Plans to take the kids from Injabulo and Moriah to Hlane
Royal Nature Reserve on school trips had been underway for quite some time; and
finally the time came and we had two weeks filled of children, nature reserves,
wild animals and stress.
Injabulo School Trips
To make things even more difficult on ourselves we decided
to do something nice for the kids at Injabulo; I do enjoy doing lovely things
for them, it’s just that you have a really great idea and then you realise that
you have to repeat that really great idea at least 60 times. So, we hit PEP
once again (the shop workers in there are basically our family now) to buy 60
blank t-shirts on which we were going to write ‘Injabulo Preschool’ and ‘Hlane
2013’ – yes, that’s right, PRESCHOOL TOUR T-SHIRTS!
After a full weekend of nothing but writing these exact words on t-shirts over and over again I was so sick of it that I would be happy if I never have to see another t-shirt again in my life... however that would be rather impractical.
After a full weekend of nothing but writing these exact words on t-shirts over and over again I was so sick of it that I would be happy if I never have to see another t-shirt again in my life... however that would be rather impractical.
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| Hard work paid off! |
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| Teacher t-shirts ;) |
To make everything easier on ourselves we stayed over at
Nelsiwe’s house on the Tuesday evening to cook the food and get up early for
the first trip on Wednesday! We were up at 6am to dish the food into take away
boxes and then it was time for another naked basin wash, squatting in a large
plastic tub of water in Nelsiwe’s bedroom... at least this water was hot as it
had just been boiled in the kettle, which is more than can be said for the
showers in hostel on a morning.
So we pack all of the kids into the hired kombi and head off to Hlane! Hlane is a small nature reserve when you compare it to the likes of Kruger (well, compared to the likes of anything as Swaziland itself is tiny!) but we saw Lions, giraffes, elephants, impala, kudu, nyala and even had our road blocked by a herd of white rhino. One Lion we actually saw lying with a dead impala, so we had obviously just missed a kill! Probably for the best really, some 4 year olds might have walked away slightly traumatised after seeing a Lion murder a small impala in front of their eyes.
So we pack all of the kids into the hired kombi and head off to Hlane! Hlane is a small nature reserve when you compare it to the likes of Kruger (well, compared to the likes of anything as Swaziland itself is tiny!) but we saw Lions, giraffes, elephants, impala, kudu, nyala and even had our road blocked by a herd of white rhino. One Lion we actually saw lying with a dead impala, so we had obviously just missed a kill! Probably for the best really, some 4 year olds might have walked away slightly traumatised after seeing a Lion murder a small impala in front of their eyes.
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| Crocodile Class |
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| HLANE 2013! |
We also took them to Swazi Secrets where they process the oils from the marula
nuts to make beauty products, unfortunately they weren’t doing any production
while we were there, but the kids seemed to have fun pushing the crushing
machines around and wearing marula lip balm.
The second Injabulo trip was pretty much the same as the
first; apart from the fact that Hlane was so busy with about 4 school trips we
had to wait hours for our safari. In the mean time we took the kids down to the
reception which was teeming with American tourists and we had them all singing
and dancing! Yes, we actively paraded our cute preschoolers in front of
tourists for entertainment, but it meant that they weren’t getting up to any
mischief and the tourists now have lots of pictures and videos of our awesome
kids to show people back home.
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| 'Thishela' - teacher in SiSwati. |
Ashley’s Birthday!
Friday 19th sees Ashley joining the land of 19
year olds! To celebrate we had planned to have a joint preschool party
for Ashley and Nelsiwe’s daughter Ciara; what we didn’t realise is that
Nelsiwe’s plan was to have the party ‘after’ preschool hours, which she failed
to tell us. So we muddled through the day with no other teachers and random
people in party dresses and presents turning up around 12 o’clock. Failure in
communication and Swazi Time... obviously the day was never going to go as
planned.
In the end it was really great fun and absolutely crazy! Nelsiwe had made enough food to feed all of the kids at preschool, all of her children (who stayed off school for the occasion) and all of the guests she invited. There was also a huge birthday cake for Ashley and Ciara, and after the cutting of the cake and making a wish Ciara nearly took off the face of one of the preschoolers as she started jumping up and down with the gigantic knife still clutched in her destructive little hand. This is the girl who can completely wreck my classroom with her bare hands in 10 minutes, rips up worksheets, chews on laminated resources and sucks on the blades of scissors... she should never ever be given anything weapon-like!
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| Little devil! |
We head to soup kitchen with another huge cake that Ashley
bought from Matata Spar to hand out, everyone’s eyes (especially Aunty Vinahs!)
light up when they see the massive black forest gateaux and everyone gets a
slice.
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| Mmmm, licking the box clean. |
When we arrive back to hostel the girls have a little birthday surprise for
Ashley... they drag her outside armed with ketchup bottles, they absolutely
COVER her in it before they take a bucket of cold water and dump it over her
head. They then proceed to turn on the tap that is used to fill the pool and
drench her past drenched! I’m so glad I was in Botswana on my birthday, these
girls are merciless!
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| Ketchup attack |
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| Water attack |
Moriah Centre School Trips
With the small Moriah kombi that we drive we were only able
to take one class per day... so that’s 4 classes, add that to our Injabulo
trips and we would’ve been to Hlane 6 times in 2 weeks! No. We took opposite
days for some light relief from driving around all the time.
On both days that Ashley went to Hlane she returned with photos of the watering hole with elephants, giraffes, hippo, rhino and basically everything else all together drinking in a really African scene. When I went there was either nothing at the watering hole, or a few rhinos. Looks like she had the luckier days!
However we did see a Lion and two Lionesses running through the grass towards our kombi, and when they slowed down the Lion basically brushed himself along the back of the kombi... safe to say I was pretty nervous in the driver’s seat!
On both days that Ashley went to Hlane she returned with photos of the watering hole with elephants, giraffes, hippo, rhino and basically everything else all together drinking in a really African scene. When I went there was either nothing at the watering hole, or a few rhinos. Looks like she had the luckier days!
However we did see a Lion and two Lionesses running through the grass towards our kombi, and when they slowed down the Lion basically brushed himself along the back of the kombi... safe to say I was pretty nervous in the driver’s seat!
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| Moriah Crocodile Class |
Other developments at Hlane with Moriah Centre revealed that
Aunty Sphiwe (the other teacher of my class) had the hots for Napoleon our
safari guide! I could totally tell that they were flirting in SiSwati and then
the next trip I went on she told us that we had to get his number for her...
PULLED!
Things are crazy as ever here, but I’m going to miss it when
it ends.
Kate xx
P.S. At soup kitchen this week Aunty Vinah’s Mum was
wandering around with 3 kittens in a bag begging us to buy them for E5 each.
That’s £1 for 3 kittens to you. Unfortunately we couldn’t as we have nowhere to
keep them, and I was heartbroken leaving them there... but the great thing is
we were talking about it at Sisekelo and one of the sports coaches decided he
wanted to buy them!
So the next time we were at soup kitchen we bought 2 of the kittens (the 3rd apparently disappeared or was eaten or something) and brought them back to hostel for him! They’re called Ashley and Kate. Score.
So the next time we were at soup kitchen we bought 2 of the kittens (the 3rd apparently disappeared or was eaten or something) and brought them back to hostel for him! They’re called Ashley and Kate. Score.
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| N'AAAWWWWW <3 |
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