Today was my first day back in Cape Town. The weather is amazing and I’m so happy to be back. Chris, my boyfriend, is here with me for a week so it makes coming back even more special.

Our trip here was really long. We first flew from St. Louis to Detroit, where we had a four hour layover. Then we flew Detroit to Amsterdam, a seven hour flight. It was alright though because they feed us (not the greatest food but it is better than nothing) and they have movies. We watched “Friends With Benefits” and “Debt”. They were pretty good. Then in Amsterdam we had another long layover.  It went by pretty quickly though. Then we had 11 hours to Cape Town. It wasn’t bad though, except Chris and I didn’t get to sit next to each other. L Finally after 24+ hours of traveling, we arrived in Cape Town late. I was nervous because we weren’t certain that we would have a ride. We ordered a cab but via email and we weren’t sure that it was confirmed but sure enough our driver was there and we were dropped off at our hostel. Unforunately there was some mix up with our room, but we were able to get a room even if it wasn’t the one we ordered.

Tuesday came bright and hot. The weather here is so hot but I love it especially after the cold of the States. We sorted out our room and had breakfast at the hotel before embarking into the city. It was a beautiful hot and sunny. We found our way to Green Market Square, looking around for souvernirs. Then we went down to the Waterfront and walked around more shops. We found the Nelson Mandela Gateway to Robben Island and got tickets for the 5pm boat ride to the Island. Then we wandered around some more before taking a ride on the ferris wheel which wasn’t there the last time I was here. It gave us beautiful views of the city and the Waterfront. Then we decided to see a movie. The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. It is a very dark movie and I recommend preparing mentally for it.

After the movie it was time for Robben Island. I was very excited because I was supposed to go over two years ago when I was here before but because of various reasons I didn’t get to go. It was so worth the wait. The ferry ride was beautiful and we took tons of pictures. The prison tour was interesting and informative and I loved the bus ride around the Island. We even saw some penguins which I didn’t realized lived on the Island.

After our Robben Island tour, we had dinner at the Cape Town Fish Market which I highly recommend. I made Chris try the malva pudding which I also recommend. It’s unique to South Africa and I absolutely love it. Well that’s all for today. Tomorrow we’re going sandboarding, like snowboarding without the snow. It should be fun. More updates later!

I have to admit that life has not been as exciting as it was during the Charity Challenge. My first day after the Challenge was boring because my kids were testing so the teachers didn’t need me and I ended up typing up a test for one of the teachers and then planning for Friday.

Friday was good though. I worked with three different Grade 3 groups. It was hectic because there was no teacher in that day so I had to go find another teacher and ask for help. I also discovered although I sorta knew that the kids have to pay R1 to not wear their uniforms on Friday. We read “Fat Cat” which is this hilarious story about this huge cat that eats lots of mice and then ends up pregnant. Not the best summary but you get the idea. Since last week went so well I decided to make the comprehension harder which proved difficult. They seem to not understand the story very well so I’m not sure if it was the story or how I phrased the questions. They enjoyed the colouring part though and once I got the hang of it, they were able to identify the main characters like I wanted. After school, we went to the orphanage and I played with Aseza. She’s amazing. She was pushing my hair out of my face and it was seriously the cutest thing. I love it there. The kids are so much fun. I even took some pictures with my film. Only a couple though because I forgot to grab another roll of film. But I had my digital as well so I took some pictures with that as well. I got to know about girl Athula. She’s adorable and has the most beautiful dark skin. 

The rest of the term has been chaotic as usual. I did a lot of grading since the week of testing gave us lots and lots of papers to grade. When I wasn’t grading, I was outside helping with sports which helped break up the monotony of grading. Sometimes I would also help Sofia with her reading focus groups. One day we read Barry the Fish with Fingers which is this awesome story about Barry the fish obviously. The kids loved it. My favourite part of the story is when Barry is telling all the other fish about what he can do with fingers and then he starts tickling the other fish. So Sofia and I start tickling the kids and they absolutely loved it. It’s kinds crazy here but it’s awesome when we get to read to the kids and they really seem to enjoy it! I’ll talk about some of the other highlights of this term later.

I have to admit that life has not been as exciting as it was during the Charity Challenge. My first day after the Challenge was boring because my kids were testing so the teachers didn’t need me and I ended up typing up a test for one of the teachers and then planning for Friday.

Friday was good though. I worked with three different Grade 3 groups. It was hectic because there was no teacher in that day so I had to go find another teacher and ask for help. I also discovered although I sorta knew that the kids have to pay R1 to not wear their uniforms on Friday. We read “Fat Cat” which is this hilarious story about this huge cat that eats lots of mice and then ends up pregnant. Not the best summary but you get the idea. Since last week went so well I decided to make the comprehension harder which proved difficult. They seem to not understand the story very well so I’m not sure if it was the story or how I phrased the questions. They enjoyed the colouring part though and once I got the hang of it, they were able to identify the main characters like I wanted. After school, we went to the orphanage and I played with Aseza. She’s amazing. She was pushing my hair out of my face and it was seriously the cutest thing. I love it there. The kids are so much fun. I even took some pictures with my film. Only a couple though because I forgot to grab another roll of film. But I had my digital as well so I took some pictures with that as well. I got to know about girl Athula. She’s adorable and has the most beautiful dark skin. 

The rest of the term has been chaotic as usual. I did a lot of grading since the week of testing gave us lots and lots of papers to grade. When I wasn’t grading, I was outside helping with sports which helped break up the monotony of grading. Sometimes I would also help Sofia with her reading focus groups. One day we read Barry the Fish with Fingers which is this awesome story about Barry the fish obviously. The kids loved it. My favourite part of the story is when Barry is telling all the other fish about what he can do with fingers and then he starts tickling the other fish. So Sofia and I start tickling the kids and they absolutely loved it. It’s kinds crazy here but it’s awesome when we get to read to the kids and they really seem to enjoy it! I’ll talk about some of the other highlights of this term later.

Monday November 14th

Tuesday Novemeber 15th

Wednesday November 16th

I am so sore. I am beyond sore. I am in pain. Today was fun though. We started off the day early at 5 and then got ready, had breakfast and then after much to do travelled to Cape Agulhas the southern most tip of Africa and began the challenge. It started out really well. We were excited and even singing. This soon changed when we were met by hills (we weren’t expecting hills) and then the wind. The wind made it ten times worse than it would be normally. It was very difficult. I did well and pushed myself a lot. I found that if I sang even if it was to myself I was able to go farther then just focusing on what I am doing. So moral of story: sing. It helps, at least for me. We stopped a lot for breaks: pee breaks, food breaks which was good. We did however somehow lose or misplace the bike pump. Probably the most important thing you need on a biking challenge but whatever we pushed through. Then there was the punctuated tires. Somehow we managed to go through all our extra bikes because of punctured tires and since we didn’t have a bike pump we couldn’t really do anything. At one point, Nick decided to start running which was awesome. It turned out to not be necessary because soon after he started running, we saw two people with a bike pump and tires. God was definitely looking after us. Unfortunately because of wind and all the hills, we didn’t end up making it to Hermanus like we planned. So about 20km outside of Hermanus we had a team meeting and decided to push to Stranford which is a little ways outside of Hermanus. We all decided to push hard and we were all able to finish. It was very difficult though. I think we were all very tired at that point. I know I really want to stop then and there. I pushed myself hard on some hills and I definitely regretted it at that point. But I was able to finish. Ebonnie was also able to finish despite a knee injury. I think that’s all. I’m tired, going to bed. We start early again tomorrow!

Sunday November 13th

Day Two started out just as rough. My alarm went off at 5:15 but I refused to get up. No other alarms went off either so we had a late start. I could barely sleep last night because of the pain. I have never been so sore. It just felt like I was burning. That and the fact that I heard rain pouring outside my window didn’t exactly encourage me out of bed. But our program manager got us all up and we were jogging in the rain by 7. We spent the next few hours biking in the pouring rain, getting soaked completely. Lucky for us, the weather did clear and we ended up having some great weather. By the time we finished I was almost completely dry which was lovely. Today had lots of hills but we were all mentally prepared for them so that made it a lot easier. We even had a baboon sighting (something common in this area). I was pretty nervous myself because they are very crafty. They have been known to get into people’s cars and take food (I wish I was joking!). I think we all pretty nervous. Almost all of us had food in our bags. But they left us alone and we left them alone and we passed them with no problems. That was pretty much our day. We walked 15km because the road was too narrow to bike (and feel safe) but besides that we biked the entire time covering 90km which brings our total up to 170km. So we are halfway there. Our goal is to travel 350km by the end of Day 5. Tomorrow the hope is to sail (fingers crossed) to Fish Hoek which is 40km away then to bike 20km which makes for a pretty easy day compared to what we have been doing. We’re not sure if we’ll be able to sail because of weather. We finished today in Gordon’s Bay which means I get to sleep in my own bed tonight! It was great because all the volunteers and staff who weren’t participating in the full Challenge were there to cheer us on and they even made us dinner which was amazing

I’ll finish up the rest of the Challenge next week!

I am so sore. I am beyond sore. I am in pain. Today was fun though. We started off the day early at 5 and then got ready, had breakfast and then after much to do travelled to Cape Agulhas the southern most tip of Africa and began the challenge. It started out really well. We were excited and even singing. This soon changed when we were met by hills (we weren’t expecting hills) and then the wind. The wind made it ten times worse than it would be normally. It was very difficult. I did well and pushed myself a lot. I found that if I sang even if it was to myself I was able to go farther then just focusing on what I am doing. So moral of story: sing. It helps, at least for me. We stopped a lot for breaks: pee breaks, food breaks which was good. We did however somehow lose or misplace the bike pump. Probably the most important thing you need on a biking challenge but whatever we pushed through. Then there was the punctuated tires. Somehow we managed to go through all our extra bikes because of punctured tires and since we didn’t have a bike pump we couldn’t really do anything. At one point, Nick decided to start running which was awesome. It turned out to not be necessary because soon after he started running, we saw two people with a bike pump and tires. God was definitely looking after us. Unfortunately because of wind and all the hills, we didn’t end up making it to Hermanus like we planned. So about 20km outside of Hermanus we had a team meeting and decided to push to Stranford which is a little ways outside of Hermanus. We all decided to push hard and we were all able to finish. It was very difficult though. I think we were all very tired at that point. I know I really want to stop then and there. I pushed myself hard on some hills and I definitely regretted it at that point. But I was able to finish. Ebonnie was also able to finish despite a knee injury. I think that’s all. I’m tired, going to bed. We start early again tomorrow!

Sunday November 13th

Day Two started out just as rough. My alarm went off at 5:15 but I refused to get up. No other alarms went off either so we had a late start. I could barely sleep last night because of the pain. I have never been so sore. It just felt like I was burning. That and the fact that I heard rain pouring outside my window didn’t exactly encourage me out of bed. But our program manager got us all up and we were jogging in the rain by 7. We spent the next few hours biking in the pouring rain, getting soaked completely. Lucky for us, the weather did clear and we ended up having some great weather. By the time we finished I was almost completely dry which was lovely. Today had lots of hills but we were all mentally prepared for them so that made it a lot easier. We even had a baboon sighting (something common in this area). I was pretty nervous myself because they are very crafty. They have been known to get into people’s cars and take food (I wish I was joking!). I think we all pretty nervous. Almost all of us had food in our bags. But they left us alone and we left them alone and we passed them with no problems. That was pretty much our day. We walked 15km because the road was too narrow to bike (and feel safe) but besides that we biked the entire time covering 90km which brings our total up to 170km. So we are halfway there. Our goal is to travel 350km by the end of Day 5. Tomorrow the hope is to sail (fingers crossed) to Fish Hoek which is 40km away then to bike 20km which makes for a pretty easy day compared to what we have been doing. We’re not sure if we’ll be able to sail because of weather. We finished today in Gordon’s Bay which means I get to sleep in my own bed tonight! It was great because all the volunteers and staff who weren’t participating in the full Challenge were there to cheer us on and they even made us dinner which was amazing

I’ll finish up the rest of the Challenge next week!

Thursday November 3^rd

Well today was…different. Yeah, different. We’ll go with that. The day started out fairly normal. We noticed that the sewage which we saw spewing up yesterday was still going didn’t think that much of it. I took out a group of students and worked on perimeter. It was pretty easy and they were really good. I literally sat back and watched them do it helping when needed. It was lovely to feel completely in control of the class J Then it was that classes turn for sports so I helped with sports as well. They did netball which was pretty fun. Then it was break time. Nothing special there. It was picture day but I forgot my camera so I just stayed in the classroom and read. The break bell went off as usual but then another bell rang and we heard screams from outside. I looked outside and saw kids running around and then kids with backpacks walking out the school. They shut school early because of the sewage. Health hazard. It was utter chaos. I hoped against hope that we would get to go home early but no such luck. Instead I went to nursery where I thought I would be taking a small group of children out and doing a small lesson….no such luck again. The carer (what we call the ladies who are in charge) pretty much gave me a group of 40 children and told me to read to them. You can imagine how that went…not well. There was screaming, kicking, and general bad behavouir. It was pretty bad and the carers weren’t really helping either. I was thankful when it was finally lunchtime and got to help feed the children. I then went on my own lunch at ACJ before returning to nusery after naptime. I love the kids after they nap. They’re all drowsy and super lazy. It’s so cute. I helped them put on their shoes and one of them Tandalethu was laying his head on my lap. He was attached to me. He wouldn’t let me go even when it was time to put the chairs up. He screamed when I tried to move until I pulled him aside and we sat in the corner. So cute! Anyways the rest of the day was good because once they were awake we just got to play with them which is what we usually do with them anyway.

Friday November 4th

Today was an interesting day. I went to school but didn’t do anything there. Joel, Emma and I all ended up going to Ikhayalethemba which was so fun. I worked with Class A which includes Asasa who I love. She’s awesome although she is trouble. We first read to them or rather they looked through the books and we tried to read to them. Then we did a creative thing which involves glue and stickers so of course there was a huge mess. Then it was snack time and we helped the children eat then it was our break time. I enjoyed some food and then we got ready for Fun Friday. Beth brought the kids in and we watched Shrek the Third. Well half of them did the other half caused trouble so we eventually ended up taking some of them out to play and the others were left in peace to watch the movie. We also gave them popcorn, watermelon and chocolate covered bananas with sprinkles. It was so good. Then it was playtime for a while before they had lunch. I had to help Asasa in the bathroom and then I picked up one of the babies because he was crying. His name is Anathi and he is so cute. I put him down and took pictures. I took lots of pictures with my film camera which I hope come out well *fingers crossed*

It was so much fun. I love being at the orphanage! It made me sorta wish I was staying over break so I could work at the orphanage although of course I’m excited about going home. It’ll be nice to be with my family and visit my friends over the month we have off. 

Thursday November 3^rd

Well today was…different. Yeah, different. We’ll go with that. The day started out fairly normal. We noticed that the sewage which we saw spewing up yesterday was still going didn’t think that much of it. I took out a group of students and worked on perimeter. It was pretty easy and they were really good. I literally sat back and watched them do it helping when needed. It was lovely to feel completely in control of the class J Then it was that classes turn for sports so I helped with sports as well. They did netball which was pretty fun. Then it was break time. Nothing special there. It was picture day but I forgot my camera so I just stayed in the classroom and read. The break bell went off as usual but then another bell rang and we heard screams from outside. I looked outside and saw kids running around and then kids with backpacks walking out the school. They shut school early because of the sewage. Health hazard. It was utter chaos. I hoped against hope that we would get to go home early but no such luck. Instead I went to nursery where I thought I would be taking a small group of children out and doing a small lesson….no such luck again. The carer (what we call the ladies who are in charge) pretty much gave me a group of 40 children and told me to read to them. You can imagine how that went…not well. There was screaming, kicking, and general bad behavouir. It was pretty bad and the carers weren’t really helping either. I was thankful when it was finally lunchtime and got to help feed the children. I then went on my own lunch at ACJ before returning to nusery after naptime. I love the kids after they nap. They’re all drowsy and super lazy. It’s so cute. I helped them put on their shoes and one of them Tandalethu was laying his head on my lap. He was attached to me. He wouldn’t let me go even when it was time to put the chairs up. He screamed when I tried to move until I pulled him aside and we sat in the corner. So cute! Anyways the rest of the day was good because once they were awake we just got to play with them which is what we usually do with them anyway.

Friday November 4th

Today was an interesting day. I went to school but didn’t do anything there. Joel, Emma and I all ended up going to Ikhayalethemba which was so fun. I worked with Class A which includes Asasa who I love. She’s awesome although she is trouble. We first read to them or rather they looked through the books and we tried to read to them. Then we did a creative thing which involves glue and stickers so of course there was a huge mess. Then it was snack time and we helped the children eat then it was our break time. I enjoyed some food and then we got ready for Fun Friday. Beth brought the kids in and we watched Shrek the Third. Well half of them did the other half caused trouble so we eventually ended up taking some of them out to play and the others were left in peace to watch the movie. We also gave them popcorn, watermelon and chocolate covered bananas with sprinkles. It was so good. Then it was playtime for a while before they had lunch. I had to help Asasa in the bathroom and then I picked up one of the babies because he was crying. His name is Anathi and he is so cute. I put him down and took pictures. I took lots of pictures with my film camera which I hope come out well *fingers crossed*

It was so much fun. I love being at the orphanage! It made me sorta wish I was staying over break so I could work at the orphanage although of course I’m excited about going home. It’ll be nice to be with my family and visit my friends over the month we have off. 

If you would have asked me last term I would have said that it was chaotic. But comparatively speaking, this term has been much more chaotic. School has been ending much earlier for various reasons testing, flooding, etc. It has been our jobs a lot harder when we find out that school is closing at 1 when it normally closes at 2:30. We’ve had to have a lot more flexibility then we did last term.

In addition, I have also been lacking a lot of motivation this term. I think it’s because I feel like so little progress has been made. It’s hard to see it, you know? I don’t really work with the same groups. I work with some groups one week and then others the next so it’s really hard to track the progress being made. The thing that does keep me going are the kids. There are some particular ones that hold a special place in my heart so it makes it easier for me to keep going.

Some of the chaotic things I actually don’t mind. For example, one day when we were supposed to have workshop, the choir was practicing. Most of my students are in the choir so workshop didn’t happen. Instead, Joel and I got to enjoy the choir which I absolutely love. They are so amazing. I love hearing them sing and I even know some of the songs now even though I have no idea what they’re saying.

Some things are going very well though. I think that overall I am improving as a teacher. I still know for sure that I want to teach math and I am getting better at explaining things and getting the kids to understand. For example, I had to teach the kids angles and I used my arms to make different angles and got them to do the same. The kids love playing games so I try to incorporate that in my lesson as much as possible. Then when it came to area and perimeter I made several squares and rectangles and got the kids to use blocks to figure out the area and the perimeter. They love things like that and I find it easier to be creative with math than it is for English. I find it hard to make English hands on. I was able to find a good activity to do with prepositions though and that seem to work really well. I would give the kids an instruction and the kid would have to follow it correctly in order to stay in the game. Basically they were passing the ball around. To make it harder once they got a hang of the instructions, I had them identify the prepositions. That seem to work fairly well, which was encouraging.

One more thing, did I mention dance club here? I’m not sure but one of the teachers and I were supposed to start a dance club at the school but that sadly hasn’t happened yet. There was the broken copier one week, then there was the flooding at school (more on that later). Basically it hasn’t happened yet and I doubt we’ll be able to start it before the term ends, which sucks because I was super excited about it. Let’s hope next term is a bit less chaotic and the dance club can actually start. 

If you would have asked me last term I would have said that it was chaotic. But comparatively speaking, this term has been much more chaotic. School has been ending much earlier for various reasons testing, flooding, etc. It has been our jobs a lot harder when we find out that school is closing at 1 when it normally closes at 2:30. We’ve had to have a lot more flexibility then we did last term.

In addition, I have also been lacking a lot of motivation this term. I think it’s because I feel like so little progress has been made. It’s hard to see it, you know? I don’t really work with the same groups. I work with some groups one week and then others the next so it’s really hard to track the progress being made. The thing that does keep me going are the kids. There are some particular ones that hold a special place in my heart so it makes it easier for me to keep going.

Some of the chaotic things I actually don’t mind. For example, one day when we were supposed to have workshop, the choir was practicing. Most of my students are in the choir so workshop didn’t happen. Instead, Joel and I got to enjoy the choir which I absolutely love. They are so amazing. I love hearing them sing and I even know some of the songs now even though I have no idea what they’re saying.

Some things are going very well though. I think that overall I am improving as a teacher. I still know for sure that I want to teach math and I am getting better at explaining things and getting the kids to understand. For example, I had to teach the kids angles and I used my arms to make different angles and got them to do the same. The kids love playing games so I try to incorporate that in my lesson as much as possible. Then when it came to area and perimeter I made several squares and rectangles and got the kids to use blocks to figure out the area and the perimeter. They love things like that and I find it easier to be creative with math than it is for English. I find it hard to make English hands on. I was able to find a good activity to do with prepositions though and that seem to work really well. I would give the kids an instruction and the kid would have to follow it correctly in order to stay in the game. Basically they were passing the ball around. To make it harder once they got a hang of the instructions, I had them identify the prepositions. That seem to work fairly well, which was encouraging.

One more thing, did I mention dance club here? I’m not sure but one of the teachers and I were supposed to start a dance club at the school but that sadly hasn’t happened yet. There was the broken copier one week, then there was the flooding at school (more on that later). Basically it hasn’t happened yet and I doubt we’ll be able to start it before the term ends, which sucks because I was super excited about it. Let’s hope next term is a bit less chaotic and the dance club can actually start.