we had a lovely last night altogether. It’s been really nice having them here and to be able to share stories and memories with each other. A little daunting when Jordan mentioned that she read my blog....so if you’re reading this “HI!” I have definitely found someone who is blonder than me which is a relief although I’m now panicking about first impressions at Uni as I have been very blonde recently.
On Wednesday we did our first music class at the Kindergarten which was brilliant. There were 15 children, none of which apart from Mattie and Ola have much English so at this stage it was more of a question of singing at them and getting them to join in with the actions. We did “If you’re happy and you’re know it” which was good fun and then we sang some other songs which Sara had already done with them. Sara has given us total free range with these classes and says that if we want to do a game with them or something different than that’s fine. I’m really looking forward to taking over the parachute that we have in the store cupboard – I remember absolutely loving that when I was younger and I reckon not much will have changed!
Thursday I had rather a scary experience and another Oh My God I’m in Africa moments – funnily enough most of the negative ones of these are attached to medical care. When Glenn a girl in G6 and one of my favourites – she is my pen pal, returned to school we were told that in the holidays she had been fainting lots but it was nothing to be overly concerned about and it was to do with growing up. She told her friends that she had epilepsy but we were told this was wrong and we should play down anything we heard. She had fainted a few times at school and had just spent a week at home recovering from a couple. She was in my second remedial class and we were a verbal times and dividing competition. She was very quiet and said she felt faint but didn’t want to go and lie down so we just continued and I kept a close eye on her. When it was time to leave I saw she was very unstable and thought I would accompany her back to the hostel. She then got worse and luckily Chelcie appeared and with some help we were able to carry her to the Clinic. As soon as she was horizontal she blacked out and her body went completely like rigid. We got her on a bed and sat with her having sent someone to get Sister Lizetta. Her whole body was totally stiff but she was having spasms and we couldn’t get her body to relax – her hands had turned into claws as she was so stiff and the end of her fingers were freezing. Her breathing was regular generally although sometimes it went shallow but then would return to normal again. I was very worried that she hadn’t woken up and after half an hour we sent a child for Sara. Sara fetched Mrs Vermaak who had been dealing before with Glenn and with her help we massaged and moved all her limbs which started to relax but then would bounce back to being rigid. Luckily after about 45 minutes of being totally out of it she woke up which was a massive relief. Whatever we had been told this definitely wasn’t fainting but something much more serious. Her Mother came to pick her up that evening and she has to go and have lots of tests. She is very much in my thoughts at the moment.
Our theme for our Art Room for Parents Day is ‘Around the World’. With the younger ones we are colouring in animals from different places but with the older ones we are exploring different endemic art styles. With Grade Three we did Koru Art which is from New Zealand, Grade 6 Aboriginal Art from Australia and with G7 we were exploring Chinese symbols. It’s really important that the art work is of a very high standard and that it all looks spectacular. This is one of our big challenges for the year – 4th August has become our D Day! As we this is when Parents Day happens and therefore the Art Room is open with the craft fair inside as well as performing the Drama in the afternoon.
On Thursday night we had supper with Nicole, Sabine, Mathieu and Maxime as they leave tomorrow. I cooked Gemsbok Josh Rogan Curry and we ate in the Pastoral Centre where they contributed wine and Swiss chocolate! It was a really fun evening and I only wish we had done it with them before however they invited us to come and stay with them in Switzerland which both of us eager to take them up on! They gave us all their leftover food bits which was so welcome – we now have very exotic foods such as honey cheerios, balsamic vinegar, an avocado, raspberry jam.....so exciting! It’s been really lovely having so many people around this term and we are expecting more people next week, finger crossed that they are as nice!
In order to be ready to perform a complete run through next week to Sara we had evening rehearsals of the Button Box on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday night after supper. This is possibly the worst time to have a rehearsal as its 7:30, the children and us are ready for bed and its freezing but there isn’t another available time. I got into a good habit of being changed into my pj’s, teeth brushed and a hot water bottle warming my bed so once we returned I could jump straight into bed and go to sleep! Monday’s rehearsal went well, we rehearsed the first 5 songs and added the backing track to two of them which was successful. Tuesday was less successful....we went through the middle section of the play and although the majority of the cast were brilliant Aune once again was being silly – she was putting no effort into speaking which was annoying everyone else and refused to sing without covering her face with her arm. We had discussed with Sara what we should do if this happened again and so we put the plan into action which then massively backfired in our faces! At the end of rehearsal we asked Desvino (Grandad) to remain behind as well as Kenisha and Tuyambeka. We asked both of them to read through the first scene with him so that we could “consider our options”, we explained how we weren’t replacing anyone but we needed to think about other options in case things didn’t work out. If we were going to have to replace Aune which we REALLY don’t want to do it was going to have to very soon only to be fair to the person who would take over. We walked outside to discover Aune in floods of tears, literally having hysterics. We sent everyone back to the hostel and took her aside to talk to her. We talked to her and explained that we weren’t replacing her but she was on her last chance and it wasn’t fair to the rest of the cast if she kept dragging us behind and if necessary we would have to replace her. We told her that she was our first choice of Grandma but if she couldn’t pull it together then she would be out. She then went on a massive rant about how seeing people happy and smiling at her reminded her of her Dad. She hasn’t seen her Dad since last Christmas which is very hard on her and we have talked and helped her with this before but at this particular point she was just using it as an excuse. We decided to go with it and said she had to make a grown up decision; she could either cope with it and was able to turn up to rehearsal and just focus on Drama and obviously we would be there for her to talk to at any other point or she had to make the decision that it was too much for her and she should step aside. We were very firm and said she had to make a decision by the next day. Luckily she has decided that she can “cope” and we shall wait with fingers crossed to see what happens next. On Thursday night we went through the last 5 songs in the play which all went well and hopefully things will keep improving.
I really hope that everything is going well in England or whether you are reading this from and as usual sending lots and lots of love to everyone reading this. Please feel free to send me an email as it’s now a viable form of communication for me or if you would like to skype let me know! Also forgot my very exciting big news – I’m officially legal after 43 weeks in Namibia! Finally our visas have been properly sorted and stamped into our passports until the end of August, huge relief although I’m looking forward to getting my passport back and seeing with my own eyes that its true. I trust no one when it comes to visas as we have been let down so many times. But all very exciting and it means I should be able to get home safely, touch wood! Bye for now
Love Me xxxx
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