Tuesday March 15th 2011
Today was insane. Mrs Randhir was home sick today so we split up the class again and I was left with just 8 students again. Well you’d thing that it would be easy to just watch 8 kids and teach them new things. Yeah not really. It was so so frustrating! They don’t know how to listen and I don’t know what else to do. How am I supposed to get them to listen to me if they don’t even listen to their teacher! It is mad! So repeated myself so many times today. And I left school pretty frustrated. The second half was a bit better than the first half though. I had them make get well cards for their teacher and then I drew a bee on the board and I said write 5 sentences about this bee. Only two or three students ended up giving me five sentences and it wasn’t even about the bee. Then I had them do some maths out of their workbook... That was insane, but I got over it. Then I came home and watched tv for a bit and then I continued typing this blog and now I’m at 11 pages and I’m done when I’m done with this! Haha We had steak for dinner with mashed potatoes and squash with corn and cheese on it. It was yummy. :) and then I got ready for bed and now I’m going to bed. :) hope you enjoy/enjoyed reading this haha sorry it took so long to get caught up! I’ve been nice and busy here :)
Monday March 14th 2011
Well I think I went to bed too early last night. I ended up waking up 45 minutes before my alarm... So I got online and was able to chat with Maureen a bit. Love her! Then I left for school. We were kinda late today because traffic was awful I guess there is a taxi strike going on. Well when I got to class it was like half it’s normal size! I guess because of the strike taxies are staying home so half the class wasn’t able to come to school!
Mrs Randhir was sick so she only stayed the first part of the day until one of the other teachers sent her home. So the second half of the day they split the kids up between the 1-5th grade classes and left me with 8 girls to teach. We spent the rest of the day learning about doubling and halving numbers. I think I bored them haha. I’m definitely not a teacher.
When I got home I caught up on journal writing and then I started typing up all of this... Procrastination to the max. We’re going on 5 pages now... Ridiculous.
Sunday March 13th 2011
Today was a very sad day. It’s Jamie’s last day and we had to see her off :(
Church was amazing. The lady teaching relief society was talking on service and she said that when she thinks of service she doesn’t think of that word but instead she thinks of someone coming to her and saying “please help me.” I thought that was a neat way of thinking about service and I want to start doing that. :) I also was able to meet a lady from Orem Utah! Crazy how small the world is! After church I got there and Colleen’s parents were there visiting so we talked with them for a while and then I had some left over enchiladas they have saved for me. I also skyped my parents and they are at my grandparent’s house so I was able to talk with and see them too! It was so awesome! My grandparents are pretty much the greatest. I love them so much! :) After skyping Jamie and I gave Colleen and Neil a thank you card and two gift cards for full body massages from their favorite place :) so that was awesome! :) we made them both cry and well, we cried too. Then we all got in the car and left for the airport with all of jamie’s things! I helped her check in and what not and then we sat at mug and bean and bean and waited until the last minute to say goodbye. Then we all walked Jamie to security and said our goodbyes! It was so sad! :( I am really really really going to miss her! I’ve literally spent like every minute with her for the last 2 months! Crazy! :(
Saturday March 12th 2011
Today I stayed at home and had a lazy day with Colleen! I was on facebook and posted some of Colleen’s pictures for her, watched t.v., got on fb again, made bread... And that was pretty much my day! Haha I skyped my parents this morning and that was wonderful. I was spoiled and I got breakfast pretty much in bed and a delicious toasted sandwich for lunch... Yeah today was rough ;). Around 5:30 we went into town and picked up all the girls. They were all burnt haha, they had spent all day at the beach and none of them had really slept at all last night because they were out on the town and having too much fun. So we picked them up and then we went shopping for the ingredients to make my mom’s delicious sour cream enchiladas. Jamie and I started making those as soon as we got home and they turned out to be a hit! We threw a going away party tonight for Jamie, Siv, and Ilaria. They are all leaving next week! :( everyone came over and we all just ate and talked all night. Then before I was about ready to go to bed we all went outside and stood around the fire and Colleen started talking about how much she loved having us and how much she’ll miss us and what not. And well, we all started crying. It was so sad! We really feel like we are at home here. The family is all so great and we are so welcome. It is really amazing. So after crying for a bit I went to bed early so I don’t fall asleep in church tomorrow. Gotta get up early.
Friday March 11th 2011
I was so excited all day today and pretty anxious for the jungle gym to be delivered and set up! They ended up showing up around 10:30ish and I went outside and took a bunch of pictures of them putting everything up. When they got there the church’s grounds keeper (same grounds as the school) came out and threw a fit because he thought that when they asked if they could put up a jungle gym it was only a temporary thing... Well our set is pretty permanent! But we just changed the place that they were going to put it, (which I think ended up putting it in a better place). But after that they started digging the holes and planting it! :) it was so cool, they made it look so easy. But it was really neat when the kids came out and they saw these men putting up the jungle gym and they all ran out of the classrooms and were cheering! It was really cool :) and then they all stood around it watching the guys work. When things were all done and school ended Jamie wrote a check... And well I wish I could say everything was all fine and dandy but there was problems because the wouldn’t take an american check! Yikes so they told us we had to go to such n’ such bank and transfer money and that they would wait for us. So we got one of the teachers to take us to this bank and things didn’t end up working out smoothly. And then Colleen came to the rescue AGAIN and she called the company and they called their guys and told them they could leave. Colleen is amazing! So we got all that temporarily sorted and then we got home and were able to figure things out and it was all settled. Then all the girls got ready for a weekend in Cape Town and Colleen and I dropped them off in town and then Colleen took me to her cousins (?) 14th birthday party. All her family was there and I got to meet them all and when her aunts and mom greeted me they gave me hugs and kisses. It was so awesome. Probably one of the best feelings ever ;). The night was filled with dancing and lots of eating. It was great haha. They even sent me home with a goodie bag, a plate of sweets, and a plate of food. Ah! Poor Colleen and I were so tired after all that dancin! Haha ;) It was a good day! :)
Thursday March 10th 2011
Today was relaxing because we were all so tired today. We woke up at 5 and went to work with colleen. We originally wanted to do this instead of go to our own project because she was going to take us to a guy in the town where she works and we were going to order benches for our school. Well after talking more with colleen today we found out that the quality of this guys benches wasn’t too good and they would rot away in about 3 years. So Jamie and I were in a dilemma because now we didn’t know what to donate to the school and Jamie leaves this upcoming Sunday! so we finally decided to go back to our original idea and donate a jungle gym! :) so Colleen hooked us up with the same people that they ordered their swing sets from, we found their web site and found the set that we wanted to buy! Then Colleen called them for us (which was a good idea because the lady on the other line spoke afrikaans and didn’t really want to speak english), and she placed our order and asked our questions and things and then she was able to get them to deliver the set tomorrow morning around 9am! So Jamie would be able to see the set be put in the ground before she leaves! :) that was so exciting! So we got that ordered and everything and we are so so excited for tomorrow! After work we went and stopped by a place called the “farm school.” it’s a school for kids with fetal alcohol syndrome. We stopped to drop off a box of clothes that were donated by some former volunteers that lived with Colleen. So we all went in and dumped all the clothes on the floor and put some of the babies around the clothes to take pictures and then we sat with them for a bit and talked. There was one baby there named Jamie and she looks like a 6 month old baby, in the footie pajamas and everything. Well one of the care workers there told us that baby Jamie is actually almost 2 years old and because her mom drank when she was pregnant Jamie will never grow up. It was really shocking for all of us. She couldn’t walk even, she just scoots. It was so sad. And the fact that all the kids there were affected in some way from the same thing.
Wednesday March 9th 2011
Today we went back to school and it was so nice to see Mrs Randhir an the kids!!! I really do like ti tehre. I was so exhausted today though. I still havent recovered from the weekend.
Today the principal asked me to try and create a school mascot of a cartoon elephant! Yeah I’ve taken a couple classes, but I am not a drawer!
I attempted to finish the individual reading tests, I have three left. I love working with the kids on a one on one basis. Absolutely love it. Before I left on safari one of the kids (who learns a bit differently/slower) turned in a crossword puzzle that we were having the kids do. When he turned it in to me he was absolutely beaming! He was so happy he had finished. When I looked at it first I saw that he had circled a bunch of different “words” but but it didn’t look like any were real words... So I said good job and gave him a hug. Then while everyone was on break I looked a little harder with Jamie and we found that, at the bottom where it lists all the words that are hidden, he had circled 5 words and crossed out all the rest. Well those 5 he had circled were all words that he was actually able to find and the ones he had crossed out were ones he couldn’t find! I thought that was very interesting.
After getting home I made some kaiser rolls for the family and when colleen got home she went crazy over coming home to the amazing smell of home made bread! Then I made neil’s tuna salad which was so delicious! And we all sat down and ate some amazing chicken wraps. Yummmm! I love dinner here!!!
Tuesday March 8th 2011 (back in Cape Town)
This morning we slept in until about 9:30 which was nice sincewe got in late last night and had had a weekend full of 4:00 mornings! After everyone was ready we took a minibus to town with all our bags and left them at the SASTS office off of longstreet. Then we did some market shopping/browsing and stopped for lunch. We went to a really amazing restaurant next to the green market square. Traffic was crazy on the bus ride home, it took over an hour to drive a distance of about 30 minutes. The rest of the day was devoted to relaxing and showering :)
Monday March 7th 2011 (SAFARI trip)
Today was a really long and kind of boring day. We woke up early and were rushed from the start to hurry and get up and go to breakfast because it was crucial that we left early for the “oh so big” day ahead of us. So we were rushed to pack and get out. Then we went to breakfast there and it wasn’t even out and ready yet. But then we ate and paid and what not and then got in the car to leave on our long journey. We were taking the scenic route back to the air port today and we thought it was supposed to be a tour, but it was really just a longer but beautiful car ride. We did make a stop at God’s Window canyon (the third larges canyon in the world). The driver was rushing us while we were there and wouldn’t let us take a trail we wanted to because “we didn’t have enough time.” Then we forced him to wait while we looked at things at a market at God’s Window. When we got back in the car we just kept driving until we got to the airport where he dropped us off, put our bags on the sidewalk and then said thanks, nice meeting you and drove away. Well after this 9 hour long drive we were at the airport 5 hours before our flight! We couldn’t even check in until 2 hours before the flight. We we sat around, ate and wasted time until we were able to get on the flight back to town. Ridiculous. But overall the trip was amazing!!! My highlights were: the elephant back safari, seeing giraffe while swimming, and getting to know Hannah and Colleen. Good good times. :)
Sunday March 6th 2011 (SAFARI)
I take it back... Today was absolutely one of the best days ever!!!
This morning we woke up again at 4am (third night in a row, not easy). Then we were picked up by a ranger to go on our morning drive safari at the reserve. It was a really quiet morning there to. Quiet enough that I fell asleep in the open vehicle. BUT just after I woke up the ranger spotted an elephant! So we stopped and stared at it then we found another one, then another, and another.... Turned out there were 8 elephants! And after watching them for a bit they started crossing the road behind us! Then we backed up and one or two crossed in front of us and then the main lady elephant crossed in front of us and got mad and made noises at us. We found out later that she was spooking because there was a giraffe close and I guess elephants have problems with things that are taller than them! Then we kept driving and saw the giraffe. Then a zebra from really far away. And we saw another comondika. After the morning drive we got dropped off for breakfast and we had lots of fruit and I made an egg, bacon, and tomato sandwich. Then we got all signed up for the elephant back safari. Then we were picked up by our armed ranger to take us on the walking safari in the reserve. It was kinda neat. He made bracelets for us out of a tree and showed us different animal tracks. We walked all the way to our rooms. Then we all took a good long nap. I was woken up by Jamie running in our room and saying “where’s your camera?! There’a a Giraffe and it’s baby right out back!” so I jumped up and went and watched these beautiful animals and we kind of stalked them for a bit :) AND THEN we were picked up for our elephant back safari, we signed a waiver just in case and then we started the “interaction” part of our elephant adventure :) First we learned a little about the elephants while we all stared at one. Then we played some games with her. First the guy had four of us take off one shoe and put it in front of us. Then he took our shoes and mixed them up so we had the wrong shoe in front of us. Then he had the elephant face us and he said “ok go” then the elephant picked up a shoe and gave it to it’s correct owner! She got every single one right by scent! And she was so quick too! It was phenomenal. Then she played some soccer. Then they took her away and brought over the male elephant and we were all able to go up to him and touch him and take pictures with him. They even had him lay down and we sat on one of his front legs and we took another picture. And then after everyone had posed we went over and jamie, me and Hannah put on helmets and got on him! :) the three of us rode around and the other three girls walked in front of us. After we were done riding we switched and the three of us walked while the other girls rode. It was so awesome! I couldn’t get over the fact that I was walking with elephants!!! :) I loved every second of it. :) when we got back we relaxed and I looked at some of the pictures I took and then around 6:30 we called on the radio for someone to come get us for dinner... No one responded so we figured we would wait until 7 because that’s when they usually came. Well long story short, we ended up looking out into the dark with a flash light and saw a pair of eyes that we were pretty sure belonged to a lion. Then I went to my room and when I came back outside all the girls were screaming and ran into the closest room so of course I screamed too and ran with them. Then the told me that they had heard the lion make some growling but not roaring noises. So we we had a lion outside our door and a radio that didn’t work. We were stuck there for 2 hours until jamie remembered she had cell service in the other room, so we ran to the other room but we didn’t have the reserve’s number! But then I remembered that I had taken a photo of the safari car when we were in Kruger and it had the phone number on the door! So I got my camera and zoomed into the picture and we got the reserve’s number! So we were able to call the lodge and tell them our situation and they sent someone. Then the jerk that picked us up said that he heard us screaming for help but he was busy with guests. Grrr. But we finally made it to dinner and we had kudu and crocodile! It was delicious. They performed some african music which was awesome, I got to record some of it. After we got back to our rooms I wrote in my journal and Hannah and I sang Colleen and Jamie to sleep haha. It was fun ;)
Saturday March 5th 2011 SAFARI
Today= Exausting + One of the best days ever
Like I wrote yesterday, we woke up at 4am and then were picked up to go to Kruger. We had the same guide that we had last night so all of us were tired. But he was a trooper! We were on safari in Kruger today from 4:30-6:10ish (14 hours!). We waw quite a bit of animals but everyone was saying that today and yesterday have been really really slow days. Which I believe because we didn’t see ANY zebra in Kruger. But we saw tons of impala, wilda beast, Giraffes, elephants, kudu, african buffalo, a crocadile, some baboon (from far away), comondika, and a pack of about 6 lions hiding in the bush. They were all female except one baby male. They were sleeping an dbeing lazy and we got about 5-10 feet away from them! It is so incredible to me how big their heads are! They are so massive. I loved seeing the elephants and the giraffes. They area my favorites. It was so crazy for me as I was looking into the brush thinking, “I am really in Africa and a real, wild elephant/giraffe/rhino etc. Might be hiding around the corner.” The highlight of the safari would probably have been finding the lions and seeing wild elephants. I can’t wait until my elephant back safari tomorrow!!!
For dinner we had pork chops, lamb stew, pumpkin soup, and rolls... Yummm. We are absolutely getting out moneys worth for this trip. When we got back from Kruger we finally saw zebra at the game reserve and some more impala and kudu. Today was a dream. :)
Friday March 4th 2011 (SAFARI)
This morning we were picked up at 4:45 am on the dot! We were picked up by a hotspots guide. He was very nice and knew a lot. He drove us to the air port. The van even had a head set mic that he wore and it was hooked up to the speakers so we could hear him talk. He told us our itinerary for he next couple of days. We will be staying at a camp site inside an animal reserve near Kruger National park. Once we are in the reserve there are no gates keeping the animals away from you, so the animals could literally be on our doorstep! Once we got to the airport he checked us all in and gave us our passes. Getting through security was a synch! One of the girls that was with us even got through with a full bottle of water.
After the flight...
The rest of today was amazing. After landing we were picked up by our transfer service and then we went and picked up two other people. They were on vacation from Brazil. Then we all drove for about 6 hours to our lodge at the private game reserve. It was absolutely beautiful! Johannesburg is more what I had expected cape town to be like. It felt like my idea of Africa. It was neat. :) it really made it hit home that I was in South Africa. Finally right? I’ve only been here for almost two months. Haha. We saw the FIFA world cup stadium in Johannesburg, that was neat. One of the coolest things I saw while driving though was the “caution hippos crossing signs” on the highway. When we got to the camp ground we saw wart hogs first and then we saw our new next door neighbors! The hippos living in the watering hole in our front yard! :) it was amazing. Then we settled into our rooms and got our swim suits on and went to the swimming pool across the watering hole. After a bit of swimming I got out and sat next to the pool. Then I looked up and I saw a Giraffe walking our way!!! Oh my goodness it was so awesome! So we all got our cameras quietly and slowly walked as close as we could! We got about 100 feet away from it and were taking pictures and such. After the nice swim we got ready and went to dinner at the big lodge/hotel that is also inside the game reserve. It was so nice! We ate Kudu, it was kind of like beef but different haha. It was really really fabulous though. I liked it. We also had nice potatoes and veggies. Then we were picked up by a ranger and he took us on a night drive safari. Overall it was so fantastic! And now we are all exhausted but we are waking up again tomorrow morning at 4 to start again!!! So far, today I have seen: wart hogs, wilda beast, rhino (male and female), Impala, Monkeys, zebra (only like one and it was dark so it wasn’t a very good look :( ),Giraffe, bush baby, ouwl, bunnies, and a comondika. It has been truly amazing, totally worth every penny I spent. I can’t wait for tomorrow!
Thursday March 3rd 2011
Today was good! Mrs. Randhir was back in class so I was back to just being the helping hand and I loved that. The kids were having another naughty day though. They were all super loud and seemed to complain extra today. So they ended up not going out for second break and we kept them inside to help us glue pages into their testing notebook. Before the first break I took all the girls ou tto do the reading outs of the individual littl ebooks as a group and we sat on a piece of golden grass. It was so hard tfor me to try and have them be quiet. They could not for the lf eof them get through a page of reading without people talking! Not cool. We ende dup switching from having each person read a page to having everyone read together as a group. That was better but not everyone read. After reading I had them run around and the taught them how to play red light green light. And we played outside until their break. Colleen ended up picking us up a bit early because she was in town! So that worked out well because we were able to come home and shower and pack. Then Colleen took us to the SASTS house. We are getting picked up at 4:45 in the morning for our Safari! I so so so excited!!!
When we got dropped off we met all the other girls that are coming with us. There are 7 of us total. I was also able to meet a girl named Sofia. I was friends with her on facebook before I came so it was good meeting her haha. She was hilarious. All of us went out to a mexican restaurant. I had chicken enchiladas and they were delicious. I went to bed around 10 after we got all settled from getting back from the restaurant. It was a good night :) I’m so excited for the Safari!!! :D
Wednesday March 2nd 2011
Oh boy! Today I was so tired! Mrs Randhir was gone today for a religious holiday so it was me and a kind of student teacher that is mostly just there to keep the kids quiet while they work.... I really don’t know how it is expected that one teacher can teach 43 students. It’s not fair to the teacher or the students. So today was really tiring, it was out of control. But then on a lighter note... Tonight I went with Jamie, Siv, Colleen and Neil to a fair in Wynberg. We basically just went for the food. I got sweet and sour chicken which was okay. But the rice was gross. Then I got a hena tattoo on my arm, it looks pretty cool. But it is really light, I don’t think it will last too long. Then when we were leaving we went to go watch siv and Jamie on the farris wheel. Well... While they were riding another ride turned on and it started spinning really really fast, so fast that it made the power go out on all the rides. So mid air Jamie and Siv were stuck on the farris wheel and they were ready to get off. It was so funny. Jamie said that was more scary than bungee jumping off the highest point in the world! Oh man... It made us laugh. :)
Tuesday March 1st 2011
Today was an easier day at the project. I brought my camera today and basically just took pictures all day for my online assignment. After I left the project though I felt so gross. Today it was 37C and 95F. And the kids were all sweaty and dirty from playing in the dirt and then they would come and hug me an wipe all their sweat on me in the nicest way possible I’m sure... But it was gross. So I showered right away when I got home and then I worked on some photos and then I made bread for the family and we had spaghetti and meat balls that neil made. It was super delicious but we didn’t end up eating until after 9pm because we didn’t start the food until later. But it was worth the wait :) my host family is amazing. :)
Monday February 28th 2011
Today went by pretty quickly and it was pretty eventful! I spent a lot of the day making copies and cutting the pages so they could glue them in their work books. Then in the afternoon I continued testing the kid’s reading individually. I called one girl out and she said her tummy was sore, I asked her why and other normal questions and I didn’t know what was wrong or what to say so I just had her continue reading.... Well at one point she just broke into tears and started saying her tummy was soar again... And then!!! She puked all over my legs, her legs, skirt feet everything... It was even in her shoes! So I took her over to the faucet standing between her and the classrooms so no one would see her (she was super embarrassed) and then I cleaned her up and sent her to the office and told her I’d send her things and no one would know what happened. Well... All of the testing papers for everyone in the class were covered with puke and the table and chair... Everything... So I went and got the janitor and told him what happened and his response was “gah! They are supposed to go to the bathroom and do that!” and was all upset. So I just said she didn’t know she was going to throw up all over everything and walked away. I had already cleaned up the brunt of it, all he needed to do was take a hose to everything. He’s just lucky I took her out of class and she didn’t puke on carpet and all over more than just me! It was crazy. On our way home Colleen took us to a school supply store where she buys her equipment so we could brainstorm what to get for the school. We decided we want to get outside stuff for the kids to play with or on. Hopefully we can get some donations so we can get them something really good!
Sunday February 27th 2011
Today didn’t feel like Sunday because I didn’t really make it feel like a Sunday :(. It was stake conference and everyone was meeting over an hour away so I didn’t get transport to church because my friend that usually takes me to church was out of town this weekend.... So I “bunked”/skipped church today. This morning everyone had a nice lazy Sunday. We all lounged and did our own things until about 3pm when Jamie and I finally took showers. Then we all ate chicken curry and finished getting ready. Then all of us went to Kirstenbosh Gardens for a concert. The performers were Chad Saaiman and Loyiso Bala. They were really really good. :) there were also some other performers,m they only did like two songs but it was an acapella group and they were amazing. I would have liked to see more of them. During the concert everyone drank wine, ate crackers, chicken and cheese. And it was just a really good time relaxing and being with each other. After the concert they were signing autographs and selling CDs and wat not so jamie and I went down to get a cd and the line for autographs was cut off so we just went back to the family. Then Colleen talked us into going back down and trying to get Chad’s autograph. So all us girls went down and we just kind of hung out around the end of the line. We ended up getting an autograph and a picture with Chad :) haha it was so funny. Jamie even gave her number to a security guy because she thought he would let us through to Chad. Good times. Then I got to be the designated driver for one of the cars! It was my second time driving in Africa and I think I did pretty darn good! I stayed on my side of the road, drove the speed limit and didn’t hit anything! Wahoo!
Saturday February 26th 2011
Today didn’t go exactly as planned but it was a good day! I was supposed to meet up with a friend and go to her house and eat lunch with missionaries and her. But we couldn’t work out well enough the timing and transport. So I went with Colleen, first to Matthew’s cricket game and then we went to the mall and did some grocery shopping and looked at clothes stores.. It was nice and relaxed. Then after we were done there I had her drop me off at “China Town” and I did some shopping there. It took me about an hour to skim through all the stores. But I was able to find some gifts, a little black dress that is really nice, and a little cami thing. And it was all pretty inexpensive! :) so that was nice. Then I came home and I lounged around for a bit and then I got all dressed up in my new dress and did my hair and what not and then Nadia (colleen’s niece) picked me up and we met the girls in town and we went to two different clubs. It was fun but I was so so tired. I could have fallen asleep while dancing... So we kind of made Nadia leave “early” and we made it home around 2am and we all fell right asleep.
Friday February 25th 2011
Another good day! Neil dropped me, Ilaria and Siv off in Cape Town where we met Jamie. Thenwe walked around green square market and did some shopping. Then we met up with Adam and we all went to the District 6 Museum. It was pretty neat! There was a lot of reading and it was able to help me understand a bit more about district 6. It was nice because it is such a big part of cape town and their history, so it was nice to learn about that. After the mseum we all went to ht water front and we ate luncg at one of the restaurants there. I had already been there but I totally didn’t mind because they have some delicious food! And I got to watch an african singing group perform and I bought one of their CDs it was awesome. I also went to a music shop on the waterfront and I bought a Peter Tosh CD. Then I went to the waterfront craft market and I bought some freshwater pearls!!! That was exciting. :) it kind of made me feel like a “real woman” since people always say that every woman needs a set of pearls. So I’m excited that I was able to get those. And they are real! :) and even better, they are from Africa! :) I took a bus back to Wynberg Station to meet colleen, all the other girls stayed in town for the night. Well I didn’t exactly know where to get on in wynberg... Haha I knew I was meeting her at the train station.... So I saw a sign for the wynberg train station and I got off the bus and waited for Colleen at the train station. Well... Turns out I found the wrong train station I wynberg... So Collen called and said “umm Kayla... Where are you?” haha that then I went out to the main road and told her some of the stores that were around me. Turns out that the road I was standing is known for it’s hookers! She said that I could have just waited about an hour or to and started working! Haha oh man oh man... It was an adventure. While I was standing there an older man walked up to me walking his bike and was like “you shouldn’t stand out here like this alone, people are evil!” and so he stood next to me so I wouldn’t be alone, well then he was like, if I had a car I’d take you home...” nice but kind of creepy so then my phone rang and it was Colleen asking where I was so I told him that my ride was here and said goodbye. Haha it was awesome an awesome adventure. ;)
Thursday February 24th 2011
Today was really a great and long day! It was the sports day competition for school so when we got to school we got all lined up in our houses and we walked down the road a ways with the whole school to a public grassy field. After we got all sortedwe started marching like we practiced yesterday. A couple of kids were sitting out because they were told not to March and didn’t know why they couldn’t. Well my theory is that sports day only happens once a year and it is one of the biggest events of the year, not really something that should be taken away from someone who probably doesn’t have a lot to look forward to. So I went and grabbed their hands and had them come to the back of the marching line with me and I marched around the field with my house. After everyone marched we started putting people into their racing groups and then we started races! :) it was really great to watch the kids having such a great time. It is really such a big deal for these kids and I think it is wonderful that I had the opportunity to be here for it. I took tons of pictures while I was there, it was a neat experience. :) While walking back to the school a tree branch got stuck in my flip flop and sliced my foot open. When we got back Mrs. Randhir insisted on being my doctor and she fixed me up.
Tonight I went to a meditation class with my Mrs. Randhir. It was really a fun experience. We sat in basically a living room and we started meditation, just like that. I sat cross legged on the couch and they took us on a journey. It was really relaxing/awesome.
Wednesday February 23rd 2011
Today was a pretty good day! My teacher was gone today and I had a student teacher from grade one in the class with me. She was basically there to help me get the kids quiet after they went crazy. She has that powerful teacher voice that says listen to me, I’m serious” and I don’t have that. We had some work sheets that Mrs. Randhir (my teacher) left for us to have the kids do. We got those done pretty quickly and then we read some books and whatnot. Then after the break everyone went outside and got into their “houses” for sports and practiced marching in their lines for tomorrow. Then the house I am with went into one of the classrooms and we got creative, well I thought it was creative. We made pom-poms out of plastic grocery bags and team flags out of tissue paper and wooden sticks. Only the older kids were allowed to make the stuff though (which I didn’t understand); meanwhile, the little kids were so noisy and pumped with adrenaline from the excitement of sports day. It’s such a huge event here, everything stops for sports day. It really gives the kids something to look forward to but puts a hold on education. Kind of a catch 22. After all the excitement we went back to the classroom and did another two maths worksheets. After class was out I went to grade one and helped Jamie cover some books.
When we got home we lounged and then we all helped make dinner. We had steak and kidney pot pies home made fries and salad. Then we got all ready for bed! Tomorrow we’re going to call and book our safari! So exciting.
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