Mandela's Birthday-Incredible Tribute & Not at Wakefield High SchoolAnymore!

Long post-if you don't have enough time to read it all, skip to the video link at the end!

We experienced Nelson Mandela's birthday in South Africa.  We started the celebration last night with a trip to the Canadian Embassy where they had a cinema under the stars showing of the documentary movie, "Music for Mandela" which showed the importance of music in the whole movement for the South Africa we are experiencing today.  I really liked the movie but did not see the end because Charlie was asleep on me, Katie was fading fast, and the girls had school in the AM. (highly recommend it for your netflix list)  It was a great prelude to today's events!

Today was Mandela's birthday and it was Google's page today, it also was on all the radio stations here and on the front page of the newspaper.  In SA all, South Africans are encouraged to do 67 minutes of volunteer work on his birthday.  I'm proud to say that the American Embassy rose to the occasion in a big way!  They had a group of about 70 people hop on a bus and ride to a township school to paint and do improvements to a high school.  A few months ago I had no idea what a township was....it is a "shadow" black town from the apartheid days where people still live in terrible conditions.  Basically in shacks, with rocks holding on their flimsy roofs, hand laundered laundry hanging out to dry and children playing in the dirt.

View of township from the bus window-those are not garages- they are HOUSES!

We drove through it all in our coach bus, and rolled into a high school where almost 3000 students attend, the school only has desks for about half that many students, and we had 3 main tasks for our group, painting walls in about 15 classrooms, building about 100 additional desks, and trying to organize the library.

These are the desks, moved out into the halls so we could paint...and they don't even have enough of those!

Charlie and I chose the painting crew, Colleen chose the library (and a grumpy Kelly and Katie were at school for the day).  I spent a great deal of last summer in Wakefield High School classrooms making sure wiring was done properly so that the students could have wireless access in the rooms, today, I painted over grafitti standing on deplorable desks and chairs so that students could come back from "winter break" and see some fresh paint in their classrooms.  Everything that we agonized over in my old life, all the technology and new library designs for a brand new middle school back home was all irrelevant here.  These kids had NONE of that and sadly our efforts were tiny compared to all that is needed at the school.

Here are some photos of our work...the rooms before we started, we had to paint the areas above bulletin boards & chalkboards, not the bricks.

Charlie and I do the low areas in many rooms.  Easy to reach without standing on the rickety desks...eventually we did that too!

Trash in the school yard, my old Superintendent would have had the head custodian on the line in no time had he seen that, however that is the least of their worries here.

96 desks rebuilt by embassy volunteers today. (symbolic number for Mandela)

Volunteers working to reorganize the library...if only I could put all of the amazing Wakefield library ladies on the next plane over...I need tickets for Kelli Parece, Trudy Conley, Anne Miller, and Kim Hartmann.  They would give that place the overhaul it really needs!

Before we departed, they gathered everyone together for a quick photo, the Principal of the school thanked us all and we sang Happy Birthday to Mandela.  I thought that was great, then the most moving thing was the crowd broke into this song for Mandela, I don't know the words or the language, I just know it was the most moving thing I have experienced.  I was lucky enough to capture a little on video, note the boy in the blue hat in front clapping along!

http://youtu.be/1-FHuOCOqmM

What a legacy for Mandela-people spending time on his birthday to honor him by doing good works for the country that he loved!!

Rugby's newest fan!

We attended our first rugby game, Pretoria has it's own professional team called the Blue Bulls, we watched them win at home.  Charlie LOVED it!  He now has a rugby ball, Blue Bull hat, and Springboks shirt(SA national team).  Sadly our rugby player Dad was traveling and not at the game, he also hasn't been here to tackle Charlie with the rugby ball. I have been doing my best but Charlie tells me I don't do it right!

We look forward to Greg coming home Thurs, I will turn back into a rugby spectator rather than a participant!

Happy 4th! "YOLO"

We had a great time the embassy 4th of July Party, which was hosted at the Community Center, which is this beautiful place next to the American Ambassador's residence.  It has a playground, basketball court, swimming pool and a new gym.  It is walking distance from our house (the first time we walked it was on the 4th to bring down the decorated wagon).  The kids spent all of July 3 decorating bikes, scooters, and our red wagon for the big parade.  Kelly was determined that we should win the prize.  Our neighbor kids were also part of the fun, their middle daughter volunteered to ride in the wagon because Charlie told the girls he wanted to ride his own bike.  (we took off his training wheels about a week ago and he is so proud to balance)
The event was kicked off by the Marine Color Guard, here is Katie and her friend from school with the Marines..

They had CRAZY moonbounce options for the kids, one was this two story thing that you sit in a seat that lifts you to the top and drops you.  Kelly started yelling out "YOLO" (You Only Live Once) and got all the kids doing it.  They pretty much did that ride the entire time.  They also had a mechanical bull inside a blow up enclosure that was a hit as well.

Here is Charlie on the bull with the crazy two story moonbounce in the background!

The bucket seat you sit in and get lifted to the top for the big drop!!!  (we think this would be a great addition to the Labor Day Picnic- Candy & Paul!)

Our big parade entry, Kelly pulled the wagon, Katie & Liza rode scooters, Charlie his bike with Captain America shirt & shield, along with our 3 neighbors, Ruby, Coral & Opal.

They get called up on stage to claim their prize!

Shot of the winners with their prize!  (ice cream bowls and some candy)

The only thing that was missing was fireworks, this was the place we always needed to be when we had dogs that hated fireworks!   

We hope all of you on the East Coast had some celebrations despite the bad hurricane weather!

Our First Visitor & First Safari!

Greg's Cousin Sally's oldest daughter, Colleen arrived on Friday and this week the girls were off for a mid-term break, so we headed to Marakele National Park (which is about 3 hrs North for our first big five park). We were staying at the Guest Cottage at the park, which was about 30 kilometers from the main gate.  Which you would think you could drive in just a few minutes...it took us almost an hour and a half to reach our cottage.  It is tricky driving on little dirt roads, avoiding elephant & rhino poop and trying to to scratch a rental car!  We did manage to see many animals on our way in, we saw our first wildebeest.

Then a pack of monkeys crossed the road in front of us...a Mom even had her baby on her back!

We made it to our cottage and the guys who were taking us on our 4pm game drive were waiting for us, we knew better than to take hungry kids on a 3 hour game drive, so we made the guys wait and fed them first! Glad to not be rookie parents in this case!  The big open, game drive vehicles that you sit up high in are very cool, Charlie was SO excited to go!

Colleen & the girls up high in the back!

Dad & Charlie, Papa O'Brien-Charlie has his trusty binoculars with him!

We see many animal signs (warthog holes, elephant & rhino footprints, we learn how to tell white rhino dung from black rhino dung (white=grass eaters, black=leaf eaters in case you were wondering), we see one giraffe way off in the distance, we see tons of kudu, impala, zebra...but sadly no elephant, or rhino, or lion.  We get to see the sunset and finish our drive at night, the guide busted out big spotlights for the kids to shine in the bush, they loved that and shined them on the moon, the mountains, everywhere! We headed home, chilled to the bone, sitting in an open vehicle and once that sun drops it gets cold in Africa!

We cook our dinner on our "braii" (SA word for charcoal grill) using amazing charcoal that Charlie picked out at the meat store, turns out it was some kind of wood from Namibia-cooked super hot, fast!  

This is a morning picture of "Charlie's Charcoal".  The stars at night were spectacular, no pictures could do them justice!  We could see the whole Milky Way and it was so neat to be out in the middle of Africa all by ourselves!  (there was a high electric fence around our cottage grounds to keep out any lions)

The morning was peaceful, Greg headed out early to do some animal surveillance, by the time I made it out there with the kids, he had his spot picked out where he could watch two roads in the park at the same time...the guide said the animals do like to travel along the roads as it is easier for them too!  He never saw anything but he and Kelly are pretty sure they heard a lion roaring! Here is a shot of morning surveillance!

Tons of acacia trees everywhere, thorns are HUGE, as you can see one next to Charlie's hand, elephants eat the leaves & thorns, and we were warned not to drive over elephant dung because the thorns can still be intact and can puncture your tire!

Colleen & Katie in the morning, looks like Colleen needs coffee!

 

The Hughes kids climb a cool Motswere tree that was in front of the cottage, it is a tree that can live for 1000 years, then stand dead in the bush for another 1000!  Our guide told us they are protected trees that you can't chop down.

We packed out of our cottage and started the long drive out of the park.  Our most exciting animals this time were three warthogs that Colleen spotted, we chased after them down the road (us driving, them running) until they lost us by jumping over a log that was blocking the road they ran down- they really are cool animals and it was fun trying to keep up with them (even though we were cheating!)

We broke up our drive home by stopping in a town called Bela-Bela and going to a place called WarmBaths Resort and buying day passes to an outdoor waterpark.  The water was super warm and Greg had me cracking up at the top of the one big water slide when he was saying should I check with the guy to see if its okay to go?  Why it was funny is its Africa and there is no guy at the top (or at the bottom) the only thing were crazy teenage kids in the middle all along the slide that asked you if you wanted a spin in your tube!  The girls thought they were workers, but we reminded them that in America they would have had lifeguards in the slides, but not here!  What does a day pass run you ask?  (80 Rand, which is about $8.00 a person, you can't go to the movies for that in Massachusetts!)

That's all for now, I have to get to bed, big 4th of July festivities tomorrow, kids have been decorating bikes and wagons all day in preparation, the girls and I baked an apple pie for the pie baking contest!

Happy Fathers Day!

We hope all of you Dad's had a great day, no complaints here!  Greg and Charlie started the morning working on a model.

The kids had a great game of tennis, all the walls in our compound are very handy for tennis, then we headed to this cool place called Groenkloof Nature Reserve which is about 10 min from our new house.   At the place you can hike, mountain bike, ride horses and see giraffes, zebras.  We saw the giraffes from the road but didn't manage to find them once we were inside!  We got super close to a zebra who was on our trail while we hiked.  

We ate a nice picnic lunch and Greg had seen people driving through the park while we were hiking, so he asked and found out they were on a 4x4 nature driving trail.  He bought a pass and we headed out.  Charlie would ride his bike for a bit then we would have him jump in the car when he got tired.  The 4x4 trail was pretty calm at the start, then it got to a point where it had about 8 obstacles!  (built by the Jeep Company)  This is the part where kids need Dads...I would have never attempted it, it was CRAZY!!  We did the first few then decided maybe we had better not push our luck and pop a tire or something...the first was called Hippo's Hole where you drive through smelly, somewhat deep water and big rocks... we made it...

This was Greg checking out the sign before we went through.  We checked out the obstacle called Warthog Mud Hole-super deep hole-we did NOT attempt!!  Although the girls wanted us to try them all!

Charlie was inspired and jumped on his bike for some little jumps.  We thought of our New Hampshire buddies, George, Mikey & Caden would love this place!

The big bike rider!  This bike was too big for him when we left, now he rides it everywhere!

Other adventures this weekend, we went to our first "Braii" which is basically cookout in South Africa.  

It was hosted by an Australian couple who were wonderful hosts, great cooks and storytellers! We tried some classic South African dishes bobotie-meat pie, and boerwoers-spicy sausage. The girls know some of the dishes because they eat them at school for lunch.  Katie even got Greg some Biltong for Father's Day, its like beef jerky but everyone here eats it, kids share it with them during snack time at school.  We hope to host our new Australian buddies at our house soon, but first we must stock up on some wine!  There were no empty glasses at the table!

Home Sweet Home!

After a whirlwind (with Greg on a trip of course) we are finally settled in our new house!  We moved in Friday and were expecting just our sea shipment, instead they sent a truck with our air & sea shipment.  It was also the afternoon that Kelly had to go back to see her doc for her wrist checkup.  So I couldn't figure out how to be in 2 places at once (house & doctor) so luckily a guy from Greg's office at the embassy came over and stayed at the house with the movers so I could do the doctor visit.  Kelly's wrist is healing well and in about 4 more weeks she should be back in action.  I think Greg's office mate who was my hero on Friday may never have a family after seeing all the junk & chaos associated with moving a family of 5-he may decide to stay single forever!

Kids are thrilled to have new playmates and all of their toys, Charlie especially!  They have already rigged up a pulley system with the house across the driveway from us that has 3 girls similar ages.  This morning before school Katie was scrambling around (writing a note for the basket to send across to the ten year old next door telling her what time she'd be home from school)  She managed to do that then left her lunch on the table-gotta love Katie!   Charlie went to the balcony later in the morning to send his Darth Vader costume by pulley (thanks Meg) so that his buddy, the four year old girl who currently is into Star Wars could borrow it.  When he checked the basket on the pulley there was already notes, pictures, and rainbow looms inside for the kids.  Much more exciting than any text message or letter you can receive!

Our new neighbors were amazing, they took the kids to dinner & a movie the first night so I could keep unpacking, then they cooked us an amazing Sunday dinner.  They are a great family and make us so happy that we asked for a compound housing assignment instead of a stand alone house!  (oh yes, we are also borrowing their internet while we wait for ours to be connected, otherwise I'd still not be online!)

I promise to send pictures of the house, the pulley system, etc...very soon, still waiting on my trusty phone to be unlocked...but eventually I'll break down and pull out my other camera...just haven't brought in the bag I packed it in yet!  Maybe that will be tomorrow's project!

Mandela's Quote Rings True!

I was reading a book called Living in South Africa and there is a great chapter on culture shock.  In the margin there is a Mandela quote that says, "After a great hill, one finds that there are many more hills to climb".

So true!  I foolishly thought that getting out of the states, (packing out, selling vehicles, road trip) was the big hill and then SA would be easy street.  However we are still in our temporary guesthouse, waiting for our house to be ready to move in, both our shipments (air and sea) have arrived and wait for a place to be unpacked.  We are all eager to be settled, however we have to move guesthouses because this one is booked for the next few nights & of course Greg had to travel again for a few days! So here I am dragging suitcases solo again!

As to the culture shock piece, we have all had bits and pieces at different times.  For the girls, it is adjusting to a new school where things really aren't that well explained and teachers expect a level of formality that doesn't exist in the states.  One teacher said to Kelly, "I'm not your friend, you don't say "OK" to me, you say, "Yes, Mrs. Hans"."  For Charlie it is having no playmates other than Mom and most people here seem to have their 4 year olds in all day preschool (even if they aren't working) I guess because tuition is cheap compared to daycare in the states.

My challenges are how long it takes to get things done, getting my iphone from the states to work in South Africa has taken 3 trips to 3 different places, now it is in the hands of some company to see if they can get Verizon in the states to unlock it.  I also struggle with the security aspects, you have to be on your guard whenever you step out of the gates and it is no small task with kids in tow!  My personal low was last Friday when Charlie and I were on our way to an adventure and I stopped to fill up with gas.  I pulled out my credit card to pay and the credit card company had put a fraud hold on it.  So, I was about 100 Rand short of SA dollars ($10) and we had to call Greg to come and bring us extra cash.  (I was about 30 minutes away from his office!)  Why did I only have one card?  In case my purse was stolen then there was only one card to cancel...a brilliant plan if your one card actually works!

However. to balance out all the challenges we did have a fabulous weekend, we went to an Outdoor Expo and checked out various offroad camping vehicles and we also got to learn about all the amazing National Parks we can visit.  We also went to a funky market in Jo'Burg on Sunday and got to sample some neat foods, Katie bought a coconut where the guy cut off the top in front of her and she could drink the juice. (which she didn't like) Charlie and Greg got to put on boxing gloves and have a boxing lesson on the sidewalk outside of a gym.

No photos to share as my trusty phone camera is out of commission while I figure out how to make it work here!

Greg drove to Botswana today and reported cows on the road in front of him, donkey carts, other wildlife, and as he passed a National Park he saw three elephants up by the fence munching on grass!  We hope we can join him on his next trip!