Wednesday 23 June 2010
Friday 11 June 2010
Karaoke queens and one king
After having a nice meal at a Chinese restaurant and blowing our volunteer allowance on a bottle of wine of two between us we decided that we were all in the mood for karaoke. That is me and Kate, of course, and Mariella and Max. We headed to Churchills. It was all quite drunken as you can probably tell from the photos xx
The first rains came on Monday night. I don’t think I was really prepared for this event. I was just like oh its going to rain soon. That’ll be good. It might cool down. This was an all out storm, sheet lightning like you wouldn’t believe, thunder crashing and the rain thundering down on the tin roof. There was so much rain I had visions of my pit latrine filling with water and overflowing. I lay there for a while worrying about it and finallyI had to venture outside into the chaos. It took all of two seconds to cover my pit latrine but it was like someone had chucked a bucket of water over me. Then all of a sudden it was freezing cold. This is something I have never felt in Soma so I sort of had to make the most of it and I lay there shivering. Between feeling like the world was crashing down on me and the planks of wood from my bed sticking in my back (its the most uncomfortable bed ever) not much sleep was had that night.
We were going to a school up the highway that morning. We edged our motorbikes out of the compound gate and were greeted by several swimming pool sized puddles. Could be an interesting ride… and it was! I nearly came of twice in the mud. Its tricky working out whether to go around the puddles or straight through them and as decisiveness has never really been a trait I was blessed with, I usually end up making the decision right at the last minute and coming a cropper. Aswell as negotiating the mud - the goats, donkeys and pedestrians were out in full force that morning. Usually you beep at the goats well in advance to warn them you are coming and they just stand in the middle of the road staring right at you and then when you get really close they can’t make up their minds which way to go! Its not easy.
The ride up the highway is really enjoyable though. There is hardly any traffic, the breeze is cool and you are right in the countryside with donkey cards going past carrying wood and oxen wandering by the side of the road or across the road. You turn off the highway into a sandy track with typical African round huts and you get to the school. It's just two concrete buildings, the yard is sandy with a huge mango tree for shade. It’s a lovely setting. When we were on our way back from the school there was a troop of about 50 baboons just sitting there at the side of the road. There was one mother with her little baby clinging to her stomach. It was really cool!
We were going to a school up the highway that morning. We edged our motorbikes out of the compound gate and were greeted by several swimming pool sized puddles. Could be an interesting ride… and it was! I nearly came of twice in the mud. Its tricky working out whether to go around the puddles or straight through them and as decisiveness has never really been a trait I was blessed with, I usually end up making the decision right at the last minute and coming a cropper. Aswell as negotiating the mud - the goats, donkeys and pedestrians were out in full force that morning. Usually you beep at the goats well in advance to warn them you are coming and they just stand in the middle of the road staring right at you and then when you get really close they can’t make up their minds which way to go! Its not easy.
The ride up the highway is really enjoyable though. There is hardly any traffic, the breeze is cool and you are right in the countryside with donkey cards going past carrying wood and oxen wandering by the side of the road or across the road. You turn off the highway into a sandy track with typical African round huts and you get to the school. It's just two concrete buildings, the yard is sandy with a huge mango tree for shade. It’s a lovely setting. When we were on our way back from the school there was a troop of about 50 baboons just sitting there at the side of the road. There was one mother with her little baby clinging to her stomach. It was really cool!
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