Six weeks to go

I have again had no internet connection, so therefore no blogging! This is a real nuisance; imagine if someone was trying to run a business from home!
Yes, folks, six weeks from now we will be back on Scotia's shores! We are trying hard to fit in a load of social engagements before our departure; the total stands at two lunches and three dinners so far. Plus we are hoping to arrange a Scottish night here in our house to let some of our friends taste haggis (tinned, unfortunately, due to import regulations on fresh ones) and maybe even try a wee jig (we have a Jimmy Shand CD!!!) Then we are also in the throes of arranging accommodation for our road trip. The distances between the places we want to see are immense, so it will take careful planning. You don’t want to be caught in the middle of nowhere at night without accommodation booked over here, believe me! When we tour in the USA, we usually just find a hotel en route. Things are very different here.
My last session at the school will be next Tuesday as they stop for three weeks holiday on Friday 20th. I think my group has improved but it may be that they just feel more comfortable about reading aloud now. Whatever, they seem to enjoy reading and I have taught them some simple songs. We are reading a book about farms and so now they know “dingle dangle scarecrow” and “five little ducks”. Mind you, the book talks about the crop of corn, so I have to improvise, as they know it as mealie! Still, they coped with most of it, even to the extent they tell me they have a shop in their township where you can indeed buy five eggs, just like the number in the picture! Then one girl told me, “Ma’am, we don’t buy eggs, we have chickens”. I’ll miss them! They are happy with so little, their eyes lit up when I took in leftover fruit and they were ecstatic to receive a new pencil each. They gathered them all up and gave them back to me, not realising they were a gift. I’ll miss the aqua class too, even if it is wet! Mind you, it was a bit like North Berwick this week as the generator to the gym tripped out on Sunday, giving us freezing cold water.
Martin has taken a job in Oz selling maths books, I think it’s to schools, not sure really, it may be like those guys who pitch up in the staff room during break and everyone ignores them!

Oor Hoose

Living/dining, through to kitchen


The kitchen sink, lovely but useless!


Fancy basin in bathroom 1

Fancy basin in bathroom 2

I promised ages ago to upload some pics of Oor Hoose, so here they are. I have had no internet connection for over a week, hence lack of blogs.



Martin has gone back to Oz and is currently job hunting. Les has returned from his travels to US and UK and so things are settling back into the customary pattern here. You have probably read or watched TV news about the xenophobic violence here in the Johannesburg area. We are not affected; it is a problem between different ethnicities of black Africans. Basically many black South Africans still live in shacks in townships or informal settlements. Fourteen years ago after the democratic elections they were promised houses. They have been very patient, I think. Our province is still 55,000 houses short of the target. Now they see black people from other countries such as Mozambique and Zimbabwe fleeing violence and poverty and they are perceived as getting better treatment as refugees than the indigenous black people. One newspaper letter writer said, “We already have nothing; now we are being asked to share that nothing with people from elsewhere. I don’t condone the attacks but I understand them”
Gloria, my black friend who lives in an informal settlement near the township of Tembisa says that she hears screaming and shooting nightly although she has not been affected as there are “none of these people (foreigners) at my place”
Other than that, we have been planning our final “road trip” as we are taking three weeks to see the Cape area before we come back to Scotland. We also have a load of dinner invitations to return, so we will need to get started on that before we get to the stage of eating strange leftovers lurking in the freezer. Talking of strange, on Saturday we were invited out to dinner and the starter was home made game terrine, made from game birds actually shot by our host! Not for the veggie minded, eh?
Car problems…again… We now have a silver Audi, the black BMW has a puncture. So to date we have had…Grey BMW, silver BMW, grey Audi, white Mercedes, black BMW and now silver Audi. Honestly, a Micra will never do now!

What I do in my spare time

Here are some pics of the pupils of Bonaero Park School, taken at the Library Homework Club on a Thursday and during class visits to the library on a Tuesday.(Sorry about the duplicate; haven't quite got the hang of this yet!)

Animals in South Africa

OK, now I know how to do this, there's no stopping me! Here are some animals I've been in close contact with over here. More photos will follow if this post is successful!

In glorious technicolour, direct from Africa...

Thanks to Martin I finally figured out how to add pictures to my blog! So here is one of Martin by the safari truck taken on Saturday 10 May.
He has had some interesting gastronomic opportunities during his stay so far; one of Les’ workers sent him half a sheep’s head, boiled and smoked. He ate a little but couldn’t face it all. He also bought a whole 6 ft. sugar cane and we had an interesting time trying to get into the soft sweet fibre through the tough outer skin, which looked a bit like bamboo. Les is away in the US so Martin and I have to make our own entertainment for the next couple of weeks. He came to the library and to the school again this week and had his own group of readers this time. On Monday, we are planning a trip to Soweto to include lunch at a traditional Shebeen. I have met a tour guide who does small personalised tours so we can have one tailor made to suit us. The weather has turned warm again, so at the moment Martin is in the garden taking in a few rays. I must be getting acclimatised to the weather out here as I actually find it a bit chilly and I am wearing a jumper today whilst he has shorts on!
We had some Czech visitors for dinner last night, they were colleagues of Les who came home from work with him, we all had dinner then I took them all to the airport, Les for Philadelphia via London, they were going to Prague via Madrid.
Next week the removal company are coming to make the preliminary arrangements for our return to Scotland; I can’t believe it’s that time already! We will be back sometime in July but we want to take some holidays before that and travel down to the Cape area.
But all of that is in the future; for now I am just enjoying having Martin here (even though he eats like a horse!!!)

"We all went on a game hunt!"

Another great weekend at the game reserve. We saw hippos, elephants, giraffes, lions, rhinos, wildbeeste, springbok, waterbuck, kudo, steenbok, monkeys, warthogs, zebra and loads of different birds. Wonderful! Martin enjoyed the whole experience, which turned out to be quite challenging as the lodge was without water for 36 hours due to a burst mains. However, it all just added to the “bush” spirit and as Martin remarked, we’d never washed in bottled sparkling water before! As always the food was excellent and Les and Martin enjoyed the wines.
An episode with the monkeys was hilarious this morning. Two vervet monkeys got into an upstairs room through the open balcony door via an overhanging tree. Firstly, they drank all the milk, expertly peeling off the foil lids and holding the containers like tiny cups. So elegant! Until they chucked the empty ones over the side, that is! Next, they grabbed all the sugar and coffee packets and made off up into the tree where we could clearly see them tearing open the packets and scoffing the lot. After the feast, they seemed very “high”, probably a caffeine and sugar rush! They played and fought on the grass outside our rooms for a while then simply ran out of steam and flopped on the grass! The warthog family who live in the marsh by the waterhole just a few metres from the door are thriving. The four babies we saw in January and again in February are growing fast, but still stay close to the mother. They have developed tiny tusks already. It is amazing to see them “kneel” on their front legs to root about in the grass for fresh shoots.
Next week Martin and I hope to visit Soweto and also the apartheid museum. He is coming to the school with me and quite enjoying helping with the reading programme. We will also need to do a big grocery shopping; I’d forgotten how big his appetite is!

Martin has arrived

Well, after many trials and tribulations, Martin has finally arrived from Australia. We picked him up at 7.00am this morning (Friday) after a 23 hour journey via Hong Kong. He therefore visited three continents in 24 hours! He was pretty knackered so is currently having a well earned nap. Faither is also having a nap; I can hear him snoring on the sofa in the next room! We have a few plans for Martin’s visit. Tomorrow, we are going to the company's box at the rugby in Pretoria to watch "our" team, the Bloue Bulls, playing the Waratahs from Sydney- guess Martin’s loyalties might be with the Aussie team! On Sunday we are going out to lunch with two couples from the philosophy school, Martin is worried he might have forgotten all his degree stuff by now! Next weekend we are going to a game lodge and will take the early morning safari drive on Saturday. He’d hoped he might get a gun, but we explained he can only shoot film, not animals!! Tonight we will fire up the big braai and let him try South African fare. We will be having chops, mealies, wors, pap and chakalaka with melktert for afters. And no doubt copious quantities of the product of SA,s vineyards too. He has not had a great welcome weatherwise, it is raining and 11 degrees today, but should get better over the rest of the weekend.