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Thursday Oct 26, 2006

Sorry it's late - I'll blame it on the fact we have a new volunteer!

This is even later than usual. My apologies.

The possibility of a new volunteer I mentioned last time is now a reality; Marcel's living with us and seems to be settling in well. Our first edition of the paper as a three is off at the printers at the minute so I have a rare moment of free time in the day. We get it back tomorrow so the mad rush will start again, but for now there's space to breathe. Marcel is the first boy in a long time to come to this project, so he's getting a lot of surprised reactions to his presence. The paper is called The Buchter News, so the volunteers have been called the Buchter Girls (strangely) for years – Marcel's starting to get a little concerned that people still address us as Buchter Girls when all 3 of us are there! Me and Bozena have assured him that living with us for a year will make him pretty much a girl anyway, so he's doomed.

School's getting a bit manic. I've still not completely adjusted to the idea of Christmas in the middle of summer – I'm used to schools in England not breaking up til around the 22nd, 23rd of December, but here it's 30th November because of the summer holidays. This also means that the Christmas play at Brightstart, which I'm organising for the Elementaries, is on the 17th November... That's really quite soon. All the kids seem to like the play though so hopefully it won't be too hard getting them all to remember lines, songs and times to come onstage. I know a primary school play really isn't something to get too stressed about, but I just don't want to disappoint everyone! 

Secondary school is still ok, though exams are starting so a feeling of stress is emanating from teachers and pupils alike. All the pupils – or learners, as they're called in Namibia – have to pass exams at the end of each year to go up a grade. Unfortunately, in all reality it's unlikely that this will affect any of the kids I work with. As I'm just doing one-on-one with grade 8s (the first years) who are really struggling, I don't see the more academic kids very much! I think one, perhaps two at best, of mine will pass the exams and move up a grade, so at least they'll have the continuity of being able to work with me again next year...

 We're also starting to plan our travelling for the summer, yaay. We're not completely organised yet, but I'm sure it'll be great fun whatever we end up doing. We'll definitely be in Cape Town for both Christmas and new year, which I'm looking forward to. Particularly new year's eve, because to be honest I'm missing the nightlife of Newcastle a lot – Lüderitz doesn't quite compare in that area...

I'll try and be more punctual with my next post!

Posted by Lucy Hayes ( 9:11 PM )
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