Half way through the year.

So the day I dropped Mum and Dad off at the
airport, an American guy who works here was getting married, the final in a line of ceremonies of which Mum and Dad were able to attend one. Much to the disgust of locals it was not held in a church, mostly because the groom is a ‘Buddhist’, but was held on a hill behind the new boarding school. This meant a quite a climb up and a slight struggle for some of the older members of the congregation. Guess it was a nice setting but my favorite moments was when the stand in pastor, Jock who is a teaching mentor from Bathurst, produced some terrible jokes that certainly got lost in translation. I may have been the only one laughing I think.

Once this weekend was over it was back into day to day St Judes and catching up on some sleep that the previous three weeks had deprived me of. In mid May I took two standard one football teams out to another school for a carnival which was a kak. Standard one is the equivalent of kindergarten although the kids range from six to as old as nine. It was classic football, 14 kids on the field all of whom are no more than three meters away from the ball at every point in the game. Was well set up with some little goals and minimized fields but the kids certainly just loved getting into the same kit and having an adventure away from school for the afternoon. This isn’t to say they were not competitive. It amazes me how laid back Tanzanian’s are until you get them into a sporting context and then there is little that they won’t do to win. Give it there all or cheat. These little guys were no different. It is all very funny to watch though.

By this stage the super 14 was at the crucial stage of the year so my Saturday ritual was to race into to town to try and catch the Tahs. The Sharks win was satisfying as we had a rugby training were we took time off to watch it and all the players with the exception of maybe two are sharks supporters. The final I watched by myself with some curious bar staff looking on as I went from jumping around joyfully in the first half to a far more solemn mood in the second.

School has been good. Big rains have more or less finished.
There is still the odd day that might rain but has not affected PE too much which is good. Have just finished a netball unit with all of the older kids and am now moving onto some tee ball and tennis. The PE gear here is pretty good and allows you to do almost what ever you would like as long as you have an imagination. For instance a tennis net is a rope between netball posts. The younger kids have been a challenge as I am not really used to teaching the lower year groups. There is a fair age range though considering it is essentially a primary school. The youngest kid in Prep is 5 and the oldest in standard seven is aprox. 17 (no one seems to be exactly sure). Even within year groups you may have and range of 4-5 years.

Once Mum and Dad had left the count down was on for Ali to arrive, which she did on Saturday. It was obviously great to see her. Five months of counting down suddenly seemed like nothing at all. A few hiccups on the way but she got here. Checking in at Dubai she was not in the system so she had to buy another ticket to Nairobi, hopefully it will all be sorted, out later. She has been at work for the last few days although it is slow for her at the moment but that won’t last. As I understand it, from quite soon until December is the busiest time. This is because it is peak season for Safari’s so it is also peak season for visitors. The biggest reason though is from late August testing children for next year starts. This is meant to be a huge process and I am really looking forward to seeing it and helping out, however, everybody says that is a hectic time.

I picked up Ali and more or less took her straight out to watch me play rugby. Lucky she is used to these welcomes from Inverell days. Tanzania was playing the first international of the season against Kenya A. First time Tanzania has played any national team from Kenya since then Tanganyika playing Kenya in 1956 or something. The Kenya A side was made up of the players from the Bamburi Series from earlier in the year when we were getting beaten 50+ nil and many of them have been playing on the international sevens circuit. Even though we were fielding a better team than before as locals had come back for uni holidays and from the bush my expectations were if we kept it under 50 it was a good day. Somehow we pulled off a miraculous and exiting 16-15 win. Celebrations were huge. It really meant a lot to all of the guys and particularly the guys who were born and raised here and make up the bulk of the team, black or white.

End of this week is half term. Ali and I are still planning exactly what we are going to do. We had planned to go up to Kenya to visit her cousin who lives in Kilifi, north of Mombasa but unfortunately she is going to be in the UK at the same time so we are having a rethink.

Hope all is well for everybody.