Erongo Athletics in Swakopmond 03.03.12

I was fortunate enough to be given the chance to spend a weekend, along the coast with some of the gifted athletics students at the school, attempting to qualify for the Country finals next month. The regions greatest, took part in order to decide the best that will represent us at Windhoek against all of the other regions.
I helped supervise on the journey there and back, also in the hostel by which we were accommodated and finally at the event; making sure each child was at their event at the right time.
We were very lucky to have 6/10 of the children qualify, although 3 were also disqualified which was disappointing for them.
It was a fun filled day with many laughs and some tears also, which took part from 7am-7pm. Tiring!
We also spent some time at the beach and eating ice-creams which were lovely, then travelled home the same evening, returning at midnight. What a long day it was.

The Swedish people visit 27.02.12

Omaruru Primary School is currently on a programme where they have a partnership school in Sweden that sponsors certain school things, vulnerable children and also visit every year to monitor the progress of the school.
In the week leading up, everybody had been busy preparing decorations and welcome presentations in aid of the Swedish arriving. On the day, the school choir and teacher choir put on a performance in assembly and the visitors were welcomed with a special song from the whole school. Tea, biscuits and cakes were served at break times where the teachers and visitors got together to share culture and experience and the visitors enjoyed spending the evenings in the hostel with the learners. They left a week later by which the evening before we spent having a nice meal with them and all of the staff.

Tour de Omaruru 26.02.12

Every year Spar and other local companies partner up to hold the famous Omaruru cycle race. A race that has been going for now a couple of decades; sees people travelling from all over Namibia to take part.
Professional, as well as amateur cyclists’ takes part, entering themselves into 1 of 3 races: 100km, 60km or 25km. Top prize money this year was N$40,000 and there was also a wide range of runner up prizes too.
The weather was great to see the cyclists set off and to also follow their progress along the road in the back of a friend’s bakkie. Finally, after battling it out in the wind and burning sun, all cyclists were back by 1o’clock and attending the prize-giving ceremony at the Rest Camp.

Omaruru Primary school modelling competition 11.02.12

The Grade 7 girls at O.P.S hostel decided to organise a modelling competition within the hostel on a Saturday night. They made posters and sold tickets to children and parents for N$ 2 and used the money to buy prizes such as crowns and sweets. The show went very well despite being arranged to start at 7 but finally starting at 9pm in the end (that’s Africa time for you!). Both girls and boys modelled and there were a number of categories such as evening wear, beach wear, swim wear, casual, swim and underwear. All of the models looked beautiful; however it was somewhat inappropriate to have Grade 1’s (6-8years) modelling underwear. But they definitely didn’t see what the problem was with it.
The girls were very happy with how it went, after they prepared most of it themselves within a week and only allowed us to help with making the tickets and taking them to town to display the posters.

Omaruru Primary Athletics 10.02.12

A fun filled day of some head-to-head competition between the 4 main schools in Omaruru: Omaruru Primary School, Paheye, Ubasen and Walfriden. Students took part in many of the main athletic sports such as short and long distance running, discuss, javelin, shot-put, high and long jump and not forgetting relays.
Ubasen took an early lead; but it was quite clear from the beginning that there was a strong rivalry between Ubasen and O.PS. You could practically smell it in the air!
But the rivalry wasn’t just on the sports field; it was also in the stands. The children from each school spent the whole day sporting banners and screaming victory chats at the others. I’m sure a few times I saw small fights break out and children being dragged away from each other.
Ubasen excelled in the long distance; however O.P.S. gained on them quickly when the field and short distance items arrived. With the change of circumstances, the Ubasen teachers decided to take matters into their own hands and when found to be cheating there were some stand-offs between the male and even female teachers in front of all of the children (can you believe it!)
Finally, after arriving at 7am, the day finished and the winners were announced at 2pm.

Omaruru Prison college cultural event 28.01.12

Omaruru is also home to an excellent prison college, where hundreds of students come from all over the country to professionally train to work in a prison. Every year they prepare a cultural evening celebrating the many different cultural groups/tribal people that study at the college.
The groups performed traditional dance, songs, displayed their foods and also acted out special elements of their culture. Traditional dress was worn by all and the show was truly spectacular!

Omaruru River flows! 21.01.12

Raining season is here and finally the Omaruru River runs after being dry since last year. Myself and my partner Tyche took a trip there with some friends that we have made in town and spent the afternoon braai’ing Boerewors and swimming in the very dirty looking water. Very weird to see when one is used to the rivers of England that aren’t exactly clean either!
It was very fun to float along upstream and enjoy something such as a river flowing here; which is very much celebrated when it doesn’t happen very often.

Death of the Herero chief and burial 16.01.12

December the 26th saw the death of the Herero chief Wilhelm Zeraua. The week commencing 16th January, his burial ceremony finally began in Omaruru. From the 16th – 20th his body was constantly driven back and forth from the mortuary, around town with the Herero men and women in precession. In the evenings, the body would be taken to a specialist church where the casket was opened and people could come and pay their respects (meaning they were free to dramatically cry over his body and declare the love for their dead chief).
Hereros also spent evenings eating humungous feasts in memory of him. These feasts may accommodate up to 50 people in one house and many donkey or goats would be slaughtered and eaten. Finally, the chief was buried on the Sunday afternoon (22nd) after being dead for 27 days.

Back to School

School re-opened for teachers on the 12th and for learners on the 16th of January. We were informed by Riette straight away that we would be needed for a lot of teaching this year and when we were finally presented with our full timetables it was a relief to know that we would be busy all year. I especially was every excited about the lessons I would be teaching. However, teaching did not commence properly until 2nd of February due to the handing out of books and covering them. Very frustrating to endure when you want to begin with all of you classes but that’s African time and that’s how it works!
I am now teaching 4 subjects: Agriculture, English, P.E and Religious studies to grades 5-7. I barely have any time to myself now with the entire lesson planning and running around after the children. But I am definitely enjoying it so much more.
I and my partner are still managing the school library, taking in a lot of book donations and also turning it into a small media centre, now including a music system and television to watch educational films.

Christmas and New Year

After our trip to the North, we arrived back in Omaruru for a few days to prepare for Cape-town., although our dreams were soon crushed when we were told by project trust that our visas had been rejected and we could not leave the country. Brilliant!

Furthermore, we spent Christmas at a friend’s farm, feeding kudu, riding quad bikes and swimming. We also enjoyed a Christmas meal but there was no Turkey unfortunately.
I remained in Omaruru through New Year whereas Tyche went back to Luderitz with all of the other volunteers. Omaruru was very nice and I celebrated with the majority of my friends in town attending a party that was held at the Rest Camp.

North Namibia 15.12.11

After some time in Omaruru we are all becoming somewhat agitated and what to begin our travels, so we formulate a plan to go north and potentially cross into Zambia. We leave one hot afternoon, after many arguments with each other over forgetting things and not locking doors etc, something Tyche is prone to doing! And we get our first hitchhike to Otjiwarongo. After only minutes of waiting, our next hitchhike takes us to Tsumeb where we spend the night at pleasant backpackers in our 4 man tent. Tsumeb is a cosy town, not much bigger than Omaruru but it has many more shops, not to mention a Wimpy (the best fast food ever!) which we all enjoyed visiting.
The locals were somewhat a pain though, harassing us every 5 minutes because we were clearly tourists and we MUST give them money. I however concocted a nice little story to tell them in the end, of how I am Namibian and I have been studying in the UK since I was 11 because my Father is English and now I’m back in Namibia and everyone now thinks I’m English. But with the very little Afrikaans I know, I was able to translate this and it fooled everyone! Good times.
Onward we then hiked up to Rundu and spent a cosy night in the tent along the Kavango River and played some pool at a friendly local bar. We didn’t stay long due to the long hike ahead of us that we had planned to Katima Mulilo the next day; but, hitchhiking was a problem, and after many hours stood at the side of the road trying to get a free lift, we decided to give in to getting a combi there instead. The driver originally wanted to charge us N$200 for the 600km trip, but after some serious negotiations, he finally let us board for N$150.
The journey was extremely long and cramped. The driver had managed to get 19 people into a 15 person combi and the 4 of us were cramped at the back on 3 seats, barely able to breathe and with flies buzzing all over our faces (not pleasant).
After many hours of driving past mud/wooden huts, catching glimpses of various Caprivian tribes and almost crashing into the back of a lorry, we finally made it. Alive.

Katima was lovely alongside the Zambezi River. It was exactly how I imagined an African town to be. It was grimy; the streets were littered with rubbish, water polluted and not suitable to drink. Everywhere we went there was someone either missing some of their clothes, or begging for money/food, there were flies everywhere. My face could not escape them! But it was truly beautiful, and it made me feel for the first time since being here, that I am in Africa.

During our time in Katima (about 4 days) there was a lot to do like visiting the many craft shops containing woodcarvings and weavings and many other wonderful handcrafted souvenirs. We took a boat trip along the Zambezi River, spotting some Crocodiles and Hippos and enjoying the delightful raining season that was taking place there. Throughout the 4 days we camped directly next to the river in the grounds of the luxurious Protea Hotel. The views were beautiful, there was a nice swimming pool and we also got a discount 3 course meal because we were volunteers. Result!
Halfway through the week we made a short attempt to cross the boarder into Zambia and finally visit Victoria Falls, however after crossing out of Namibia, there were problems going into Zambia; the visa was N$500 and 2 of us weren’t prepared to pay that because of lack of money. Therefore, we had no choice but to turn back.
Crossing back over, we were questioned about our over stay in Namibia and the officers were not prepared to let us back in. But finally, after long discussion we were told to re-enter, keep our heads down and not leave again. Not exactly something I would have thought I would experience during my gap year.
On the day of departure from Katima to travel back down south and home, we managed to get a hike with a couple who were travelling all of the way to Otavi and we spent a harrowing 12 hours in the back of their bakkie and finally laid down to sleep at a small bed and breakfast around 11pm. That night was the best night’s sleep I have ever got in my life!
Onwards the next day, we moved on to Otjiwarongo where we stayed in a 4 bedroom chalet in aid of Simone’s (Luderitz volunteer) birthday and cooked ourselves a nice meal and went for some drinks. We also had the pleasure of visiting a crocodile ranch.

The holidays begin 11.12.11

With school closed, finally mine and Tyche’s Christmas holidays begin. We leave late afternoon to hitchhike to Windhoek and meet up with the volunteers from Luderitz who are already waiting for us. The plan is that we are to get onto the intercape bus and travel to Zambia the next day and visit Victoria Falls for 3 days. Everything is booked and we are all extremely excited; but there is just one problem. We don’t have our passports.
We had handed them over to Robert (our rep) in October in order for them to be stamped for our work visas, but hadn’t received them back. We receive information that he has left them with a work colleague whilst he is on holiday in Cape Town so we go to pick them up from her, however, they are not stamped! She tells us that we must either stay in the country or go home, we cannot leave and come back, we won’t be allowed in. So all four of us girls start panicking and trying to contact project trust and Robert, who aren’t answering the phone. Finally we decide to cancel our bus to Zambia, only for Project Trust to contact us minutes later and tell us to go. Except this isn’t an option and neither is going to home affairs to see what the problem is as we were already 10 days over our holiday visa and would instantly be deported. We end up travelling back to Omaruru very distressed and upset, hoping that everything will be sorted by the time we need to go to Cape Town for Christmas. We at least were able to spend some time in Omaruru visiting the wine farm, chocolate factory, drinking delicious milkshakes at our favourite café Kashana and spending time with local friends partying.

Brandberg camping 18.11.11

In Omaruru, we have been blessed to meet some very nice people. And after many weeks of getting to know new friends, we were invited to join some of them on a camping trip to Brandberg.
They arranged food, tents and transport for the weekend and we set off on the Friday and returned on the Sunday afternoon, exhausted.
During the weekend we let our hair down, had some drinks, braai’ed an awful lot, went hiking up the mountainsides, did some shooting, 4x4 driving and played some camp fire games.

Erindi Private Game Park 05.11.11

After moving around town and getting to know everybody, we finally meet a gentleman, De Vries, who works at the local Game reserve Erindi, and offers to take us there for free for a weekend.

He planned an eventful weekend for us where we slept out in the bush in tents and heard Hyenas and Rhino outside whilst we were sleeping. Scary.
We went on a number of different game drives and saw a wide range of different animals; and enjoyed some traditional outdoor Afrikaans food in the form of a braai. All in all it was a good weekend and we didn’t have to pay a penny.

Omaruru Library colouring competition 18.11.11

We were lucky enough to assist the Grade 1 and 2 children to the community library for a day long colouring competition where they competed with other schools and got some sweet prizes.

Luderitz Project 28.10.11

For the weekend we were allowed an extra few days off in order to travel down south and meet the other 2 volunteers in Luderitz along the coast. So after a 24 hour hitchhike, we finally arrived there and was greeted in the form of a Halloween party, held by a large number of different volunteers from Peace core, world teach, project Trust etc. After an enjoyable weekend of meeting the locals and getting used to the new surroundings (was very cold), on Monday morning we had a chance to visit the other PT volunteers project, at a pre-primary school and producing a local newspaper. I think that after this I am very satisfied with my own project, as theirs is in the middle of nowhere.

School prize giving 27.10.11

An evening of celebrating the schools success with certificates and prizes for the academic achievements of children from grades 1-7. Dozens of parents showed up to watch and assist in the praise of the children. A professional photographer was present; we held a cake sale with Riette (Principal and our host) and there was a lot of dancing and singing in the 20 minute interval, to entertain the audience.
Money from the cake sale has gone towards new equipment for the school for sports. Everyone who attended commented on how much of a success it was.