Alumni

I don't really want to write this post since it'll be hard to follow the shark diving. We started with new kids on Monday who were supposed to be ages 16+. We expected about ages 16 to 18 but most are 20+ including one 25 year old. The first day was hard (as expected), made even more difficult by the fact that I was leading it. That meant I planned the games, ice breakers, timing, topics etc and helped keep us on track. But not knowing even how many people were going to show up meant I had to wing a lot of it.

In the end only about 7 people showed up, 5 girls and 2 guys. I think the same was true of today as well. They are all interesting people who want to go on to bigger and better things, which I hope we can help them with at least a little bit. But I get the feeling that they are past this material. Some already have kids, test regularly, know the material. That combined with the fact that we only have 3 days to get to know a very limited number of them, versus 5 days with a bigger group last week, means we won't bond with them nearly as much as our last kids.

Thankfully some of our favorites from the last group, which we have started to call our alumni, have come back Mon and Tues after school to visit. Vuyo and Massi go to the primary school across the street and are the first to show up. For the most part they just sit with us while we have our discussions or planning meetings after class, mooch off the left over bread and sandwiches provided by James House, and comment about us to each other in Xhosa.

Monday after Vuyo and Messi showed up so did C'Ko, Mandla, and Azile. We were so incredibly happy to see them, there were hugs all around. Then Mandla sat next to me and whispered "We came to see you, Natalie." I laughed at him and said of course they did, thinking he was kidding around. Then he followed with "we have a job for you." After our discussions finished I asked him what my job was, and he went over to C'Ko's backpack and pulled out a Life Sciences workbook, which he brought over to me open to a diagram of an eye and asked me to help them with it. I was THRILLED, I can't believe they actually remembered that I said I would help them with their bio homework. And then of course right at that moment our ride got there to pick us up. So I gave them the answers for 2 or 3 of the basic parts of the eye for them to label, and they were left to look up the rest on their own like their teacher assigned. C'Ko came back today and I asked him to show me his homework, which he finished no problem. Then when I asked what he wanted to do upon graduating this year, he said he wants to go to UCT and study medicine. He's planning to start applying for bursaries (scholarships) soon. I can't tell you how much I want that for him, he's so smart and friendly and could do so much in life.

After class Monday our group leader took about half of our group to the Cape Town waterfront, which I didn't realize was a gigantic mall. I found a great Nikon there for a good price, and we did some shopping for sweats and sandals to bring on our adventure tour. We leave for Joburg Thurs, and after that the 2 week tour of eastern South Africa, Swaziland, and Mozambique begins. I'm exhausted just thinking about it. If only our alumni could come too.

Photo cred Tess