Ouaga Week 11!!!!

Oh my goodness – it’s been weeks since I last wrote – you must all be getting withdrawal symptoms already!

Life here in Ouaga has moved along with a speed. The kids have completed their first quarter at school and we have passed the halfway mark between arriving and holidaying – we’re almost 3 paydays in now ;-)

The biggest event I have to share is the arrival of our container about 10 days ago. What an occasion. There were approx. 10 people helping the poor driver reverse the truck into our drive but many hands made light work and after it taking us a whole day to pack the container it took us less than a half hour to clear it. Fantastically we have a huge enclosed veranda so we could consolidate and add some order to the proceedings and it meant the house stayed fairly neat. Unpacking provided great excitement for not just us but the many curious visitors we had over the next few days. The children’s water guns provided much entertainment once they’d been rinsed and left out to air, (our only real casualty of container delays was the lunchbox ‘someone’ had accidentally packed into the toy box … luckily it was only the outside toys and it’s a lovely big plastic crate that was washed easily (and I didn’t have to clean it!)) our DVD collection was raided and already books have been borrowed.

Unfortunately Clayton left about an hour after the container arrived for a scheduled trip to Conakry, Guinea so we were restricted somewhat not in our unpacking but in our decision-making. Anyhow we did brilliantly and had almost everything unpacked and ‘sorted’ within 2 or so days. Thank goodness we did though as the next week was manic.

Clayton came back from Guinea feeling really tired and run-down and spent the Sunday night forcing me off the bed as he was so hot to the touch. It turned out on Monday by positive show of two little blue lines (very reminiscent of 3 other tests we’ve done) that he had malaria. The diagnosis and treatment here is top rate so as long as you start the medication as quickly as you can the disease is not life threatening. People here seem a bit blasé in some ways as the more we discuss it now the more we discover how some people have had malaria over 26 times and class it as really bad flu!

Clayton however having experienced it for the first time was definitely not in agreement and spent a horrible 3 days going through each and every stage (cold, hot, sweats) very thoroughly. By the 4^th day he had rallied to the couch and managed an hour or two in office. By Sunday (yesterday) the 7^th day he was still conveniently recovering when he had to take a break from his list of jobs which had been on hold since the now infamous container had arrived. For ease of mind though he is feeling much better this morning and is off to the mine for a week of head office visits and technical reviews.

As I mentioned before the kids have completed their first quarter at school and today is the first day of a week’s break. We haven’t much planned as dad’s away but Jenna and Robert are attending a ‘stage’ (french for a kind of internship) at their horse riding school for 3 mornings starting tomorrow. It should be fun and they are really looking forward to it as it involves not only some riding but also instructions on how to saddle the horses, brush them and generally care for them. Rumor has it there might even be some acrobatic training!

Owen and I are planning a few chill out in the pool activities and have volunteered our services for a morning or two at the school library. They are having a big 2^nd hand book sale and need barcodes removed from all the sale books… I figure that’d be right up Owens street.

We really have all been made to feel so much part of the community here. Friendships here are fast and furious and bonds seem to be formed so quickly. Someone mentioned that subconsciously or possibly knowingly we all realize that we are here for finite amount of time and there is no time to pussyfoot and for want of a better word woo each other, we have to get in there, get involved and become friends or get left behind J Robert has embraced this way of life completely and now has a twin. Their teacher finds them so alike and always together that he has taken to calling them both WillBert (William & Robert). He is also doing so well at school and besides the usual ‘talks a bit too much’ has had a very impressive progress report so far.

Owen has a new bestie called Connor who is the son of a teacher couple at the school and is a delightful fella who says dude a lot! They’ve taken to organizing their own playdates and since I am often not at pick-up its not unusual for an extra person to be dropped off at our house after-school.

Jenna has taken us all by surprise and although hasn’t firmed up any mega friendships is friends with everyone from the littlies to the higher graders. She has been doing absolutely brilliantly in her school work to and according to her progress reports is set to bring home A’s and B’s this term! (for those in the know, you’ll know this a huge achievement and just cements that we are making the right decisions with regards her education) I was reduced to tears though last week when a teacher came up to me to tell me how amazing Jenna is at the local orphanage she visits every week. He shared some lovely stories and made me such a proud mom. She is often the only student who goes to the orphanage – it’s an elective after-school activity. She has such a big heart and can be such a caring child …. It helps when people share these things with you as a parent because you can hold onto those images for dear life when she has her very regular ‘teenage’ moments and her life is spared!

I am enjoying the sunshine here and the lifestyle and the house-help has given me the time to get involved with a whole host of activities. As I’ve mentioned I’m part of the PTA here and we are in the process of organizing the biggest event of the school year here – Holiday Fair. It’s an event that hosts over 90 vendors and has more than 2000 visitors from throughout Ouaga walk through the gates. There’s also a host of other activities happening like – a Christmas concert, Santa’s visit and games galore so much much organizing. One of things I’m helping with is finding sponsors – the response is amazing (apparently it’s the same every year) and it looks like the main prize in the Raffle will be a flight from Turkish Airlines to anywhere for one person! 

One of the other reasons last week was so manic was because I also did a few hours of substitute teaching for one of Jenna’s classes. I so enjoyed it and am hoping to get involved with some special needs teaching on a more regular (once a week) basis.

I’ve also been invited to help out on the OEA (Ouagadougou Ex-pats Association) committee. It was started a few years ago by some real go-getters who unfortunately left last year and so things have kind of fizzled out and the two ladies left holding the baby (one literally J) just haven’t got the time on their own. We’re starting with a kick-off drinks get together in Nov that already has a sponsor!

On top of that I’m desperately trying to get back into my workshop (which isn’t nearly big enough already!) to create some pretty things. I’ve managed some new curtains for Owen’s room but Christmas is fast approaching and my usual idea of doing everything handmade is once again being pushed to the limit. Why do we always leave things to the last minute? I think people in general work better under pressure perhaps and although we complain about the stress we’re actually thriving on it.

My plan mostly while here is to keep myself as busy as possible. I fill my mornings and the kids and I have afternoons together and then if Clayton is around (L) evenings are his. It is so easy to withdraw and cocoon oneself and it’s a constant battle for me to keep on top of the melancholy that sets in when I think about my friends and family both in SA and the UK. I’m really finding the loss of independence in terms of not having my own car difficult and although I have access to shared drivers our schedules are not always mutually agreeable.  

However the absolutely breath-giving emails that you all take the time to send me are so appreciated and I sincerely apologise if I take too long to reply. Please know that you are always all in our thoughts and we miss you all terribly.

Ok enough soppy stuff. It’s just 7 weeks until we visit the UK (so looking forward to some nice crisp winter air) and then only 11 or so days and we’ll be sunning ourselves on a tropical beach – hope Father Christmas can find us.

As soon as I figure out how to transfer the photos from my new Samsung phone (any techies among you have some advice for me?) I’ll send out another picture newsletter. We have seen some amazing things in town and on the roads already and we’ve even had the camel man come to our door (ok garden gate but still) to take the kids for a ride. He’s so completely traditionally looking in his turban and many layers of cotton gowns but I had to laugh at the very modern laptop bag attached to the saddle of the camel! He must get amazing signal on top of that hump J