(origineel bericht op be-more.nl)
Last Week!
Today is the start of the last week here! I’m starting to think about that a lot more, thinking of what to pack and what I can leave here, and the fact that in a weeks time I won’t be waking up in my little bunk bed here to all the children. We’ve had a really good last weekend, even though it was just the 4 of us. As you know we planned a lot! Friday we went to the beach with the Day Care children which was a lot of fun! They were so excited, and unlike children at home, they came out from their houses just in their swimming stuff carrying a towel. Nuh, one of the caregivers came with us to help control the kids. At the beach it was very windy so there were big waves. Some of the kids wanted to go straight to the sea. Most of them were a little scared of the water and hung on to all of the volunteers – sometimes with 4 or 5 clinging onto everywhere possible (arms, legs, tshirts, bikini). One girl, the ‘daughter’of one of the cooks here, wasn’t afraid at all, and kept asking me to go deeper with her, so her and I went further out into the waves, with her clinging onto my hand tightly. She really loved it. When she got a bit scared though she asked to be picked up, but then asked me to walk out further while holding her. The waves were breaking right onto me and I was so scared that I would fall over with her, but she still asked me to go further. When we went back to the beach we had something to eat, and the kids played in a little shallow water pool. Some of them came back shaking quite vigorously and each of us volunteers ended up with a few children sitting around us trying to warm up. Even though the wind made it a bit cold, the sun was shining and it was a really nice day. The little girl asked me again to go out with her to the sea, but when we got there she was still shaking so we went back almost straight away. When we got back to Mother of Peace they were all so tired! In the evening we took the girls aged 7-12 to the cinema to see Zookeeper. There are a few girls in that group who are a bit naughty so part of me wasn’t looking forward to the trouble to come. We took them for a McFlurry before, then had popcorn and a coke with the film. As I expected, a couple of the girls misbehaved. A huge problem with them is that they don’t listen to the volunteers. A couple of the children here don’t have much respect for us, never listen and always answer back. One girl in particular is normally causing trouble, and she was the one who was difficult when we were out. The girls discovered the hand dryers in the toilets before the film, so half way through they all said “we need the toilet” but when we got there they just wanted to play with the dryer. I found it difficult with the girls being out because they didn’t know how to behave. They ran around everywhere, pushed past people etc. and because there were 11 of them and 4 of us it was, at times, difficult to keep them under control. One woman said in the toilet “if you cant keep your children under control then don’t bring them out” which I thought was a bit harsh, even though the girls were a bit hectic. 3 new children had arrived that day at Mother of Peace, one girl who is 10 so she came with us. She is a very cute little girl with a bald head and a very pretty face. She was very quiet and perhaps was a bit overwhelmed by arriving at Mother of Peace with all the children there and then being taken to a big shopping centre and a film. At first it seemed like she didn’t really know what to do with the McFlurry, but after some encouragement she tried it and smiled – then it disappeared quite quickly. She kept holding onto my hand tightly as we walked around and I think she felt reassured when she looked to the other girls to see what they were doing and that everything was ok. Mallory said when she walked back with her to her house later, she found a doll on the ground and picked it up, and in bed she held it tightly as she settled down to sleep her first night here.
On Saturday morning the 4 of us went to Galleria, the big shopping centre, to look around and to have lunch. It was nice to have a couple of hours away from Mother of Peace without having to worry about any children! In the afternoon I had organized a football match for the older boys. Because I don’t know very much about football, I asked the oldest boy in my house, a football lover, to help me so he put together the teams and refereed. One of the boys wasn’t there for the first bit of the match, so I suggested that the referee took his place, put the boys from the other team said they wouldn’t play if he did, so we got Justin to play instead. The boys said he was too good to play against and that they were scared to play him! The boys seemed to really enjoy it, and we got some of the other children to come and watch, and they all cheered when the match started and when the winning team was announced. One of the boys asked me at the end “when can we play again?”. It was so simple to organize, they could easily do it themselves every week or whenever they wanted, but they seem to rely too much on the volunteers to organize anything for them. Saturday night we had Saturday Night Fever*, a bonfire with games and marshmallows. The kids played Fox, a game where the volunteers hide and the each have a letter. The children have to look for them and when they find them and get all the letters they have to work out the word and be the first ones back to the starting point. I didn’t really want to hide in the dark by myself so I kept them busy while the others hid and I was the one they had to give the word to. Some of them couldn’t find the hidden volunteers and gave up, while some of them kept thinking theyd won and shouted Game Over Game Over! A group of girls won, which really annoyed the boys who thought they’d automatically be the first back. When the game was over we lit the fire and toasted the marshmallows. When we organized the evening, we made a deal with Nuh – if we sang then the children would sing and dance in Zulu. Mallory Jessica and Anne sang a Dutch song, so I couldn’t sing, but the second song I joined in with the dancing to make up for it. When the children started singing it sounded really good! I’m always amazed that whenever anyone sings in Africa it sounds good, and they find the harmonies so naturally. It really was beautiful singing. Then they started the challenge – you sing and pick someone to challenge to the Zulu kicking (to see who can kick higher). The girl leading the singing picked me!! I reluctantly went into the middle of the circle and started the kicking, but my legs didn’t go very high at all, the other girl kept her kicks very low so I would win! Gradually the singing turned into I guess what you’d call singing games – the girls sang songs and rhymes where they took it in turns to sing something and from all of the laughing we assumed it was entertaining.!
Yesterday we had the Street Party, our big finale event. It was quieter than I thought it would be, but it was still fun and everyone seemed to enjoy themselves. We decorated the pathway between the houses with balloons and streamers and posters and we hung the big sign we had made. We had bought so much food (drinks, crisps, sweets, hotdogs, ice lollies) and the kids were desperate to make sure they got one of each and equal to everyone else. Some of the boys were sneaky and kept trying to get more, but thankfully the caregivers and Gloria were there to help keep an eye on things. The housemothers seemed to appreciate it as well, equally making sure they got what they could and making sure all their children had as well. It was hot as well, which made sitting outside really nice. We played a couple of games and music, and when we finished at 3pm we got all the kids to help us clean up and gave them all an extra sweet to say thank you. For the rest of the afternoon they kept coming back one by one saying they hadn’t got something when they’d seen someone else with it, or could they have another drink or bag of crisps. It was a nice afternoon and a good way to say thank you to everyone for such a good time here! The children are really starting to open up now, its such a shame I’m leaving in 5 days.
The rest of the week is as normal with the daily routine. Wednesday night we’re going back to uShaka to go to the aquarium and to have dinner as the last thing we do together before leaving. Everyone is starting to realize that it’s the last week and I think we all want to make the most of it. One more blog entry after this while I’m here….I really hope I can come back to South Africa next year though. Even though a month seems like such a long time to be away, its gone so quickly. I’ll be sad when I leave on Friday!