Not much
leaping this week as unexpectedly the 8 Educational officials I have been in
contact with before and during my first week in Lesotho forgot to tell me there
is a school mid-term break!! So………with all our colleagues in Maseru or South
Africa, our plans were postponed and we had a week off – what to do in a dry,
dusty border town???
First stop
was to obviously finish all our Workshop preparations then we paid the local
orphanage a couple of visits. We met all the children on our last visit and
left lots of clothes and games with them….this time we thought we’d bring our
teacher bags with us and keep them busy for a few hours. Explaining what a parachute was to them was an
interesting feat….why would someone want to jump out of an aeroplane? But as a
big, crazy, coloured thing they could run under, flap about and chase each
other on it was a welcome visitor! So was the drawing materials and pictures of
Swallows for them to draw and imagine what its like to fly all the way to Wales
and back again. We sampled our new reading books with them….and really a
picture says a thousand words sometimes!!
After a lot
of walking, sweating and saying hi to all the children kicking about near their
homes we spent a lot of our time in our favourite (only) Internet café in
Bedco. Printing resources at the extortionate price of 4 Rand a page but also
writing letters of support to ensure the place is not going to close down due
to lack of Government funds!
As the week
came to an end, things started slowing down much more than normal in
preparation for Independence Day on the 4th October. What a better
way to spend a National holiday, drinking cider next to the river watching
grown men swim……well, try to swim, urmmmm naked…..and smelling the food cooking
on the fire, which was a Pigs Head by the way! Pass me the tofu ntate!!
