0 Finally a sign of life from me again!

I’m very very sorry for writing so irregularly in the last weeks! I always have the best intentions to finally write a new post but then I just don’t find the time to actually do it … but I promise to be on the mend! That’s why I decided to write one “South African lesson” per week from now on. There are so many things here that already became completely normal for me so that I don’t even think about mentioning them in my posts. But I’m sure that for you many of these things wouldn’t be se self-evident and so they’re maybe worth their own posts.

To bring you up-to-date concerning my work at the moment I can tell you that quite some things changed for me. My project partner Stella, from who I wasn’t separated for more than one day in the last eight months, is already back in Germany since one week now. For me that means that I am living and working on my own now as the only international volunteer at Cotlands. After having done everything together for such a long time it is quite strange to be on my own now and of course it was much more fun together especially for enduring exhausting or also boring working days. But I will just see it as a challenge to do all this on my own now!

In my last posts I already complained a little bit about not having too much work to do at Cotlands for the moment but that also got better now as I am doing the same work on my own now so that I am quite busy now. I still do a lot of office work, in the last weeks I also had to help a lot with sorting store rooms and in the afternoons I still do the homework supervision at St Mary’s children’s home. Here I am now especially trying to help a 12-year-old boy that can’t read or write which was only recognized some weeks ago. Even the pronunciation of the single letters is still quite a challenge for him – and for me teaching him is actually quite a challenge too! For the moment I am making an own letter memory with him to introduce him to the alphabet and first words in a playful way.

Furthermore the children now plan to start a children’s home soccer team and want to play against other homes. So we are sometimes practising with everyone and playing some matches which is also for me a lot of fun because some of the children are quite good!

This week I also represented Cotlands at the “Citizen’s Golf Day”. Right next to hole 4 Louisa and me, luckily I was allowed to bring some help because otherwise I would have had to sit there on my own all day long, had our little Cotlands stand with a big box for donations and some prizes for our raffle. Everyone that wanted to play the hole had to – more or less voluntarily - listen to our Cotlands promotion and in the end we were quite satisfied with the collected donations and happy about our first caddy tour!

For now I think that’s all, but as I promised: You will hear from me soon!

0 Finally new work!

After many worries about our work we finally found something to do! In the mornings we still go on working at Cotlands and the amount of work is still changeful but in the afternoons we are working for St Mary’s now.  St Mary’s is a children’s home near Cotlands that gives home to 60 children aged between seven and 21. Some of them are orphans, some were abused or neglected and some have been infected or affected by HIV. They live in six different cottages together with a house mother. In their cottages they have their bedrooms - single rooms for the oldest kids and 2-, 3- and 4-bed rooms for the others - a cosy living area, a dining area and a kitchen. The hole premises is quite big and they also have a lot of space to play outside.

Since last week we are going to St Mary’s every day at two o’clock. The children are going to many different schools so their homecoming times are also differing. When we’re arriving only some children are already back home. We look after them while they are eating their lunch and wait until the others gradually arrive. When everyone finished eating it’s time for homework at half past three. Stella and me both have our own cottage where we always help with the homework. In my cottage the children are aged between seven and sixteen and they are all very cute and nice. Somewhere between half past four and five when everyone finished the homework it’s time to go home for us. When there is some spare time in between lunch and homework there are many things to do with the children as St Mary’s has a very nice premises with a small soccer field, a basketball area and a little pool.

So far we really enjoyed our work in the children’s home because the children as well as all of the housemothers were very nice and welcoming. Furthermore after working with babies for half a year it is also very nice to work with some older children again because there is so much more that you can do with them. So far they were especially interested in German music so that we always had to bring our cell phones for playing Cro or Helene Fischer for them – only the best of course! They also tried to learn some German so that they are now always seeing us off with a cheerful “Tschüs”.

I’m really happy to finally have some satisfying work again and I already fond of all of the children!