Singing like a Bass

Tonight there is an event at the Home, and I've been asked to sing. Bleurgh. I love singing, I'm just not so keen on the solo part, more on the in amongst 50 other voices part! But I was told I was singing about 10 days ago, so I sing tonight. In theory, we are just background noise while the VIP guests arrive and mingle, but we've been warned that it is also entirely possible that people will arrive, not have anybody to talk to and we'll be the focus of attention.

It is a very formal event I believe, so we will have to dress up. After having a limit of how many clothes will fit in my rucksack and the weight limit airlines place on baggage, I haven't got any concert blacks (obviously). I have some clothes that I consider smart, and several combinations of smart clothes as well! I have also brought a skirt with me-the only skirt I own, bought about 2 months before I came here by my mother for my birthday (I don't wear skirts). And naturally my room-mate wants me to wear the skirt and warns me that if I don't, I will probably look under-dressed. This is fine for me, I have perfected the under-dressed look! And I would prefer to feel comfortable and look confident than add to the nerves and uncomfortableness, I feel when singing solo, with a SKIRT.

I might have also lost my voice a little bit, so here's for sounding husky and singing like a man!

8 legged updates:

We found a huge spider in the kitchen again on Wednesday! This one sat on the bin so we managed to get it outside. The only problem is that I'm not entirely convinced it was the same spider as before! The other one was big, fat, brown and hairy. But the one we took outside seemed more spindly and white and not hairy. But just as freaking huge!

In other news, one of my room-mates got a parcel from home that included her Nintendo DS. Holidays start on the 7th December for about 6 weeks (Summer holidays happen in December here what with being in the southern hemisphere and what not!) And both me and her have around 12 night-shifts over the holidays, and we're on opposite shift systems so I can use her DS when I have my night-shifts! YAY!

Update: Uses for a bunk bed

So I found another use for my bunk bed! And this is a good'un. When I was ill, my bestest friend ever, Sarah, came and watched a movie with me on my laptop in my bed. But because the top bunk is so low, we couldn't sit upright so we had to lie down with the laptop balanced on my stomach. This is fine if you are one person, but it's quite uncomfortable is there are 2 of you and neither can see properly (I have a Dell and the screen turns a funny colour when you view it from a wonky angle). So I decided there had to be better, more comfortable and more practical ways and places to out the laptop where we could both lie down and see properly. As previously mentioned I hang my washing off the slats, and if I can hang my washing up, why can't I hang my laptop up? And that's what I've done!

It took some planning-obviously. And I had to buy some twine, but it took me a couple of days to make it and now it's fully functional!

Basically I just deformed a wire coat hanger so it was a little bit bigger than the base of my laptop and wove/knotted/braided some twine across the bottom. Then I made a harness for over the keyboard because to be able to see all of the screen, you have to have it tilted down (if anybody has been lying in bed texting and dropped their phone on their face, you'll see why I wanted to make sure my heavy heavy laptop was properly secured...that thing could flatten my face). And it also can slide out of the whole thing-with a little difficulty, so if I need to take it outside to check emails or anything like that, I don't need to cut it down! It doesn't look fantastically pretty, but it works awesomely, so much so that I think we have planned to watch Madagascar or Despicable Me tonight! (On that note, if anybody wants to send me the new Ice Age DVD for X-mas, you will make me and Sarah VERY VERY happy volunteers!)

The Monster in Back Kitchen.

I want to tell you about a small phobia I have. I am absolutely terrified of spiders and I hate it! I hate that I can't deal with any spider related situations. It sucks. I still have to ask my Dad to remove spiders from my bedroom in England (I would ask my Mum, but she teases me about it!). So I was a little bit worried about the size and the teeth on the beasties here, one of the volunteers from my organisation got bitten on the toe a couple of weeks ago and had to go to the hospital to get pills to make the swelling go down! Spiders bite here. And jump. So far I've only really seen little'uns and a couple of bigger ones but nothing uncommon for an English spider. I found a lime green one on my shirt collar a month or so ago which was creepy but sort of cool!

Then last Monday there was a spider on the wall outside our kitchen, but this was no ordinary spider. Oh-ho-ho-no. This spider was as big as my hand. And I'm prone to exaggeration when it comes to spiders, but I swear on my life, this thing was as big as my hand laid out flat. It was a monster. But it was sort of OK because we knew where it was and it wasn't moving and it was outside (my bedroom, bathroom and kitchen are all close together but you have to go outside because they're all individual rooms. My bedroom door leads straight outside). Then one of the kids tried to catch it in a coke bottle (I honestly don't think it would have fit through the neck) and it ran off into a tree, and I stopped sitting under trees!

And today I saw a monster...in the kitchen. We were trying to compare it to something a standard size that most people could relate to, and yes we're to technology dependant for our own good. But we decided it was definitely as long as an Ipod Classic. And it was hairy and horrible.

A Warning

I'm going to post an entry later. I typed it yesterday so it's a bit out of date reading it, and the subject matter is scary. But I'm at the gym now and the post is saved on my laptop.

Church for the Athiest

I went to church today! It's the first time I've worked on a Sunday since I arrived so it's my first time going to a church here. I imagine most people reading this are imagining me living maybe in a mud hut, almost certainly the scene is very orange with dust/dirt on the floor instead of grass and the only vegetation is small and bush-like probably orange (or dead). You're also probably imagining African Church to be like what you see on TV with lots of gospel music and people randomly just standing up and singing. Oh and the population in your head is entirely black.

So all of that is NOT what it is like here. The area I'm in is very westernised (I'm sat in a Virgin Active for crying out loud!), there are lots of trees. Loads of grass. I live in an actual building made of bricks. The church the children go to is also very 'western' and the population is majority white. But it was still a very interesting experience. I got to sing "Away in a Manger" and "Silent Night" in Afrikaans and I had to explain to the children why I didn't take communion (I think that's what it's called, the bread and wine?) and then explain to some very confused children why I didn't believe in God without pushing my beliefs onto them. I personally don't believe in a God and sometimes I disagree that they're never given a choice between religion and science, I think they're not taught the science theory at school. But sometimes I think it's good that they have something to believe in. A greater power if you will especially after what some of them have been through, it's nice that every night they pray for their sister to get better or their Mum to get better so they can got home and they truly believe it will help. I almost envy their faith then.

Noodles in a Thunder Storm

On Sunday I was horrifically sick :) When I got up in the morning everything was fine, but by about 3pm I was feeling pretty rotten. From then on I was vomiting roughly every 2 hours for about 12 hours. On Monday morning I was supposed to start work at 6am on my new shift system, but luckily I have amazing room-mates who offered to work for me if I needed them to and as I still felt sort of awful at 5.30am I woke one of them up and asked if she could work my morning shift for me. My next shift starts at 2pm so I went back to sleep, thinking that if I don't throw up before that shift I won't have been sick for 12 hours so if I felt better I was planning to be to work (I was brought up that if you are there to do something, unless you are dying, you do it! Except for school. School is compulsory so I tried to get out of going to that. A lot.).
Anyway I get up at 12.30 planning to have a bath then maybe try and drink some water, still not entirely trusting my stomach to hold down solid food, and go to work. I see one of my room-mates as I'm leaving the bedroom and she tells me I have to go back to bed as the volunteer manager has got another volunteer to replace me for that day and maybe also the next. I feel I could go back to work that day, but maybe it's a good idea for me not to. I go and sit in the kitchen for a bit when I get a call from the volunteer manager who tells me off for being out of bed but says she appreciates me wanting to go back to work and if I take the day off (and spend it in bed) then I can work the next day providing I'm better of course!

So I spent a long day yesterday in bed watching films on my laptop. I have discovered although my bunk-bed is useful for many unexpected things, watching films with a friend, it is hopeless at. You can't sit upright to watch so you have to lie down, but because the bed is unnaturally narrow, it's a bit of a squeeze. But I'm working on developing a laptop hammock so I can hang my computer of the bed to watch movies! In my head, it's an awesome plan that works really well and my laptop will never fall out of it. In reality it will either break the laptop or my face!

New Shift System for Lucky Little Me!

Next week I get to to work the long week short week shift system for 2 weeks instead of Monday to Friday! I'm really excited :) It means I start work at 6am instead of 1pm but I get to wake the children up in the morning and help with that routine which I've never been able to do and I get the same amount of days off next week (2) but the week after, I get 5 days off! I'm predicting boredom! But it will be nice I think!!

I think that's all for now folks! I'll probably remember something I wanted to say when I get home but hey, that's life!

Table Mountain-Attempt #1

Yesterday me and two of my room-matesgot up at 4.30 am to climb table mountain. We left at 5am and were starting to climb by 6am. By 8am weare having a discussion as to whether we can actually make it to the top without the rescue helicopter! We decided we couldn't and came down another way.

Table Mountain is very steep. You start by climbing steps, but the steps are made from boulders. They're steep enough that you are exhausted after 3 or 4 but not steep enough to warrant climbing!

Once we were almost down, we started to think about climbing Lion's Head, the mountain/hill next to Table Mountain because we'd been told to do that one first as it's slightly easier. We could see some of the path from where we were and it didn't look to steep and most importantly it wasn't steps!

So we got a taxi to the base of Lion's Head. The path was considerably steeper than we thought it was but we took lots of breaks and it was definitely easier than TM. But then occasionally we found ourselves taking big boulder steps, but it's OK because the ground is less steep now so you just have to watch your feet because it's getting rocky. Then we come upon The Chains. This is part of the route that is optional (2 of us did it and the other one walked/climbed the other route) I've attached a picture of me about to start it, but it's just a wall with some metal pegs and chains nailed into it to help you pull yourself up! It was difficult mainly just because my legs are short and there were a couple of times I thought I wasn't able to reach and if you look down, you can see almost straight down a very steep mountain! But I did it!

From that point on you are basically rock climbing. It isn't straight up, but you have to pull yourself up in some parts!. But we all made it up and down and I was very proud of us. And we went to 'Mr Pick-Wicks' for a milkshake to celebrate!

And I only just realised that it's bonfire night tonight...I've been trying to explain the history of it to the other volunteers who aren't English and they don't get it. But it makes a good story so I might tell it to the kids in my house!

What a Week

I feel like I haven't posted in ages. I've had a bit of a horrible week. Well up to Tuesday it was horrible. Wednesday, things to a dramatic and unexpected turn for the better but I'm waiting 'til everything is finalised and everybody is informed before I can post it!

But I got a parcel from home yesterday which was exciting! And much better than could have been expected! It included my first ever voting paper which is fun...it's a shame I'm 6ooo miles away and can't vote!

There are also plans for tomorrow that start at 4.30am and involve Table Mountain and don't involve the cable car! But I'll write more about that if I recover!