MATRIC RESULTS

Hello!

Didn’t think you’d hear for me again did you? Me either. But alas. I just had lunch with Uncle Mike and he reminded me I hadn’t updated everyone on the Grade 12 prefects matric results! The results were released just two weeks ago. I waited eagerly for the morning of the results and called Zolisa on google voice first thing to get the report. She was jumping up and down (I could tell from her voice) because she could go on to university! She got an exception.

Of the six grade 12 perfects the results were:

3 pass with exemption (!)

1 pass with distinction

2 fails (the failed section(s) can be retaken in the coming months – and they will, they’re rock stars)

Last year, a total of 17 grade twelves at Walmer received exemptions so having 50% of our prefects pass with the ability to go on to university is HUGE! The national pass rate this year was 73.9% with a pass rate of 61.6% in the Eastern Cape (yup, the lowest pass rate in the country). So congratulations to our matrics. Defying the odds per usual.

The 2013 school year started yesterday so I’ve been able to see (via facebook) the newest class of matrics wearing their yellow ties proudly. Fulbright 2013 arrives in PE today and will join the school on Monday. I’m looking forward to reading their blogs this year.

Happy 2013!

p.s. Colleen is back in SA and is finishing up her first week of teaching at Lebone – I’m excited to skype with her this weekend and hear all about it! Meanwhile, I’m busy interviewing with some really neat places in NYC to find my next step here in the states.

HERE WE GO!

THE LAST POST. I’ve been back in the US for exactly two weeks as of noon today. I can hardly believe it. Its been a whirlwind of jet lag, thanksgiving holiday, apartment hunting, and reuniting with friends and family. Today, two weeks later, Scott and I signed a lease and picked up the keys for a our new home in Park Slope, Brooklyn and only one block from Prospect Park!

So HERE WE GO into “real life”, finding a place to live, and getting health insurance. Only part of the equation missing is my employment… but that’s next weeks problem.

WHEN… YOU’RE ON A FULBRIGHT IN SOUTH AFRICA

When… the taxi is a tall new one, you’re the last person on it, and it doesn’t stop at Mr. Fish, Park Sheraton, and 5 Ways, and the music is tolerable

When… the prefects come in to the office with big hugs and stories

When… Anathi fits through the smallest gap in the window to retrieve the keys from the office

When… jhoo, now now, yebo, lazy to, diarize and busy with… all become part of you daily vocabulary

When… everyone at Mel’s church prays in a Tebow quickly and in xhosa every 10 mins

When… the “bums and tums class” turns into a “FIERCE” class and you “unleash your inner African” through dance

When… the key to the bathroom is on the hook and there is toilet paper

When… you read over 25 books in 10 months

When… there is soy milk at a coffee shop

When… after months of trying different blends, Mastertons Blend 81 coffee wakes you up every morning

When… Zim says, “Molo ntombi! Uphi omnye?” and you eventually learn that he’s saying “Good morning girl. Where’s the other one?”

When…after a long day you pick a recipe (from our beautifully decorated recipe pages), sit at the table and practice trying to eat more slowly

When… you have to find Mel at her mom’s house, ambush Zolisa for a lunch date, and laugh when Asanda runs away to Durban

When… Call Me Maybe saves a roadtrip

When… there is no wind (or even just 10 mph), the sun is out, and you can go for a run before school

When… the library prefects show up on time for short break

When… the two ladies next to you on the taxi are extra squishy and you fall asleep

When… the flat sparkles after Flo

When… the toi-tois create a black smoke over Walmer Township from burning tires and there’s no school for a week

When… the school decides last minute that the Heritage day celebration will be on the same day as the health fair

When…the teachers at school tell Dinah I’ll be a great “umakoti”

When… the wind blows in the one direction that doesn’t make the flat buzz/howl/screech

When… the guide tells you to jump in so that you can swim two feet from the edge of Victoria Falls in Devils Pool

When… La Motte Chardonnay is in the grocery store

When… The car is stuck in traffic on a hill and you realize you’ve mastered clutch control

When… Jessie Princess is at Barneys on your first Friday and last Friday nights

When… the 8^th grade “regulars” come and hang every day at the library

When… Big Booty Karen stands you up for dinner

When… the student social enterprise opens and the prefects are trained and beaming that “they’ll be able to change the school”

When… Santo Antonios asks AGAIN if you’re from America

When… The braai is ready before 8pm for chicken sosaties, roosterkoeks and potatoes

When… The ‘hike’ becomes a rock-climbing cliff hanging adventure

When… the Modern/African fusion dance show at the Port Elizabeth opera house is actually a children’s recital and the kiddies dance around in lion constumes

When… the weathers been crappy so you take an impromptu road trip to the Karoo

When…the State Department sponsors an “Indaba” and we all stay in our own person castles

When… the Hobbie Beach ocean water feels perfect after a run

When… The principal announces, “I like to see you walking”

When… Xhosa sounds familiar and makes you feel at home when traveling outside the Eastern Cape

When…the sun sets in Colleen’s room every evening

When…Ntobeko guilts you into continuing our Xhosa lessons and you just can’t let him down because he’s the best

When…the elephant walks right in front of your car at Addo and you don’t hit it

When… at 6am on November 7^th SABC 2 morning news announces that the race between “Ooooobama” and “Robmney” is close… then they check the twitter feed… then they call America (silence on the line)… then they ask the weatherman… yes, “we believe Ooooobama won, we’ll get back to you soon”

When… Linda’s morning welcomes to school ‘hello babeeeeee” and medical advice to eat more vegetables at night to help your stomach get better

When…the matrics read “Oh The Places You’ll Go” at dinner with Angelo’s; and then the adventure of getting them home in the floods

When… a massive bird-of-prey flies into your bedroom

When… the City Lads win the Eastern Provence finals in East London

When… Milton ’07 reunion happens in South Africa with Olivia and Trevor

When… the morning news tells you the exchange rate is even better than yesterday so you decide to go shopping

When… You change Xhosa lesson to dinner-time to avoid learning too much and to hang out with Ntobeko

When…Juneta says “good morning Bubbly”

When… the hole in the office ceiling when we were robbed is never fixed so the room is filled with the smells of the ladies cooking next door (which you pray won’t be intestines)

When… you witness the windiest Iron Man in history

When… the Grade 9 social enterprise project is FINALLY over and the Grade 8 cookbooks are FINALLY written

When… “You been workin’ hard” when your work day lasts longer than 9-2

When… Scott put up with your new driving skills in March along the Garden Route

When… you walk 10Ks to digest a ¼ loaf bunny chow in Durban

When… the internet stops working after 2 months and Dimension Data never manages to fix it in the following 8

When… you drink Roiboos tea and a rusk every afternoon

When… you walk from Zambia to Zimbabwe

When… you zipline from Zambia to Zimbabwe

When… the meal has to sit in the “wonder box” over night before cooking it

When… In less than a year you go to Stellenbosch, Franschoek, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Tsitsikamma, Knysna, Plettengberg Bay, George, Mossel Bay, Cape Town, Port Saint Johns, Coffee Bay, Cintsa, East London, Gramstown, Port Alfred, Johannesburg, Rustenburg, The Cradle of Mankind, Pretoria, Graff-Reinett, Cradock, Middleburg, Port Elizabeth…etc

When… Malva Pudding is on the menu

When… your wife, Colleen, calls to check in because we’ve been apart for more than 20 minutes

When… you have to say goodbye to your flat at The Beaches, your job at Walmer High School, and your life in Port Elizabeth, South Africa and fly home

When… now it’s time to move back to the US, find yourself a place to live and a job in the NYC. (Any brilliant ideas for employment or if you just want to hire me … feel free to let me know)

I fly back to the USA this Thursday.

Can’t wait to see everyone back home!

Cheers,

AMB

Image

Credit: Story People

Jozy & Rusty

I couldn’t leave South Africa without properly seeing Johannesburg, so last weekend I took an impromptu solo trip up to Gauteng to see the city and visit with some Fulbright friends. I stayed in Melville and got to have a lovely dinner at The Ant Cafe with Scott Fry and Mariann on Friday night.

Satuday, Scott was kind enough to drive me around to see some of the attractions in Joburg. We drove around Soweto and stopped at Vilakazi Street, the only street in the world with two Nobel Peace Prize recipients houses (Desmond Tutu and Mandela) and walked through the Hector Pieterson Museum. We then drove to see the Wits University campus where Mariann and Scott have their ETA placement and even through the seedy CBD (central business district) of Joburg.

Rob and Ben (two more Fulbrighers) came in from Pretoria for the day and joined us at the to Neighbourgoods Market  for lunch before we all headed to have some beers in the Melville Koppies before a rain storm came in. When the rain did arrive we moved back to Scotts flat and enjoyed a nice dinner with the Fulbright crew.

Neighbourgoods Market

Koppies

After dinner I went back to my awesome B&B/Backpackers, which felt like a backpackers for adults. I loved it. I relaxed during a big thunder/hail storm with some people I met there for the evening.  Sometimes there is something wonderful about true independent travel because it makes me so keen to meet new people and explore a new place in a different way. Sunday morning I went out and about with two of the Europeans I met the night before at our lodge to the Rosebank Market on the roof of a mall to explore the crafts and get some lunch before hopping back on the Gautrain to meet up with Colleen and drive to Rustenburg.

Back at the airport I waited at the rental car pick up for Colleen who was flying in from Port Elizabeth. When she arrived we burst into laughter – we were wearing identical outfits. Cool. This is apparently what happened when we’re apart for more than 24 hours…awkward (yes, we’re beginning to feel the strain of separation anxiety that will be reality in two weeks…).

And we were off on our two-hour drive to Rustenburg where Colleen will live in less than two months to see the school and find her a nice place to live. We stayed with two lovely 24-year-old women, Sarah and Cailin, who are teachers at the school. They had a spare bedroom that we were hoping had Col’s name on it, so we cooked them our best recipes and tried to charm them into letting her live there. It worked! Wednesday night they ‘proposed’ to Colleen and I officially gave her away to her roomies next year.

On Monday, Colleen had a long meeting with the English department to plan their courses next year so I joined Sarah and Catilin at Lebone for the morning to see the school and even had the chance to give a lesson to Caitlin’s 5^th grade class to help her introduce her new unit.

Lebone Library

The school is beautiful. Every classroom has a courtyard and is very integrated into the landscape.

Classroom Courtyard

…and Rustenburg isn’t too bad! There isn’t a ton to do there, but its more than miners and desert… there were even some pretty cute parts of town.

And that’s about all I have to report from my last weekend trip of my Fulbright. We got home last night only to find out that we hadn’t actually missed anything at school because there are, yet again, protests. Sadly today we won’t be labeling books with our new fancy LibWin system but we have created a long to do list of the other things we need to accomplish in the next two weeks. The real shame is that the protests are interrupting the Matric and national exams for our learners. They really need to move the commissioner’s office farther away from the school!

AND AS IM WRITING THIS A HUGE BIRD OF PREY JUST FLEW INTO MY WINDOW AHHHH.

Ok, crisis averted. I just spent the past twenty minutes in the kitchen running away from the massive creature that wanted to hang out with me until it found the actual window opening again. Shiver. Fifteenth floor, window open… apparently a lethal combination. 

Anyways- Dinah (Scott’s mom) landed safely in South Africa despite a cancelled flight due to Sandy and she’s currently on Safari. On Tuesday she, her friend Hetty, and Mariann (Fulbright friend) all arrive in PE so lets hold thumbs that the protests are over by then so that Col and I can show our visitors the school and the township where we teach.

Kid, You’ll Move Mountains!

Last night Colleen and I took our six Grade 12 library prefects out to a nice dinner to celebrate their hard work as prefects and to wish them luck on the Matric exam. We had a wonderful time at Angelo’s despite the rain that’s been plaguing PE for over two weeks now (and the flooding that made for an adventurous return home for the kiddos).

Inspired by Robbins House (as always still), we gave them each a copy of Dr. Seuss’ Oh, the Places You’ll Go (thanks dad for sending them all the way from the states)!

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“You have brains in your head. You have feet in your shoes. You can steer yourself any direction you choose. You’re on your own. And you know what you know. And YOU are the one who’ll decide where to go…”

UMTHOMBO WOLWAZI News

THREE EXCITING UPDATES FROM THE UMTHOMBO WOLWAZI LIBRARY

1. THE UMTHOMBO WOLWAZI STUDENT STORE IS OPEN

    

At the end of term 3, we purchased the initial inventory for the Umthombo Wolwazi Student Store (Walmer High’s own social enterprise) and it is now up and running! All proceeds go back into the library to buy more books and supplies. Prefects get 50% off for all their hard work.

2. WE HAVE AN ELECTRONIC CATALOG

Manel helping us out during long break with the electronic catalog

After fundraising enough money, Colleen and I finally purchased the LibWin software and a new computer to run the system on. Now, while the students take final exams, we’re spending our days putting every single book into the system. Its thrilling… not! But its worth it.

3. THE US EMBASSY DONATED $2,000 to our library to buy books and supplies! Today, Colleen, Mrs. Gxoyoyia (head of the English Department) and I went to a bookstore to see what we wanted to add to the library.

_________

That’s all from me for now. Today marks 4 weeks until my Fulbright is over. Now the name of the game is working hard to leave everything ready to exist past our short time at Walmer High. Its not going to be a glamorous few weeks at school, but we’re busy tying up all the lose ends.

Wild Coast Road Trip

Beware… the longest blog post EVER!

For school holiday we traveled along the Wild Coast starting from PE heading East (Garden Route is PE heading West).

Sunday. We woke up early to drive the full day (9 hr drive) up to Port Saint Johns along the N2. We discovered three things 1. The rental car doesn’t have a USB or Auxiliary to plug in our iPods 2. The radio doesn’t reach much further up the coast than East London 3. The N2 is always under construction so Google Maps time estimates should be doubled.

Monday

The Saint Johns River Lodge was wonderful! We had our own little room with a deck right on the river. In the morning we went for a jog and enjoyed a breakfast at the lodge before heading to see the two attractions: The “Blow Hole” and 2^nd Beach, the “most dangerous” beach in the world for shark attacks. I’m sure if you’ve seen Shark Week you know.

We quickly learned that PSJ tourism is not quite as traditional as we expected. We followed the directions to the Blow Hole and ended up on top of a hill with nothing to see. We asked a passerby for directions and he said he’d show us the way. He hopped in the back of the car and pointed us further up the hill when he got out at his house. We found the “spot” and were a bit confused to just see what appeared to be a cliff. No one told us we would have to hike in our bare feet down the side of a rock face to see the “Blow Hole”. Just as we almost turned around another man scurried down the path and up to the next cliff. If he could do it that fast, we can do it…slowly. And so we did.

The casual walk to the Blow Hole

The Blow Hole

After seeing the blowhole, we carried on and drove to 2^nd Beach to test our luck with the sharks. We didn’t see any but did put our big toes into the water, just to say we’d done it.

Next we went to see the view from the airstrip. No such luck. We got to the top of another hill and were told to turn around because the army was doing a ‘practice shooting’ in the area… nice. So instead we attempted to find another beach we were told is a nice place to sit. We drove on a dirt road for 20 minutes before we were warned the road deteriorates soon and we’d need a 4×4 to traverse any further (little did we know this would be the theme of our trip… shitty shitty roads).

Instead, we went back to our Lodge, sat by the river and read before dinner.

Tuesday

With a 9am departure from our lodge we decided to drive to the Airstrip to see the view of PSJ before heading on for our quick two-hour drive to Coffee Bay.

Or so we thought.

The drive up to the airstrip was more complicated than anticipated (we should have learned by now, I know). We got stuck behind a bakkie going 10 ks per hour so to cheer up the kids heading to school, we blasted “Call Me Maybe” and danced like crazy people for 20 minutes. We found the airstrip eventually and the view was rewarding.

Port Saint Johns from the Airstrip

And then we were off to Coffee Bay.

The first leg of the trip was a mission and Col did a great job navigating pot holes, winding roads and avoiding people, goats, dogs, cows, and sheep before we got to Mthatha where we could get onto the main road and be in the clear and maybe even have some music on the radio because the three CDs were getting OLD.

Likely story.

Instead we got to Mthatha, switched drivers, stopped at a petrol station to fill up our tank and to pee but were told to get back in our car because there is “no petrol in Mthatha” and there are “too many tsotsis.” Ok fine, we’ll wait until we’re out of town to get gas and to pee. Holding it a little bit longer > getting mugged. Then I turned the corner into the most traffic I’ve seen in my life. The am radio was on and told us “there is a petrol shortage” in South Africa due to the transport strikes (strikes that are also preventing our lovely new electronic catalogue from being delivered to school). Good. We have ½ a tank and are on a road trip through rural South Africa. Safe. For the next hour I practiced my clutch control on a steep hill in downtown Mthatha with billions of other cars. Fun. Yes, we’re very grumpy at this point! Time to turn it around.

Revert to strategy from Port Saint Johns…Green CD, Track 3… “Call Me Maybe.”

How many people on the roads can we get to dance you ask? Maybe the Tsotsis won’t hijack our car if they want to dance instead. Worked like a charm! We had the traffic police, cars around us, and gangsters on the street dancing to Carly Rae Jepsen’s pop jams.

Finally off the hill, we turned the corner and onto the N2. Phew. Now to figure out how to find petrol. Fortunately after about 20 minutes we saw a Shell station with a few cars parked at it (all the others were completely abandoned) so we pulled in behind a couple from the Netherlands and parked the car to wait the 30 minutes for the gas truck to finish unloading. 30 minutes became over an hour… but we chatted in Xhosa with the people who worked there and eventually an hour and a half later when they began fueling, we, again BLASTED “Call Me Maybe” for a garage-wide dance party! Who cares if we make a fool of ourselves, we’ll never see any of these people again.

Off we were again to Coffee Bay, hungry, hot, and tired. We arrived before dark to this itty little town filled with the truest hippies imaginable. At the Bomvu backpackers we asked, “what should we do if we only have 24 hours” and the response was something to the effect of “see where the spirit takes you and follow the wind.” Hm. We followed the spirit to sleep by 8pm after an exhausting day on the road.

The only store in Coffee Bay.

Wednesday

Seeing as Colleen and I aren’t the most “follow the wind” type people when on a 5-day road trip, we made arrangements to hike in the morning to the Hole in the Wall (and be driven back) and an afternoon “Village Tour.”

Our guide met us at 8:30 to start the three-hour hike from our backpackers around the coast to the Hole in the Wall where we talked with him about his life and he answered some of our cultural questions about the amaXhosa. We learned more about the sangomas (traditional healers) and the pace of life in a traditional xhosa village.

The dog followed us. He literally tried to eat goats and sheep along the way.

After a nice dip in the water, our guide ensured us we would have ‘arrangements’ to drive us back to Coffee Bay. Arrangements apparently meant walking along the dirt road trying to hitch a ride. Eventually a “Nature Truck” (as our guide called it – in reality it was the Eastern Cape Agriculture Department) let us sit in its bakkie for the remaining 8ks.

HOLD ON

Then we walked onwards for the village ‘tour’. What we thought was going to be a cultural introduction to xhosa in the Transkei turned into a ‘meet the fam’. We walked up to his village and sat in his house for HOURS chatting with various family members and tasting different foods they were preparing for dinner as well as some traditional beer.

Our guide’s house (each hut is a different room)

It was fun to be able to put our language skills to work and we were both surprised with how much we were able to understand and speak when we had to. Give us two full weeks in the Transkei and we’d be pretty darn good at xhosa!

Preparing Umngqusho

Side Note: Our guide offered me a lobola (bride price) of two goats, a chicken and three t-shirts. I told him that I didn’t think my dad nor my uncle (its customary for the uncle to be involved in this process) would approve of the price and he better find some more cows. He said that because he ate “indigenous foods” he was very strong and probably could win in any match with my present boyfriend. Xhosa men can have two wives, but he reminded me that women can not have two husbands – ‘they would fight too much’. Good to know.

Tasting a pap/kale dish (don’t know the name). It was NOT good. I much prefer samp and beans (Umngqusho)!!

After 4ish hours we were ready to go back and were not longer able to be subtle. GET US HOME BEFORE DARK PLEASE! We began the walk back to Bomvu Backpackers and our guide said he had to “check on something” and we should continue walking. Five minutes later he joined back up with us with a HAND FULL of weed. Yes, a full handful. I think coffee bay would have a more accurate name of marijuana bay but nobody asked me. Weird little town.

Thursday

And we’re off again. Content with our big Wednesday and a bit overwhelmed by the earthy/hippy/druggy culture of Coffee Bay we ate breakfast and began driving to Cintsa to Buccaneers Backpackers, the “best backpackers in South Africa.” The ride, as usual, took way longer than expected due to the pot holes and road work so we stopped in Butterworth to try to find lunch. Fail. I’ve never been in a more hectic Spar (grocery store) in my life and we called it a loss. We arrived in Cintsa to try and find lunch at one of the two restaurants – both were closed. Hungry! Fortunately the Backpackers fed us mini sandwiches and told us dinner was available at 7pm. The hostel was very neat– and felt a lot like going to camp. Cintsa itself is mostly a beautiful lagoon/beach and because we had crappy weather we just went for a short walk and relaxed in the evening.

For dinner we ate at their main house and sat next to….wait for it… the NETHERLANDS COUPLE. So much for “who cares if we make a fool of ourselves, we’ll never see any of these people again.” Anyways, they said they had never had so much fun at a petrol station so I suppose they didn’t think we were actually insane.

Friday

Our last day we drove from Cintsa back to PE with a pit stop in Port Alfred for a cute lunch at a wonderful café – Zest. Back in PE, we immediately threw our clothing in the laundry and took the first proper shower of the week. TGIF and how wonderful it is to be home again!

Tomorrow starts the last school term of the year here in South Africa and marks our final month and a half in South Africa!

Wild!

Harkerville Hut – long weekend

Are we there yet?

Yes, 6 adults in a little “bakkie.” Col and I were the youngest in our little hiking group by almost 20 years yet we all squished ourselves into this vehicle for a 2.5 hour drive to the Harkerville trail head (between Knysna and Plett – right where Scott and I hiked on our trip) for our first night of the trek. It was beautiful but super technical and tiring! Annelie, the woman who arranged the trip for us way undersold it as a “beautiful and a bit difficult” – oof.

Meet the crew:

Danrich, Jomine, Annelie & Colleen (obviously)

Saturday night we braiied with a nice Afrikaaner family at the hut and slept early to be ready for our two day hike.

Sunday (15 K to the Sinclair hut): In the morning we finalized our backpacks and put the heavy things on our backs. Unfortunately Chantal got sick Saturday night and an hour into our hike decided to hike back and find a way back to PE L…and then there were 5.  The first few hours were in the forest on pretty easy terrain before a steep downhill climb to the ocean. Down on the ocean we walked for about 4 Ks through what felt more like an obstacle course than a hike as we climbed over rocks and up and down cliffs before heading back up a steep hill to the hut. Yah, we were sore and excited for our dinners!

Monday (12K back to the Harkerville Hut): We were greeted in the morning with stormy clouds and a wet ground from a rainy night… to do the escape route or to trot on? Trot on! Escaping would be “hiking” along the N2 for who knows how long. We’ll survive a little rainfall. This morning we started with a quick dissent back down to the beach and a terrifying day of scrambling around rocks, climbing chain ladders and using chains to aid us as we hung off of cliffs. AH.

ah.

Col got a bit stuck…

By about noon we arrived at the same beach that Scott and I reached during our day hike in March! The rest of the hike was the same as the one we had done… the climb back up a steep steep hill and a walk along a 4×4 road until we FINALLY reached the hut again…. sore and exhausted. A quick shower and we were back in the car for our trip home to PE, dinner, and sleep!

Now it’s Tuesday after a great long weekend thanks to Heritage Day on Monday, and we can barely walk and are falling over in our chairs from exhaustion. It was beautiful, but it was incredibly challenging and way more technical than any hike I’ve done before.  This week is to catch up on sleep, water, eating, and life. Time is FLYING.

Double Duty

Learners in traditional clothing playing with Hula Hoops…

…This is what happens when there is a lack of communication at a school and two of the biggest events happen on the same day. The Community Health Fair & the Heritage Day Celebration! Friday consisted of Colleen and I in our traditional amaXhosa makeup, running around with our heads chopped off trying to organize the partner organizations for the health fair while the students were busy dancing and doing plays to celebrate their culture.

All week was hectic getting things in order and we ended up renting a car for Thursday night through Saturday morning to try to be in as many places as once as we could manage.

This was Friday:

6 am: up!

7am – 9am: last minute errands

9am – 11: set up and organize all the different rooms

11am – 1 pm: Heritage day program in the court yard

1pm – 4 pm: Health Fair

4 pm – 5pm: Return DVD and PA system

5:30 – 6:30: Wash off sunburned and face painted faces (which now had tan lines from xhosa makeup), and have a quick dinner on Stanley Street

7pm – 9pm: Opera House for “To the Point” dance show

9:01: BED BED BED

Heritage Day: Seeing all of the teachers in their traditional clothing was beautiful and it was really wonderful to see such a rich culture we’ve been learning about and experiencing in a more modern context this year.

All the teachers in their traditional clothing!

Performances for Heritage Day

white amaXhosa for the day

We were asked what “olden day” clothing we would wear to celebrate our culture? Tie-die and peace sign shirts? Poodle-skirts? Pilgrim hats? Hard to say.

Health Fair: All thing considered, the health fair was a great success.  We invited community organizations (SANTA TB, LifeLine PE, PE Mental Health, Sandalani Clinic, Fierce Dance Class, LoveLife, Grassroot Soccer, Gqebera Clinic) who participated by giving informational lectures, fitness activities, HIV screenings, health activities, awareness information, health screenings etc.

Health Fair Stalls

 

FIERCE Dance Class

Side Note: The Fierce Dance Class was the result of an accidental class I took at the gym last week. I was intending to take a class called “bums and tums” a very girly class similar to the Pure Barre class I enjoy at home. When I arrived the dance room was covered in feathers, African masks and the instructors had on face paint and leopard print clothes. Hm… I was already there and the gym was packed so I decided to check it out, why not. The result – a “Zumba” type dance class, but rather than Latin influence, African influence. We even “went on a safari” pretending to be different animals. Yes, awkward. That said, I called her up the next day and asked if she would give a free lesson at the high school for the fair and she agreed. It was a huge success! The kids loved it and even our partner organizations jumped in.

To The Point: The dance show at the Opera House was… interesting. It was publicized as a professional dance troop with modern and African influences on the front of the local newspaper. In reality, it was more of a company dance recital with funny little dances. It was on my bucket list to get to the PE Opera House, so at least there was that.

Exhausted, we went to bed ready to wake up at the crack of dawn to quickly pack for our camping/hiking trip the next morning.