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Boredom, Cats and Parrots.

I have tonsillitis and so, am super duper bored. I've made a 3D spinning cat out of card and a tree full of parrots. My mum sent a book of cut out animals that you glue together and they move in different ways. I was in so much pain yesterday I could barely swallow. I woke up at about 4am this morning with my throat so sore I think I was crying in my sleep. I got up and went to the kitchen for some ice water and Sarah left some of her amazing pain killers in there for me. My throat was so swollen I had to cut them up so small they were nearly powder and every time I swallowed it was excruciating. It is my long week this week, obviously, I wouldn't get sick on a short week, that would be considered helpful. So at about 4.30am I texted the shift leader (thank god for night-shift!) to say I was really sorry but I wouldn't be able to work that morning. The volunteer manager has what I would class a phobia of sick volunteers. She's not scared of germs so much as all the volunteers all getting sick at the same time which is fair enough I suppose. But because we all live so close and there's no way of getting away from sick people, if one of us gets sick, often quite a few folk go down with. For example, I share a room with 3 other people, a bathroom with 7 others and a kitchen with maybe 14 people. And there are 150 kids. So our manager has installed a new rule: You may have one day off sick. If you need to take any more off you have to go to the doctor. I think it's half to discourage people being 'sick' because they were out drinking the night before and can't face work and half so that people who are actually sick get medication. If you don't go to the doctor, the extra time you take off get taken off your leave.

So I went to the medi-center today. Being sick here really makes you appreciate what an amazing thing the NHS is. Yes it has it's flaws but they'll treat anyone any time-even if you do have to wait a bit! Anyway, I went to the doctors. The doctor checks my temperature and I have a fever, he then gets his light and one of those little wooden sticks they use to press down your tongue. I open my mouth and he takes one look, puts back the little stick and goes “Well I'm not going to need that and I think I don't even need my light”. He pokes my definitely swollen lymph nodes and announces that I definitely have tonsillitis.

Now I have some MASSIVE antibiotics (seriously, you'd think if it was for tonsils so swollen and painful you can't swallow, they wouldn't give you pills so insanely huge you contemplate not taking them cause it looks too painful) painkillers that take me from unable to swallow my own spit, to barely a sore throat. And a spray that tastes so alcoholic I think I get drunk off one squirt and it burns when I hits my throat. And I'm off work until Wednesday (but because it's my long week I would only work Monday, Tuesday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday) and cause I've not been 100% for a couple of weeks my boss says she might as well just give me the whole week off.

My organisation is coming on Thursday so if I get the whole weekend off, it might be nice cause then I might be the person that gets the free trip up Table Mountain or whatever because everyone else is working this weekend but I;d be so bored if I couldn't work and I miss my kids already!

Right I'm going to make a spinning frog!

Infections.

I has tonsilitis...YAY

The Last Roomie...

My Japanese room-mate leaves tomorrow morning and it makes me want to cry.

But as a surprise for her, we've made a leaving video for her and hidden it in her luggage.

On the plus side, Sarah's moving into our room on Wednesday. Yay.

6 Months Gone/Left.

I am officially half way through my year. It hasn't gone in the blink of an eye so I'm not so worried about my next 6 months disappearing but I can't help but think of all the things I haven't done yet that I want to do.

But today I had a wonderful time! I've been helping at the kids drumming club since October, I have been every single week except one and I love it. I'm the only volunteer who goes, others come to one session and can't be bothered coming to more or don't like it. But because I've been going so long and I go every week I've had so many opportunities come from it. There is a drum circle in the evening on Thursdays that is for members of the local community which I now go to every other week when I'm not working which is amazing, someone always brings me a djembe because I don't have one! Today the CCW who runs the club (lets call him H) took 2 kids and me to his church to do a little class with some of the kids there. IT WAS SO FUN! At first me,  H and one of the kids showed them some basic rhythms and talked a little but about technique like which bits of your hand need to hit which bits of the drum then we put them all in a circle and gave them a black plastic drum each and had a jam. The kids picked up the patterns really really fast, we only had to play the rhythms once or twice and they had them. At the end, H was on the big bass drum and one of the kids was playing his djembe and I was on a miniature skin and H had me leading a jam! I was so honoured he felt I'd picked up enough to lead! And we're doing it again in 2 weeks!

Swallows and Amazons

When working with the child-care worker that I do, I have to work an extra 2 hours every morning. Ok, so that's a small lie. I have to work from 6-10 but all my kids have gone to school by 7.40 every morning, 7.50 if the bussie is late. If you work with the other child-care worker you get your break at 7 or 8 because she doesn't have any more work for you. My ccw makes me work until 10 in the little kids house. It is utterly pointless me being there as there are 4 kids the oldest is 3, and 3 volunteers and 3 ccw's. But I do quite like it. We get to watch 4 babies playing and occasionally they come over and just want to sit on your lap for a bit. When I go in, the littlest (but not the youngest) one always clambers up onto my knee so I can sing her a song. This morning she did that but after one song, two of the others wanted to join in so I had the littlest duckling basically sat on my hips then another two, slightly fatter/chubbier/squidgier ducklings on each knee. When baby duckling realises he's all on his own on the floor he starts to cry and wants to sit on my knee as well! But there's no room so I sit all of them in the floor and Sarah walks in to see me sat on the sofa singing "Mr Rabbit" with funny voices and actions, and 4 kids sat at my feet, completely still, watching me. When I sang it again, most of them sang along (in that one-note-continuous-squeak babies do) and did the actions. (excuse the out of character moment) IT WAS SO DAMN CUTE!

When we took them outside me and Sarah were sat on the slide watching them play and there were so many swallows flying around us and so close. It's so odd that in England you always hear of all the swallows flying thousand and thousands of miles all the way to Africa where it's nice and warm. All of a sudden we're on the other end of that where we are in Africa where the swallows came and soon they will by flying back to England where it's nice and warm! (well sort of).

Alcohol, Drugs and other Undesirables.

Ok. So this post is an interesting one. This happened last night.

Yesterday was the Valentines Ball for the kids, they all get dressed up and look baie lekker. The little'uns went first from 6-7 then the older kids from 7-9.30. In the change over there were a lot of volunteers hanging around and our manager called us into the nearest living area to have a quick meeting. We got the impression it was very important because absolutely everybody had to be there whether they were working or not.

Due to the fact it's a children's home (and it's against the law) there is a zero tolerance for drugs and alcohol on the premises. If alcohol or drugs are found in your room or on your person you get sent home straight away. So were all called into this meeting and our manager starts off with: "What's the children's homes main rule?" And we're all like "ohhhhhhhh" From what I've heard, staff smelt people smoking weed a few days ago and in a different incident also saw volunteers smoking. So yesterday evening during the valentines ball we all had our rooms searched. About an hour later 4 people get called into the night shift leader's office and long story short, they had to have left the home by midday today. It's about as much drama as there will ever be in my time here.

In other news, I did litter picking today with my kids! As part of a project with Cape Town Council (I think) some of the ids are taking part in an outreach programme which today involved picking up litter for a hour. The kids found 2 bras 6 g-strings and 9 wine bottles and I'm almost certain they threw them all away (you never can be too certain) and then we had a lovely braai at someone's house!

Brazil, Leavers and Sarah's Feet.

Ok so there are 3 things I want to write about today: My new room-mate, people leaving and their parties and Sarah's feet.

Lets start with my new roomie. As I think I've mentioned before, she's from the far and exotic lands of Brazil! Where they speak Portuguese and no English. She speaks a few words of English but it is literally about 5 words and I never imagined how difficult it is! I think I'm a pretty patient person, I can sit with a child going over and over something for hours. But when you're trying to communicate with someone who doesn't even have a basic grasp of the language, its really frustrating. We were trying to ask her if she wanted to heat up her plate of food so we said “Do you want to make your food warm?” and she didn't understand so we simplified “Make food hot?” still nothing so we cut down to one word “hot?” and when even that didn't get a response we pointed at the microwave and made microwave noises. And still we got nothing. In the end, we just put her food in the microwave and hoped she didn't mind. But I can't help but feel as annoying as it is for us trying to talk to her, it must be so isolating. Luckily there is an American guy here called Thor who's father is Cuban so he speaks Spanish and understands Portuguese and the new roomie speaks Portuguese and understands Spanish so together they've made it work!

A lot of people are leaving at the moment. Most volunteers arrive in batches so loads of people arrive in July/August (end of the academic year in most if not all of the northern hemisphere) and they either stay for 6 or 12 months. If they stay for 6 months then they leave around February which is where we are now. So many volunteers are leaving they're throwing a party for them all. I'm doing something, unexpected, with another volunteer and we're basically musical gods with what we've come up with and it works! I can't actually write down yet what's happening in case one of the leavers reads it, it's all a massive secret. But I will write something on Monday :)

And finally, Sarah's feet. Again. Sarah has yet again managed to contract something from one of her kids. I've just realised the way I'm writing this is like she had a choice or it's her fault she caught what she's got. It really isn't and I feel for her. Her foot has swollen up so much and she's in so much pain with it. But she has mastered the art of hopping! She has Impetigo. And poisoning in her lymph. Impetigo is (and I quote from Sarah) a skin condition that leads to blood poisoning. In SA you have to pay for medical treatment (As much as it may have its flaws, the NHS has never looked so good to us!) so one of the medical treatment options we volunteers go for is wait it out. It rarely works, usually folk just have to pay more because they waited and it got worse, but Sarah thought what is there to lose why not wait until Monday. At that point her foot was just swollen and a fair few weeping blisters but it didn't look as bad as when she had foot and mouth so she just left it. But then she got a red rash thing on the bottom of her foot that seemed to follow her veins and when someone mentioned blood poisoning we googled symptoms and given that she had a fair few of them we thought maybe she should go to the doctors. Then there was a brief moment where she thought maybe it was Deep Vein Thrombosis but that was quickly shot down. When she went to the medi-clinic they said it was Impetigo and if it had gotten any worse it would've become full on blood poisoning. So now she has had an IV full of antibiotics and 2 creams to put on lots of times a day as well as a salt water wash thing and antibiotic pills for about a week and she gets off work until Wednesday!

A Moment of Silence...

My bunk mate has gone home today. Life will not be the same without her. The mood is similar to if someone has died. And another room-mate is off home on the 23rd.

Sadness.

Psychologies of Swearing

Recently there has been a massive increase in the amount of swearing I've heard in my house. One of the first phrases in Afrikaans and the first words I learnt were swear words. In an attempt to try and improve this in my house I've been teaching my kids English swear words and gestures. Now for anybody sat reading this who now thinks I'm a horrible monster, hear me out!

I've taught the kids that raising your little finger is the same as raising your middle finger, and crossing both raised little fingers is off the scale bad. I'm also contemplating telling them that bagpipes is a worse swear word in English than jou ma se p-word. When talking to one of the Germans about my plan she said apfelkuchen could also work (of course means apple cake in German).

It got me thinking as to what makes a swear word so rude? If the kids shout bagpipes at me when they're angry or want to insult me, does that then mean that for a few seconds bagpipes becomes a swear word? Is the meaning behind the word what is the insult or the feeling? If you were to say s*** to a child or in the hearing of a child in England (and probably in any other english speaking country) the child's parents would be far from impressed, but the word is just another one for poo which kids say all the time. My dad used to complain about dog s*** in front of me and my younger brothers even when we were small but he said because he was not using it as a profanity it didn't count.

I wonder what other words you could use?!

My Work.

It feels like ages since I've posted anything and in my attempt to remember an interesting story of something, anything, that has happened to me recently I realised I have never posted about long week short week (LW/SW) work. LW/SW works like this: Long week you work Monday, Tuesday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Short week you work Wednesday and Thursday. This week is my long week. On weekdays, I get up at 5.30am and am at work for 6am. I wake up all my kids and get them into their school clothes. Some of them can do it all by themselves and others are so slow I do it for them (This doesn't encourage any good habits, but when you have 50 minutes to get 14 kids ready for school, you'll do anything). Once they're all dressed with their faces washed, teeth brushed and downstairs, they get their food. If the Tannie arrived at 6, then she makes their pap. If not, it's a stressful morning! Their morning pap is usually 2 weetbix with far too much sugar (in my opinion, but everything is sweetened here. Cultural differences.) and hot water and milk. Once they've eaten 2 children have to wash and dry dishes if it's their task before the school run begins. 14 kids go to 4/5 different schools. 2 girls have to walk to school but the rest go in a fleet of bussies all leaving at specific times. Most of my kids leave on the first bussie at 6.50. Then 2 leave at 7.30 and 4 go on two separate bussies that both leave at 7.40. Now all my kids are at school I go to the house with the really little'uns where Sarah and Kaori (my room-mate) work and we sit, the 3 of us, watching 3 of the little kids that are too young for nursery for 2/3 hours. This is about the most pointless time of my day but actually the most enjoyable.

When I go back to work at 2pm most of the kids are back from school so if they've finished eating, I try and do homework. The Tannie I work with can't read or write which usually isn't a problem but it makes homework in Afrikaans a little challenging for me! I have a dictionary which I take to work with me and now I've been doing it for 6 months I know the general set up of how it's written down which makes things much easier. A different South African volunteer comes every weekday except Friday to help the kids with their homework so it's not the end of the world if I can't help every kid. This Tannie lets the kids play outside from 3pm so I get to spend an hour sitting outside keeping a general eye on all the kids and playing with some little ones again before I get another break between 4 and 5 (outside time for all the kids). Once I come back, I shower them all and if they have school the next day, I make lunch boxes. Then I dish up their supper if the Tannie hasn't already and they eat. After supper they get to watch a movie before bed. Then they go upstairs and brush teeth and go to bed at 8pm. It's a long day! I finish work at 9pm, collapse into bed ready to wake up at 5.30am again! But on weekends I start at 7am...luxury!