Greetings from South Africa! A month has flown by already and we are settling nicely into our new country and starting to feel at home. We have experienced so much in this short time as we soak up our surroundings and the wonderful South African culture.
Our days are quite simple as we establish our new routine. We enjoy a relaxed breakfast together as a family whilst learning some Afrikaans. Laurence leads us in pronunciation as a 'g' is a guttural 'h', a 'v' is an 'f', a 'd' is a 't', the vowels are all mixed up, and you have to roll your r's!
We then head to the girls school followed by Joel's preschool whilst listening to a crazy mix of African music, Metallica and Disney songs.
The girls are really enjoying school. They have an incredible timetable with the added bonus of swimming in an outdoor pool.
Amelie has accrued enough points in class to choose an activity for herself. She turned down a day of sitting in the teachers chair for the option of 'Show and Tell'. She has taken in some photos of England to show the class where many have never seen snow before or a Queen's Palace! She has also been star of the week now for using some brilliant adjectives in class. Well done Am.
Elowen has surprised us with her growing confidence in the pool. She now happily jumps in with a noodle instead of just standing on the step. She is also the juiciest member of our family. The mosquitoes unfortunately love her. So we have developed an evening routine, little short of a military operation, of shutting windows and doors before lights go on and applying peaceful sleep to keep the bites at bay. But sometimes they win and Elowen comes downstairs in the morning saying,"I've been bitten by a dragonfly again", (very cute).
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| After school play with the neighbours and Elowen armed with her noodle |
Joel has had an incredible start at preschool. Teacher Lara is in charge of the class of roughly 9 pupils. The children eat a hot breakfast and lunch and have 2 snacks during their day. In amongst all the eating, the children find time to do lots of artwork and lots of playing outdoors. Whether its racing round on bikes, climbing jungle gyms or playing in the sandpit, Joel is having fun. He's really relaxed, which makes us so happy. And he has had a birthday! Baker Boy Joel turned 4!
I have completed my first South African Parkrun, hurrah! It was hard work. Even though it starts at 8 am instead of 9; the heat, the altitude and the hills (I should have predicted hills having moved to a place called Lone HILL) made it a tough 26 minutes and 55 seconds. And to top it off, a man at the end said that I looked how he felt! There is no need to have a shred of compassion for me however as I came home and did this...
But in amongst all the pleasures that South Africa brings, it's poverty is all to clear to see. Whether it's people helping you into a car parking space in exchange for a few Rand (10p); people filling up your car with petrol or packing your bags in the supermarket as part of the job creation in a country where 26% of South Africans are unemployed; or people with limbs missing, begging on the streets; the need is overwhelming. South Africa has just suffered a decade of corruption in the government under the former president, Jacob Zuma, which has affected the poor terribly. But the country is hopeful that, under the new president, Cyril Ramaphosa, who was Nelson Mandella's choice to succeed him, there will be great change. He is already stamping out corruption and bringing lots of investment into the country.
There is also some incredible charity work going on, which I would love to get involved in. Laurence's mum runs a soup kitchen for the poor, provides food for a house of 23 orphaned girls and has many more projects that she helps with. I will no doubt post about this in the future.
So, in all our joys in this African Spring, we have also loved watching Autumn, Halloween, Fireworks and Remembrance Day from afar. The wonders of social media! It is great to see what everyone is getting up to. And please do share this with people who's numbers I don't have. We will of course be in touch again soon.
Lots of love, Jess x
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