the Human Jungle Gym

Thought I'd share these. We taught two small and dear people how to play twister. They loved it, but it soon was not enough and poor K was challenged to go through the game with Sheena on his back! It was MUY entertaining! He of course ended up on his butt splayed across the twister board, but he managed not to squish Sheena.

Thanks for Thanksgiving

This is easily my most favourite of the American holidays, it is Christmas without the religion and without the commercialism. It is all about friends and family and reflecting on your life and focusing on the good things about it. It's like the government has given Americans three days to just be together with their favourite people and enjoy each other.

Our usual thanksgiving is for Keir to make the turkey (a Happy one) and everyone to bring sides, I make the Tofurkey - yum - and then we eat till we can't. Then we all lie around or play baord games and perhaps manage a roll around the block before we face the dishes. Of course, here in Namibia no-one has the day off, but K and I took it off. We shopped from a list that reached my knees and then we chopped, peeled and mixed to our hearts content.

There were of course some of the usual mix-ups. I completely forgot to do the peas and we had to use philo pastry for the pies! Plus it never even occurred to me to make Gravy! Essential to all large dinners, shock horror. Then there were the uniquely Namibian hiccups. No Turkey... well, no WHOLE turkey. The closest we could come was to find four pre-cooked turkey legs, which looked very funny lying side by side in our roasting pan. We were all left to wonder where the rest of the Turkey's were. Perhaps they were only eating turkey breast for thanksgiving in Zambia, and only thighs in Botswana? Of course, if we only managed to find turkey legs, what was the chance of finding a tofurkey... Sigh!

The dinner itself was so wonderful. Somehow it still had the feel of thanksgiving, even though it was hot and the Bird carcass was missing from the middle of the table. I was so thankful to be sitting at a table with my Mom and Sisters. The whole evening had this lovely feeling of companionship and contentment that I always associate with Thanksgiving.

K made the most amazing pumpkin pie from scratch! From an actual pumpkin! I really enjoyed it, but he felt like it tasted too much like pumpkin and not enough like pie. Also - HUGE shoutout to KO for the stuffing recipe. Sooooo Good. I think it's the thyme - apricot combination that make it!

Of course all this has left me feeling very thankful for thanksgiving.

This is the weekend.

They wrote my paper on Friday and so this is the weekend for marking. So far I have two complete failures and two kids who got 78 out of 80... lets hope there is a lot more of the latter and not so much of the former hidden in the rest of my pile of papers, or it is going to be a very grumpy weekend indeed.

Almost over

Tomorrow is my second last class, ever, with my Grade 8's. After spending the year with them and seeing them grow up a little, and finally figuring each one of them out I am feeling stupendously sad. Most of them are really great kids and even those that aren't have still taught me something this year.

sniff sniff.

Talk to you again when I grade their papers and have to polish off a bottle of wine cos the little b's didn't study.

The man who does not read good books has no advantage over the man who cannot read them. Mark Twain

When we moved here, I was invited to join Mom's bookclub. One of their ladies was going to be away for almost exactly the months that I am here and so I took her place. The way that it works is that the ladies each contribute $$ each month for the person who is hosting the next month. That person then uses those $$ to buy as many books as she can afford, prepares a simple meal and sends out an email with directions to her house. I didn't think I would get to host as the lady I was replacing had already hosted, but they didn't have anyone for October so I got given a wad of cash and instructions to buy what I liked.

This turned out to be a very stressful job. Let me first explain the ladies that belong to this bookclub. These are all ladies who are my Mom's age and older. They have already been through children and careers and all that nonsense and are at the peak of their wisdom and experience. They are almost all involved in some sort of job where they are contributing to society, through lifeline, USAID etc. Their thoughts are well developed, they can tap smartness at the blink of an eye. In short, they are mature in a way I can only hope to be when I get there.

The books they choose are about child soldiers in Rwanda, women in Turkey, slavery, Autism, male dementia and so on. The books I typically choose to read are fantasy, historical novels, murder mystery and the occasional Jane Austen.

Sooooo, when I took my $$ into the bookstore, I ended up on their couch with piles and piles of books, trying to eradicate some of my choices. I was torn between what I thought the ladies would choose to read and what I would use to while away my brain. In the end I settled on a fluffy dan Brown meets Phillipa Gregory, a Jon Ronson, which is sort of like an immature Bill Bryson. The latest bill Bryson joined the group as I thoroughly enjoyed it and as I had never read out of Africa but had cried for the movie about 100 times I added that one too.

Then I took two unknowns. The first was called 'McCarthy's Bar' in which Pete McCarthy travels around Ireland going into every single pub he sees and commenting on Ireland and himself as he goes along. A book that I would call highly entertaining and an excellent read for when you are traveling too. The second is by James Chatto, love, life and loss in Corfu. It's beautiful. The most of the book is a rambling tale of how they are enchanted and adopted by the island. You get so involved in their lives and in their characters without even realising it, then suddenly the 'loss' part hits. I was left sobbing into my pillow, but so glad that I had read the book.

I made an excellent chickpea curry and fruit salad with icecrteam for desert and told the ladies about my books. Luckily October is everyone's busy month, so they all felt like and had time for easy reading and my books got snapped up.

Just the right smell

This evening was the first of the rains. It was only a spatter, enough to make the dust settle but not enough to actually wet anything. The clouds have been slowly collecting all day, starting first as puffy whites this morning and getting lower and darker throughout the day, till this afternoon was stifling hot and muggy.

It feels as if all of WHK pauses to listen when the pat pat pat starts, and everyone perks up and says; 'is that rain?' The scent of ozone follows so quickly that you don't even need to go outside to confirm, but each one of us did. Not together in a group, but trailing each other for to each have that feeling of silence and peace as you turn your face up and the cool water hits your closed eyelids. As if that weren't enough, there was a double rainbow, glowing above the Jakaranda which is in full bloom across the road.

The country here is so desperate for rain, and we have been looking at a brown landscape for what feels like a very long winter that the first rain is something we have almost been holding our breath for. Now the grasses will start to grow, the trees will suddenly burst out with green and all the thorns will flower with bright yellow stars in patches all over WHK where there are no buildings.

When you bite off more than you can chew

If you're wondering why I am not posting as often as I should... here's why, I'm two timing, I'm doubling up, I'm leading a double life.

http://stpcnamibianews.blogspot.com/

Nothing to report

I'm sad to say that life is really quiet here. Mostly we are just getting on with our daily busniness. K has gone to Gobabeb and will be there all week. It has been very odd adjusting to having the house completely to myself. Well aside from the cats, who must be missing K cos they have taken to following me around the house. Henry has a little sniffle and has had a drippy nose all week and so just wants to snuggle everytime you sit down for more than 30 seconds, which is adorable of course. The worst of being home alone is when I come back from TV watching next door to a dark and empty house and then get into an empty bed. I miss K's feet the most at this point. They always find me in the night.

Other than that - bird club at school is hilarious, every Tuesday we take out the students and spend an hour an half trying to convince them that if they chat at the top of their voices they won't see anything, which doesn't seem to bother them that much, and at least we haven't heard the dreaded "B" word yet! The club does remind me how quickly time is passing - it seems impossible that every week Tuesday is here already and we need to arrange what and how and communicate that to the students. Thank goodness for assembly.

Next door - R is writing exams this week, L took a spill and has her arm in a sling, which is teaching me how tough it is to plan supper for a family every day, you can't jsut tell them to make toast like I do for K quite often. Ooh - we watched no less than five episodes of West Wing last night. Whenever we get to the end of the season there is absolutely no way we can go to bed without watching the first of the next season. The of courses the brilliant bastards made that a cliff-hanger too! Will CJ become the new chief of staff, will Josh finally realise that he is in love with Donna, will they ever bring peace to the world and good, free education to the USA?

Working and on a Friday night!

Sometimes the internet can be the most frustrating time spender. I have just spent the last 45 minutes looking for a map of namibia showing the areas occupied by which tribes. I am CONVINCED that it exists and that someone has published it online. I am also convinced that I cannot teach the next chapter without it. This after an hour of reading the textbook, making a timeline and scrunching up my brain to come up with some interesting way of teaching this stuff. You see, I feel that one must have some concept of the geography of Namibia for it to make sense that Witbooi and Maharero couldn't get it together and sort out the Germans.

To temper my frustration and kick start my creativity, I have been working on a few different techniques for making me feel better. First a glass of crisp cold white wine, then balance on my excercise ball in front of the comp. Trying to sit cross legged on it has given me a good few minutes of entertainment while I wait for a site to load. Also Chris Evans is helping considerably by playing some absofab music! The I decided to become completely distracted and read my new fave blog: http://www.hoboteacher.com/blog/index.html It's great if you are a teacher - and perhaps if you aren't one too. But he makes me laugh and laugh because so much of what he says happens in my classroom daily!

Maybe I can come up with some version of Risk that shows the movement of tribes, troops and Germans around Namibia around 1890. Or some kind of role play? urgh.

Our fifth anniversary!

It was even harder to leave K wrapped up and snuggly in bed, and go to school to face rambunctious and enervated Gr. 8's yesterday. It was our fifth anniversary, even though it seems like we have only be married a couple of years, it's just been so easy. I guess in the grander schemjavascript:void(0)e of things, five years isn't that long actually. I'll get back to you at 25...

Found this in our local squash club's newsletter - couldn't believe our eyes!

Click on the photo to open it big enough to read the text.

Home improvement

I had such fun today - As you know, Henry has been making a pest of himself two doors over so we have had them inside for the majority of the the time. This has been fine because it has been winter and having windows and doors closed kept the cold out. Well Summer has arrived and the days are suddenly hot and the closed up house seems stuffy, confining and smelly.

After a week of thinking about it, K and I came up with a complicated plan of attaching some kind of netting to the burglar bars on the sliding french doors which open to the garden. I became determined that this experiment should happen this weekend. So this morning we went on a hardware shopping spree - netting and cable ties!

After a brief break for West Wing we locked the cats in the bedroom and went to work. Our four metres of netting spread out onto the lawn and we began cable tying it to the burglar bars. Disappointment quickly raised it's vicious head. The cable ties were too small, but we are smart and we connected two together and continued. Of course now our number of ties was halved and K had to jump in the car and fetch more. By the time we were finished we were hot, bothered and our fingertips raw from the plastic cable ties.

We let the cats out to see if our construction would stand up to them. It passed the sniff test and then the scratch test. Then Oleo climbed up the netting for the climb test and that passed too. Now we are waiting to see if it passes the neighbourhood Tom-cat at night spraying and howling test.

Ok, now I am actually busy

Term started. And it's haaaaard! Firstly we have changed times back so not only am I getting up early, it's in the dark! Yuck. Plus it is still chilly so it horrid getting out of the shower at that time of morning.

Enough whining, I am enjoying being back. It seems as though people have brought a new energy with them from the holidays and are excited about new projects and old that are happening this term. Of course I have had to say goodbye to afternoon naps as I am now planning and doing extra work in the afternoons. I made it through 7 books this holiday and I suspect that the current one will take me all term to read.

My most exciting thing about this term is that I have an office! No more working on the staffroom comfy chairs and coffee tables for me! I share it with an energetic and friendly teacher and it is situated in the quiet part of school, next to the chapel. It is under a massive pepper tree (schinus molle - not indigenous but wonderful shade and scent) and there are lots of other trees around so the birds are constantly chirriping. This morning when the students trooped into chapel I realised that I am directly underneath the church bell, which is one of my favourite sounds.

As a result I am looking favourably at the new term, and expecting to enjoy not carrying all my books back and forth between home and school.

Long time no see

I was just going through my favourite blogs and being mad at them for not having posted anything. (With the exception of one) When I realised that I have not posted in the longest time either!

This is because I am realllly busy.

HAHAHAHAHAHHAHAH. No actually it is because laziness begets laziness. We are on school holiday and here is our schedule:
get up late, feed the cats and go back to bed
get up again, decide we don't need to shower EVERY day and stay in our pyjamas while we check mail, eat breakfast and then read something on the bed.
get up again, eat lunch
watch an episode of Bones, and one of West Wing, this is exhausting so we must go back to bed with our books.
get up again, wonder what to make for supper, order pizza and eat it in front of CSI. (Which is unadvisable if you have a sensitive stomach - seriously)
Then pretty much we go back to bed.

It is heaven, but I am starting to feel restless and am quite glad that school starts again on Monday. I suspect that on Monday I will not be glad that school started because I will want to be in bed frequently.

Also - the weather here is really wierd. Spring in Namibia means that outside can't make up it's mind whether it is really hot, or really cold. There is a haze in the air from all the veld fires up North and it feels like you need to turn the light on all the time. I am really looking forward to the crisp mornings of summer, which incidentally is tomorrow. Clocks change at 12, which will then be 1.

OK, now I've posted - it's your turn!

Bird list for Etosha, as promised

Redbilled Hornbill
Monteiro's Hornbill
Yellowbilled Hornbill
Red-eyed Bulbul
Rock Kestrel
Black Shouldered Kite
Groundscraper Thrush
Longbilled Crombec
Fork-tailed Drongo
Dusky Sunbird
Glossy Starling
Kori Bustard
Pale Chanting Goshawk
Red-billed Quelea
Marico Sunbird
Helmeted Guineafowl
Lilacbreasted Roller
Whitebacked Mousebird
Pririt Batis
Crimson-breasted Shrike
Whitebrowed Sparrowweaver
Crowned Plover
White-bellied Sunbird
Lappet-faced Vulture
Swainson's Francolin
Grey Lourie
Cape Turtle Dove
Double-banded Courser
Pied Crow
Black Crow
Northern Black Corhaan
Redcrested Corhaan
Secretary Bird
Double-banded Sandgrouse
Spotted Eagle Owl
Gabar Goshawk
Blacksmith Plover
Egyptian Goose
Red-billed Teal
Cape Sparrow
Southern White-Crowned Shrike
Namaqua Sandgrouse
Pearl-spotted Owl
Blue Waxbill
Violet-eared Waxbill
Grey-headed Gull
Fiscal Shrike
Short-toed Rock Thrush
Laughing Dove
Grey Hornbill
Purple Roller
Greater Kestrel
Burchell's Starling
Black-chested Prinia
Greater Blue-eared Starling
Red-headed Finch
Black-cheeked Waxbill
Scaly-feathered Finch
Ant-eating Chat
White-throated Canary
House Sparrow
Tawny Eagle
Red-billed Francolin
Common Moorhen
Red-billed Buffalo Weaver
Ostrich
Marico Flycatcher
Sociable Weaver
Wattled Starling
Namaqua Dove
Titbabbler
Black-throated canary
Masked Weaver
Acacia Pied Barbet
Hoopoe
Giant Eagle Owl
Rattling Cisticola
Hottentot Teal
White-crested Helmut Shrike
Little-banded Goshawk
African White-backed Vulture
Bare-cheeked Babbler
Stark's Lark

Birding in Etosha

yes - that's right. We went to Etosha and twitched. Best Big Game Park in the world ( according to me) and we looked for lbj's, warblers and eromomelas!

I have to say though, that people who have the vaguest interest in birds - should do it this way. When you are sitting at the waterhole and "nothing" is there, or you are tired of craning your neck to see the Lions on the other side of the trees, then the birding comes in really handy. It keeps you at the waterhole for a few hours where you are more likely to see the big game, rather than rushing desperately from one waterhole to the next.

We were very excited and also a little proud of our extensive bird sightings and identifications. Collectively we saw 83 different species, and that is not counting males, females and also one notable "mellanistic form"! I won't exhaust you with the full list. (Well maybe I will, but in another post) I'll just give you the highlights for me. Although I think our number is very impressive considering that there are only 340 bird species to be seen in Etosha.



I think my absolute favourite was the Giant Eagle Owl. He was at the Okaukuejo waterhole, sitting perfectly still in a tree at dusk. We only knew he was there because he started screeching incessantly. Just as the book said, the juveniles frequently will make single piercing screams all night, and he did. We also saw a pearl spotted Owl, which is a tiny and adorable little thing. He flew across the waterhole in the middle of the day, and perched perfectly on a piece of wood for us. He had caught an lbj (unidentified) and was on his way to taking it home, but the lbj was almost the same size that he was so he was having some difficulty flying!



At a tiny and completely deserted waterhole, we had an absolute treat! A huge eagle had come down to drink. Ladydi tortured us by stretching out the 100& ID for a good half an hour, but we eventually agreed that it was a Tawny Eagle!



And of course there were a few tiny birds that I will always adore, no matter how many times I see them! Blue, violet eared and black cheeked waxbills all drinking from a pipe near our camp! Not to mention the delightful red-headed Finch!

Teaching is stressful

I just finished marking the History exam papers.

When I first saw the paper I thought it was reallllly difficult, even for me! They wrote the paper while I was cruising around Etosha, and when I returned there was a massive stack awaiting me and my red pen. Which, by the way, was empty from all the marking through the year.

I arranged myself at the dining room table where I could spread out, made tea and lined up my pink pen and my red pencil. I marked the first paper with the pink and the second with the pencil. Neither was satisfactory and the first two students did not even pass. This gave me an exceptional excuse to work avoid for another 24 hours.

Next day, Mom provided me with an excellent red pen; bright, roller ball, liquid gel, 0.5mm needle tip. I once again commandeered one end of the table and commenced. I marked all afternoon, with a pause for tea and another pause for washing. Some students passed, some even did quite well. After three hours I needed something else red. Red Wine, really gooood red wine. Delheim cabernet sauvignon shiraz. It was wonderful and I had to mark one of the students papers again today because after three glasses everything had taken on a pinkish tinge, and her 85% was generous from the bottom of the bottle.

This afternoon I marshalled my energy and necessary marking resources and finished the last of the lot. It took me a long time but now I am done and have reviewed their marks against homework marks and last term's marks to assess their progress or lack thereof. I don't need the better part of a bottle of red to induce the stress that this brings. Exams were always considered the ultimate test when I was at school. Teachers talked about them all term, and set them very carefully and as a teacher, I am no different. Except from this side you know that here is the way you will know whether you have got through to the students, whether the child who needed special attention got it, whether the child who always gets 90's with other teachers, gets them with you too, and many other nail-biting thoughts.

Thankfully it appears that most of those questions have been answered in the positive and I have to tell myself that for those that are negative, this is the information I need to adjust what I am doing with them. I also had a pleasant surprise on the last two papers. Students who always make the class average, this term have set the upper reaches of the marks.

They call me... MR. PIG

There were so many giraffe, especially browsing really close to the road, so that Keir always had to drive very slowly for fear of rounding the corner and finding another group munching on the trees along the roadside. Most of them were afraid of the car and sadly would gallumph off as soon as the car approached, but there was one who came over to inspect Hank in his fabulousnous and covered in dust.

Giraffe in abundance