The Upper Primary kids are having a week of tests and assessments, and next week the teachers get the joys of marking and report writing and then its the end of another term. We did try to find Mr. Samson this morning to see if his class was due to finally see the volcano eruption and the waterfall flood, but he was MIA somewhere. A real shame, as now I'll have to hear all about it by email from the teacher mentors.
I had my last morning recess break with the prep and standard 1 kids, and this time one of the female teachers was playing ball with a group of them, so it was fun to watch them all. I had a couple of small jobs on, and so I did get to spend quite a bit of time in the office. There are a couple of you who will be pleased to read that part I know! I even had time to back-up my photos from my laptop to my portable backup hard drive, and was congratulating myself that I had nearly finished copying all the files when the hard drive took a dive onto the floor - and has since decided to be very blonde. Its light is on, but I don't think anyone is home because I can't get it to register on my laptop or any of the office computers. I'm hoping that it will decide to work tomorrow, otherwise I'll be carrying my laptop around with kid gloves and getting another hard drive as soon as I can. Gotta love this technology.
Although it seems like I've only just arrived at the school - even though I've lived several lifetimes - this afternoon at the Waterhole was my official farewell drinks. It felt really strange. Before I left Sydney I was really worried about doing the job here, and it is amazing just how it has turned out and the opportunities that have presented themselves. It's been wonderful to have a job that doesn't seem like work at all. It's been great to have one that allows me to be out and about again, office based not office bound. And it's been so easy for me to go from a structured, restrictive, office bound mind numbing routine to a completely new living and work environment. I know a lot of people but I still struggle being able to put the correct names to some of the faces, and my swahili isn't good. If I was here for longer then I'd be joining the weekly swahili classes on offer, as well as some of the others too. The school environment is in English, but outside the school its very mixed. I don't think languages are my forte!
I've also enjoyed the feedback, which comes mostly via email. And I've also learnt there are people reading this who are not 'followers' so I'd like to say a welcome to G, a really very special lady who called Nairobi home for a many years. I'll be back in Nairobi in a couple of weeks and I'm sure you'll enjoy the bits between Arusha and Nairobi in this blog as you've no doubt experienced it all as well. I am still amazed at how much Nairobi has changed since I knew it last and there is no way I can relate the Arusha of today to the Arusha as it used to be either. On Thursday I am revisiting Mto wa Mbu, which is a village not many people ask to go back to, but it will be interesting to see what that's like now. Actually, it's a village not many people have even probably been to! I know the world has moved on, but sometimes it is staggering just how quickly things change and yet underneath, some things never change. I remember in Mauritius looking at the hotels that were just starting to be built - I'm sure the Mauritius of today is superficially different as well and it will be fun to go back and check it all out. Sadly, I can't on this trip, but ... Also, for those who have asked, yes - I obviously have taken more photos than the ones on the blog. So if you're interested in checking them out, I AM open to offers of coffee, lunch or dinner - or all three! - to gasbag and show them to you. Let me know!
Back to today - tonight's dinner in the Bondi kitchen was quite a treat. Cindy had prepared a lovely 'help yourself' dinner, and so we all did. By the time we'd nearly finished, Ellena said that she wouldn't mind making something for desert. This sounded good and even though we agreed that we were all too full, that didn't seem to end the conversation. It was decided that pancakes sounded good, and a Ellena said she'd love pancakes with lemon syrup and sugar. The only 'problem' with this was that we didn't have the ingredients for the pancakes, nor any lemons or lemon syrup - but we do have sugar. Being the creative cook she is, Ellena then said she would make a mousse, and what was in a mousse? While Lucy offered to google recipes to find out what type of mousse could be made with the ingredients we had, Ellena decided to make avocado & cocoa mousse. My hearing isn't good at the best of times (it will be better after July though) but I had heard correctly. In the end, Ellena had a mixture going of avocado, cocoa, golden syrup, sugar and almond essence. She thought there was still 'something' missing and that problem was solved when she found a few bananas which were mashed into the "mousse" mixture. By this time, I'd put the kettle on. Lucy had decided googling a mousse recipe with those ingredients probably wasn't going to prove successful. Cindy though had found a small bottle of Amarula, and rather than add it to our coffees, or 'waste' it in the "mousse" she solved the problem by swigging it and then passing the bottle around. Good idea!
Ellena was offering test tastes, and I have to admit that it really did taste much better than it probably sounds. Not at all like mousse we all decided, and that problem was solved when we thought it would be interesting to find another banana, and coat it and somehow freeze it to see how it would taste tomorrow. By this time we were running low on bananas, so at the moment in the Bondi kitty freezer there is a plate of "Banavaco" boats and some "chocolatey buttons" and the leftover mix is in a recycled small yoghurt container with a teaspoon acting as a paddle pop stick.
I can guess what you're all thinking - yummo!!!!
At recess today, with prep and standard 1, there was the usual mix. At least 3 games of 'football' on, all together. The translation for this is that there were three fluid groups of kids, not all boys, chasing a ball around the field, and sometimes even using the goalposts. It was interesting to watch when "collissions" occured between groups. Then there was the growing group of mostly girls playing with one of the teachers, or vice versa. And kids up, down and around on the monkey bars. Also some kids trying to walk backwards down the slippery dips and the usual full swings, with groups patiently waiting their turn. It's a busy time.
Of course there's always an exception, or three. This boy was lying there just watching anyone who walked past his field of vision. Then he was like this for a while, before obviously deciding just what it was he wanted to do
which was to tumble and sumersault around the place, even through the groups of ball games
Zuhura joined in with the group playing with the teacher but I didn't see Highness at all today
And on to Bondi tonight
The "mousse" in it's early stages. You can see the looks on Cindy's and Lucy's faces, and at this stage Lucy was still trying to find something on google to match our ingredients
as you can see from their faces, the taste test didn't go as well as Ellena had hoped it would. Cindy's solution hit the spot!
so much so that she didn't want to waste the bit left in the cap and Lucy was trying not to look at the banana additions
One question to any floral expert readers - this purple flower must be a weed because it grows everywhere, in small bushes with long green leaves; you can put a cutting in the soil and next week you'd have a flowering bush and it thrives on neglect. But I can't find anyone who knows the name of it, so if you do know, can you email or comment and let me know? Not sure if it is specifically African or not ... ???
John thinks it looks like Patterson's curse but he can't see the leaves to be sure.
ReplyDeleteNo i don't fancy the mousse - you were all a bit free with the bananas considering since the cyclone here their price has gone from $4 to $10 a kilo.