I Hope I don’t need a Rabies Shot

So this was my first weekend back in Uis after spending the past two in Swakopmund. It was much, much slower around here. Saturday morning we had cleanup at the school at 7AM (lots of fun after staying up until 2:30 trying to send pictures on free internet…) which mostly involved hauling around rocks to fill up ditches where water flows when it rains. It was nice to do some physical labor, and the kids (and principal) really liked that I helped and got my hands dirty. I had one little girl who must have been 5 or 6 walk back and forth with me on each trip and skip next to me when she wasn’t carrying rocks. We smiled and encouraged eachother (without speaking- she doesn’t know English yet) and whenever she got too tired I would pretend to be exhausted and need a rest. Too cute.
After clean up there was a neat dance performance by some of the older girls and then the kindergarten (before pre-primary, mostly 2-4 year-olds) had their athletic competition. It involved mostly races like running, sack race, jump like a frog race and was perhaps the most adorable thing I have ever seen.
The afternoon was spent reading (with McLean) and taking a short trip (guided by McLean) to the china shop in town where Chinese people sell Chinese goods, which are all sorts of different things like clothes, blankets, jewelry, dishes, fake hair, etc. for super cheap. I got a nice sun hat and we picked up bread and milk across the street and headed home.
Sunday was also pretty uneventful, save for the parents meeting. It was three hours long and all in Khoekhoe… and I had to be there. So much fun. Fortunately, I got to play with the principal’s 18 month old daughter the whole time, and I think the fact that she liked me endeared me to the parents. Although she did bite me hard enough to break the skin, hence the title of this post. Adorable little brat. Apparently the first 20-30 minutes were talking about me and my housing situation. No idea what was said or decided but people were speaking quite passionately. I think they don’t like the idea of me living alone… but no one felt it necessary to ask me what I thought.
Before the meeting I cleaned the entire house, built a little table out of some shelves I found in the garage, and re-organize to adjust to living alone. The afternoon was spent lesson planning and cooking, which all made me feel quite domestic. Anyway, I hope everyone had a fabulous valentine’s day party! I was sad not to have my annual party complete with piñata, but had a nice Sunday nonetheless.