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Sunny Christmas Day - 28/12/11

I woke the earliest I have on a Christmas Day since I was a small child. However, it was a wake up call from my frequently unfaithful bowel opposed to the excitement that used to be that got me out of bed. A lot of the day seemed pretty ordinary except for a few small differences.

At home in the UK my family stock up on Shloer and alcohol, use the posh china, lay the special tablecloth and all eat together. Here I was presented with a can of Fanta and two bottled ciders. I sat watching TV with the children (wearing their new shoes and clothes) for about 10 minutes before being told to eat. Rather than posh china and smart tablecloths the special treatment was actually having china and a tablecloth. AM was with his biological family and so I sat alone, but being Christmas I insisted the children ate with me and not outside in the sand.

The meal was larger and had more variety than usual; spaghetti, rice, onions, tomato soup sauce, mayonnaise and two pieces of chicken.

For the rest of the day I walked around Ndama with the youngsters. At one point I was sent with money to buy a bottle of wine and join some people to drink it in a small metallic hut. Later I caught up with an outdoor party. Music, dancing and more wine. By 5pm my summery Christmas, wine and dodgy stomach put me to bed for around 3 hours. When I woke up again I was presented with more fizzy drinks and cider. The constantly slightly bloated, sicky feeling reminded me of Christmas at home, just lacking the compulsory family boardgames.

The young lads would 'taste' the drinks and on 'family day' - as they call boxing day here, though the idea behind the name remains about the same - one boy, Mervin, smirked and said, reminiscing about the day before and shaking his head, "Us and those beers yesterday..."

Church - 28/12/11

As much as I hate being told about someone who is a better person than myself in every way (a valid reason to question their existence in the first place I'm sure) I went to church with AM and our host father. The service started at the ungodly hour of 7am on Sunday morning.

For many years I have only been to church on Christmas day, almost to justify celebrating it. Apart from that any other references to church in the UK will be based on what I remember from being a child, so bear with me.

Rundu churches are unlike our traditional bell tower, graveyard and gargoyle covered ones in England. They range from the type you see on the Simpsons to a basic, rectangular mud hut. Ours was like the former. On arrival it was full - people were on time! A peculiar occurrence what with 'African time'. The majority of the service was prayer and hymns. As with most things here they were performed with pride and volume. Everyone, bar me, sang all the hymns loudly, in tune and often with several harmonies. Even Oh When the Saints sounded great. Being a reserved nation our songs are often quietly groaned.

There was much more standing in the service here allowing my height to add to my colour in making my religious/cultural ignorance more than apparent. When not standing we knelt. The pews were just as wooden and uncomfortable as home but with no cushion on offer - I was praying to stand again.

On the more positive side there were no crying babies or toddlers running riot. The Lord's prayer was followed by showing one another 'the sign of peace'. We shook hands with all within arms reach whilst singing about God's blessings. However, as in England there were call and reply prayers that never fail to lack enthusiasm,

All in all it was a pleasant experience but it still remains that Church is not my thing regardless of the side of the hemisphere I am on.

General Bits & Bobs from Namibia - 10/12/11

This post is just for a few bits I want to mention which hasn't been connected with previous posts. Also it's a chance to see some photos.



This is a bush fire we drove through on our way from Windhoek to Rundu. It was caused by a car accident and spread rapidly. Photos don’t do it justice.



In my house are three dogs, these are the younger two. The room they are in is the same room that some drunken bloke often sleeps in and I have to climb over if I need to use the toilet. The kitten turned up one day and so my host family decided it was theirs. Like the dogs it had no name. My use of past tense here is relevant. I had a conversation with Shady, 11, one of my host brothers recently after not seeing the kitten for a week…

Me: How many cats do you have?
Shady: One
Me: What about the baby cat?
Shady (very nonchalant): It’s dead
Me: What happened?
Shady (still nonchalant): The dogs killed it


…so it was mauled by the dogs, not that anyone cared.



This is a poster from one of the kindergartens explaining how to get revenge on an ex-girlfriend by going to the toilet near where they are eating.



Far left is Shady, 11, one of my host brothers busy playing with my iPod. The lad in the middle is Mervin, 13, another of my brothers. In front of him is Pauline, 6, my host sister with Chris Brown on her lap. He is one of the older brother’s child and is seen playing with my diabolo (after stealing it from my room) in the other photo. The other child is one I see a lot but is not related to my family. These are some of the many children that hang around my house. They like to hijack our room requesting diabolos, my iPod or to play cards.



Washing clothes in the river. It was quite a novelty for the many others washing to see a white male doing the same.



Our article in the national paper the Namibian Sun from the fun day we held.



World Aids Day - traditional dance performance. We helped set up the shelters and chairs as well as hand out posters.

Other bits

As well as those mentioned above, since being here I have had several new experiences:

A taxi driver pulling over to be served a drink and consume it out of his window whilst taking me to work.

Several dead dogs.

Puppies being sold for N$20, less than £2.

A man getting knocked down by a taxi who then got up and walked off.

The panic in Hungry Lion (like KFC) when a babies heart stopped. There is a very limited number of ambulances in Rundu. Luckily the child came back to life after a few worrying minutes.

Having children run up to me constantly just to ask “How are you?” or shout “I’m fine” from those who haven’t quite gotten the hang of it.

Children who I don't recognise yelling my name.

Building Playgrounds - 10/12/11

Since the kindergartens closed for the summer our team has taken on several new projects. Still associated with the Mehozetu Network we have a team working on educational resources such as a teachers pack with all the ideas and more that we have bought to the kindergartens. A Special Olympics group have accepted the help from several volunteers and we are all about to hold a summer school for 13-15 year olds. The project I am working on is building playgrounds for the kindergartens and this is what I am going to talk about in this post as the title suggests.

Currently the network is having safe buildings built in all the kindergartens and a couple are changing plots. There are also a few already with functioning playgrounds and so we have limited ourselves to 8 playgrounds. Up until the week just gone we have been collecting materials and deciding what will be built. A supermarket, OK foods, donated 9 old wooden pallets which we intended to make 'shop fronts' out of for the kids to role-play with. TrenTyres and Tyre Rack (tyre places with unimaginative but practical names) have donated old tyres to us. However, most successfully a hardware store called Cola Cola Hardware agreed to generously sponsor our materials. A couple of unemployed, local, skilled labourers offered their help in building (drilling, sawing, mixing cement etc.).

We came up with a design and showed Natalie and Nelson, the couple who own Cola Cola, and they phoned around all over town getting hold of large wooden poles, paint, rods, bolts, nails, rope and more.

Part of the climbing frame in progress


Along the way we’ve had several hick ups, ones that made it look like we were going to have to give up. First apparently nowhere in town had enough wooden poles which was soon solved when we found out an order of 400 were on their way from South Africa this week. Then we overlooked the fact we’d need concrete to make the climbing frames stand. Again this was solved almost straight away when Anneke, a volunteer working with Mehozetu, contacted a builder friend, Glen, who worked out a deal for us. Most recently was when the first climbing frame was put together then we realised all the threaded rods were in a condition that the bolts could not be attached – just like every other issue it was solved within that day when my host dad showed me some tools to fix the issue.

The frame so far

Clara demonstrating how to use the frame


This past week Glen, the said unemployed locals and us (the GX playground committee) have put together 4 almost complete frames and installed them in kindergartens. It looks like the picture above. We are still to place another tyre on top of the one in the image, bury some as stepping stones as well as some smaller poles, lay down large tyres and install rope swings. Once complete the more creative types on our team will paint it.

After putting the frames together a GX volunteer, Megan, explained to Glen how great the other helpers were and how they were looking for work. Glen then offered them a job starting Monday helping with the buildings I previously mentioned - a great by-product from our work and a wonderful thank you for their incredible contribution.

Kindergarten Placement 4, Sindanno - 10/12/11

Due to little access to internet I am slightly behind on posts and so this refers to a couple of weeks ago.

The fourth and final kindergarten Ester and I worked in was Sindanno, the final one because the schools were closing for Summer. Sindanno is, in my opinion, the best kindergarten for resources. There are two classrooms with boards and posters, several offices, toilets, a kitchen, a vegetable garden and a large playground with swings, slides and climbing frames. Just the plot itself is large.

Previous GX volunteers had introduced a timetable, gardening scheme, educational songs and a few other things. Being the last week of the year we decided not to be too intense since they have had all sorts to take on from the weeks before. I bought in a team/house point system to help the teachers focus on praising the children for being good rather than just punishing those who are bad.



One of the days the teachers took the children to remove the tomato plants from the garden. At one point the teacher suddenly started shouting in her local language and all the children ran away – I stood looking on unknowingly. Eventually it became apparent that the teacher found a snake amongst the plants. A child bought a large stick for her to lift the leaves up with to reveal the snake, at which point Ester ran too. It was around 4 inches long and not poisonous however the teacher continued to whack it with the stick. After several hits she called for an even bigger stick and with it crippled the snake further. She then hooked it on the stick and took it out of the garden where she, and around 10 children, ensured it wasn't coming back by all simultaneously smacking the snake with even more sticks for about 5 minutes.

On the last day the winning house got sweets and a large meal of liver and rice was cooked for everyone. Lots of games were played and reports were handed out. Some children passed and progressed onto grade 1 where as others passed but for some unknown reason did not progress. The grades on the report cards didn't seem to determine whether they moved to grade 1 or not but having worked with the children all year the teachers knew who was ready and who wasn't.