It was a super great weekend! apologies for long post.

Well, we all survived our 12 hour adventure on Saturday with just 30 kids and no aunties. There was no sharks at the beach, no one got swung in the head w/ a mini golf club, we survived our first time experience with encountering escalators, and successfully gorged ourselves on KFC. It was an all around blissful day but I can easily say that us - the volunteers - were wiped out. Possibly the kids as well.
At 6am we woke up and made 80 sandwhiches and 5 litters of diluted orange drink for the kids. By 8am we rolled into Agape, piled the 30 kids and us - 6 volunteers - into the agape bus. The bus's legal maximum holds 22 people, but that didn't stop us. We then drove for an hour to Durban, which was the first time I saw it.
The Aunties dressed the kids in their finest clothes and I have to say they all looked spectacular! I especially loved Sbonga (3years old), Unati, one of the twins (age 4 turning 5 this Sunday n Mother's day), and Boy's outfit. Yes, there is a little 4 year old boy named Boy. He is the only guy out of the 7 toddlers...so he's got a super harim with him and he acts the part w/ a super low voice and struts/ waddles his way to the beach.
I walked w/ each twin and they are the slowest moving humans in the face of the earth. It's like having an anchor tied to you. They really don't believe in time and just wander their way as they see fit. I have really learned to slow down.
The youngest ones of the group was Sbonga (3) and then the oldest was Phalani (18). We got to the beach about 10amish. It took us awhile to get everyone aboard the bus because we had swimsuit changing going on and then we had to make sure the little ones had gone to the toilet before they sat in the bus for an hour.
Durban's beach was beautiful. Once again, the Indian ocean reminded me a lot of the Pacific w/ the piers jutting out and the big expanse of water and nice waves. All 36 of us were at the beach from 10 - 3pm and it was hot, but the water was perfect. 3 volunteers would stay up on the beach and the other three took willing groups to the ocean. I realize their is many toilet comments, but the little ones broke the record in visiting the toilets. I can easily say I have never visited the toilet so often. I think the idea of having a toilet nearby and so clean was such a great novelty to the little ones - that they went often. They thought it was good fun.
By 1pm, the twins - Unati and Andishwa, Sbonga, and Boy decided they were done...so they dressed themselves, sat on their towels, and waited for another 2 hours. For being 3/ 4 years old, I was amazed at their indepence and patience. It was boiling hot out there. Not crying.
The only little one who had troubles was Wandlie, who's autistic and when he gets angry he bites - which is no fun. He ran every where so there had to be one volunteer dedicated to him. He must of eaten a at least a pound of sand, but it was great to see him love the water. He had a lot of fits and when he can't express himself - it is really tough and trying. Besides him biting, he just sreams. We had to alternate every 30 mins because it was so tough for each volunteer to watch him for longer than that. At the end of the day, we were glad he came but it would have been significantly easier to not have him come along.
After the beach, we took the kids to put put golf and I have to say most of of them had never been to a mall nor seen escalators. Durban is a large sophisticated city...so there are malls and so forth. Our small group of 36 made a HUGE bottleneck at the escalators because the kids were so scared of the moving steps. People at the mall got really upset with us and couldn't understand, but when we told them they had never been on an escalator - you could tell they felt really bad for yelling at us. This was a bit stressful, but it all worked out.
I think the escalator could of been the best thing ever for them, but after we got the group down the first set of escalators the kids were easily distracted by all the shops of the mall. We quickly moved onto the mini golf.
My group was Sbonga (3), Unati (3 and possibly the next world class South African golfer), and Tando (5). Clubs were swinging and they all became deeply attached to their colored balls. Nothing was better for them than having their colored ball disappear into a dark hole only to pop out somewhere else. It was AMAZING! The laughter and frenzy it created was out of this world. Luckily, I didn't get hit with a club either...I thought it could of been a flop, but far from it.
It was about 5pm, when we shuffled & piggy backed the kids back to the bus. Bob asked everyone if they had fun and they all shouted "Agape". I think they were tired and wanted to go home, which must mean we were successful in entertaining them, right?
But we hadn't hit the big wonder of it all, KFC. Note, I will not be visting KFC for the rest of my life. In a small KFC, we took over the WHOLE seating area with everyone sharing a seat. I have never seen more fried chicken in my whole life, chips, coleslaw, and bread rolls. Tessa, our volunteer coordinator, had preordered 10 big family bucks with our left over money. In addition, someone in line waiting to get food donated another 2 huge buckets...not that the kids looked like there were short for food by then...so we brought 3 buckets of chicken back to the Agape at the end of the evening. There were no seats left for us - the volunteers - so we stood ate, managed food coming/ going, toilet runs, napkins, and all general choas that comes with 30 kids and crazy excitment. The KFC pitched in ice cream ontop of that as a gift and little plastic toys, which was really sweet. The kids sugar level was sky rocketing.
The most notable thing at KFC was to see the kids hide food from us even though they were stuffed. It just showed their uncertainty of when they would get their next food and if they would be full from their next meal. This just broke all of our hearts. It was especially disheartening to see the kids w/ tummy aches from eating so much and so fast, had their pockets of food hidden. Nothing went to waste.
Sbonga, the slowest eater, and the other little ones would alternate between chicken and ice cream. But in the end every scrap was gone.
Somehow, the place didn't look destroyed when we left and we had the kids say thank you in unison to the whole KFC crew which was sweet and very boisterous. The kids returned home to Agape and we came home to washing swimsuits, putting things away, towel washing, and general fatigue from a really good day. We were also all severally burnt and we all glowed a wonderful bright pink color.
The next morning was ours to do as we wish. We all thought about sleeping in late but we got a call at 8am to be up and ready by 9am to go "jumping".
I got a very unique view of South Africa yesterday from 9,000 feet up. I went skydiving and it was MAGNICIFENT! So pretty and I loved the free fall! That kind of woke me up. 4 of us spent the whole day doing that. We came home by 6pm and then headed to a dinner out because we couldn't imagine cooking. Too much effort.
Today, we shopped for groceries for school. We buy fruit everyday for the kids to have in the afternoon when the older ones come back from school and the young ones wake up from their nap. At school, Sandra and I finished painting the classroom we were working on, we then cleaned the floor, and put on our first coat of "stoep" (cement) enamel. I felt like we accomplished a lot and walked over to the internet. Today will be long - we have to go to the airport to pick up the kids coming back from NYC at 8pm in Durban. 9 kids were in NYC to be part of the choir for Alicia Keys and Bono's fundraiser song that will go along w/ the documentary about Agape orphanage, Keep a Child Alive, and the other projects like Bobbi Bear and Dream Center. The connection is Keep A Child Alive from Leigh Blake, who started Red Hot with Bono in the early 90's and also the campaign that used celebrities like Gwenythn Paltrow that said "I am African too." I am sure you all have seen this campaign that was in the 90's that caused a bit of stir.
That should be fun to see and meet these 9 kids. I am sure it will give them all an incredibly distorted view of American life to have met two celebrities and be in NYC. Oh well.
Tomorrow, two kids will come over the volunteer house to cook dinner w/ us after the normal school day. Hopefully, the second coat of paint will be placed on the floor and be drying. On Wednesday, we are visting Bobbie Bear - the center for sexually abused kids, and the Dream Center - where they help the people in the last stages of AIDS to pass away peacefully. It should be eye opening and a huge learning curve.
I am really enjoying my colleagues and we have had some great talks about AIDS and culture and just the problems of Agape and the South African government. Unfortunately, there is much we can really do more than what we are doing. I am also learning more and more Dutch.
I am going to try to give you profiles of each kid I have learned of so far. I know the 7 little ones now. Since I don't see the school kids as much it is harder, but it's coming. So I end this post to add another. Sorry no pics.
Thank you again for all your wonderful support!
cheers,
a

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