I just realized I have some serious catching up to do! Here we go...

On Friday, November 5 Jerome and I went to the Castle of Good Hope in Cape Town. This castle was built between 1666 and 1679, and is the oldest surviving building in South Africa. In the beginning it was the center of civilian, administrative and military life in the Cape area. Now it has been converted into a museum and a military base. I really enjoyed its displays on the Boer war. We got to take a look inside the prison cells. The prisoners had all carved messages on the wooden doors. One of my favorites went as follows:

Unwelcome stranger to this woful place
Adieu to friendship and to mental peace
Content is fled; O! Tedious time
When sad reflection ponders o'er no CRIME
No cheating comfort glad's the weari'd eye
As the incessant hours in dull rotation fly
Signed: Percy

Here is me on the castle rampart. You may notice that my hair is now about 22cm shorter... :) Esther, Emily, and I are all donating our hair for cancer wigs.



The next day, Saturday, we went to Robben Island. While we were at the waterfront waiting for the ferry, a group of Coptic(?) Christians came out and starting singing. We didn't recognize the language, but it sounded beautiful. They were dressed all in white, and the men and women were singing in harmony. It sounded so neat! Anyways, we took the ferry to Robben Island, and then had a bus tour around the island. Before Robben Island was converted to a prison island, a community of lepers lived there. In this way the lepers were kept apart from the main population. We got to see part of the cemetary where all the lepers were buried. There were a few gravestones, but most of the dead lay under the bushes in unmarked graves.

Later Robben Island was converted to a prison island. Political prisoners were forced to work in a limestone quarry during the day. The limestone was used to build roads on the island. Prisoners were told this work would only last six months, but it turned into 13.5 years. At the quarry there is now a pile of stones. In 1995 former prisoners returned to the island, and each man or woman took a rock and placed it in the pile. This was to show that, despite race, background, religion and language differences, they had built relationships that would last. We also got to see Nelson Mandela's prison cell. If you are interested in a more in-depth description of our Robben Island visit, see Jerome and Andria's blog.

After we got back from Robben Island, we went to Imhoff farm, where I rode a camel named Ligman ("man of light"). The girls brushed another camel named Isaac ("laughter"). Riding Ligman was very cool...and somewhat surreal! I never would have thought I would ride a camel! It was actually a much smoother ride than riding a horse. When Ligman stood up and knelt down, though, I had to lean way back or I would have fallen off! It was a very fun experience :)



On Sunday, between services (services are at 9:30 and 6) we went to Muizenberg beach. It was very windy so it actually didn't feel that warm. I love these colourful changing huts!



There were a whole bunch of kids playing in this canal water at Muizenberg:



A little ways away is this sign:



There were even people fishing in this water! The water was green, and most likely contained sewage. If you did catch anything out of there, would you really eat it?!?!

On Monday I drove standard on the other side of the road! And Jerome and I are both still in one piece! :D Tuesday I volunteered at Tygerberg, and Wednesday at Chrismar. I went on a few house visits on Tuesday as well, as a part of volunteering for Chrismar. I met a 25-year-old coloured man named Charlten. His mother had tried to abort him, and as a result he has serious physical handicaps. Though he couldn't talk, he would answer 'yes' to questions by blinking his eyes. He was so sweet, and was smiling the entire time we were there!

At Tygerberg there are a lot of children. Many of them have eye problems or skin diseases. I often see serious burns on their hands as well, probably from cooking over a parafin stove or exposure to unsafe electrical wiring. It is definitely an eye-opener to be walking through those halls!

Wednesday afternoon Emily, Esther, and I went on a 6km walk/run that Chrismar was hosting as a fundraiser. I was very proud of the girls. They did not complain once, and were even encouraging eachother to keep running. At one point some people were handing out little bags filled with water for the runners. For the next 4 kms there were little blue bags thrown all over the sidewalk - some of them just feet from a garbage can! The girls were so shocked that they started picking up the garbage. Together we walked/jogged and picked up little blue baggies :) We also sang praise songs the whole way. I was so proud of the girls. I have wonderful nieces! They were very excited to get medals at the end:



I love this picture! Alicia gave a ballet show the other day. She makes a very cute ballerina!



Anyways, that is the quickie version (actually...it is quite long. I guess we did a lot of fun stuff!) of the last week. Enjoy the pictures!

Since I have the time and motivation to blog right now, I'm going to cover a few different topics. I apologize in advance if this is scattered or confusing.

It has now been three days since Grandpa passed away. It is hard to be so far from home, but I am glad to be around family here as well. The memories of times I spent with him keep coming back, and I can't help but feel cheated out of years with him. At the same time, I am so thankful that Grandpa can now be in heavenly glory, surrounded by the innumberable multitude of believers. Because I can't put words to my thoughts, I want to include this text that has been on my mind lately.

Revelation 7:9-17

After this I looked and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and in front of the Lamb. They were wearing white robes and were holding palm branches in their hands. And they cried out in a loud voice:

"Salvation belongs to our God,who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb."

All the angels were standing around the throne and around the elders and the four living creatures. They fell down on their faces before the throne and worshiped God, saying:

"Amen!
Praise and glory and
wisdom and thanks and honor and
power and strength
be to our God for ever and ever.

Amen!"

Then one of the elders asked me, "These in white robes—who are they, and where did they come from?" I answered, "Sir, you know." And he said,

"These are they who have come out of the great tribulation; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. Therefore, "they are before the throne of God and serve him day and night in his temple; and he who sits on the throne will spread his tent over them. Never again will they hunger; never again will they thirst. The sun will not beat upon them, nor any scorching heat. For the Lamb at the center of the throne will be their shepherd; he will lead them to springs of living water. And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes."

What could be better than praising our Mighty God for all eternity?


On a completely different note, here is a picture of "Guitar Guy". He is at the intersection close to our house every day, and will serenade you while you are stopped at the robot (traffic light)..."for a small donation", of course! Today we were all joking and smiling at him as we drove up to the intersection, and Andria warned, "Just wait..you smiled at him. In a minute he'll be singing at our car!" Sure enough, he came up and serenaded us :) Kudos to him for his entrepreneurship originality though!



This afternoon we went to an ostrich farm. Andria and I went on the tour while Jerome had a picnic with the girls (they had done the tour before). I loved seeing the baby ostriches; hulle is baie oulik! The best part of the tour was getting to sit on an ostrich...now that isn't something you get to do every day!





Last Saturday we started working on the murals in the younger girls' room. Bethany and Alicia want flowers and butterflies, and Emily and Esther want monkeys and horses. I quite enjoyed taking a break from schoolwork to rediscover my creative side.



The rest of this week has been fairly busy with school, piano/theory lessons, volunteering, etc. but we still always find time to be silly! I love pulling a funny face when the girls are supposed to be concentrating, and then watching them trying to control their laughter (...or not trying...). Sorry Andria! Usually it is safer if I go upstairs to study - then we both get some work done :)

I'll try to put up the next blog about holidays soon. I wish you all a blessed weekend, and I am praying for strength for all those who knew Grandpa and are now missing him.

Keeping with my Sunday tradition, I'm going to write about Mountain Zebra National Park. On our drive from Lesoba to the National Park we stopped to see a Boer War Concentration Camp monument in Nord Aliwal. This was one of many concentration camps in which died a total of 27 927 Boer women and children (22 074 were children under 16) during the Second War of Independance (1899-1902). Britain first used the scorched-earth tactic, destroying Boer homes and farms, in the hopes that this would decrease moral of the fighting Boer men. Then Boer families were rounded up and put in concentration camps to keep them from reoccupying the land. Women and children kept in the concentration camps died of starvation, disease and exposure. At the monument we could see the ages and names of those who died. The number of children who died at only a few months old was astonishing. There were quite a few entries of children only two or three days old as well. Other children were born in the concentration camp, and died after a few terrible years of starvation and disease. It was a real reminder of the sinfulness of man and what we are capable of doing.

We arrived at Mountain Zebra National Park at about 5:30. Just a few minutes into the park we saw a Rhino and her baby! That made 3 of the big 5. I was very excited.

We also saw black wildebeest, blesbok, eland, kudu, vervet monkeys, rooi hartebeest, and of course, mountain zebra. We have to go to church soon, so I'll just post some pictures quickly.

Eland:

What a majestic creature!

Blesbok:



Rooi Hartebeest:

Vervet Monkey:

I hope you enjoy the pictures - I have to get ready to go to second service now. I wish you all a blessed Sunday!

Ps. The name of the bird on my last post is the Longtailed Widow. The colours are unusual in this picture because it was molting.

It's Sunday afternoon and I am the only one home, so I thought I should put up another blog about our holiday (which was...quite a while ago now!)

After the Kalahari we drove to Kimberley. I love this picture of the girls playing doctor in the car. I brought back the cap and mask for Alicia from Tygerberg after working in the Milk Kitchen one day.



Jerome had to have a conference in Kimberley, so we incorporated it into our holiday. Kimberley's biggest (and only? :P ) tourist attraction is the 'Big Hole', a HUGE hand-dug open diamond mine. Tuesday night (day 4 of our holidays) we all stayed in the one hotel room that Jerome's work had provided. Jerome and Andria went out for dinner at the hotel while the girls and I had mcdonalds and watched tv. They were very excited to watch cartoons, as we only have a couple channels at home! The next day while Jerome had his conference we went to the Kimberley Diamond Mine Museum. We watched a little video about the mining and then had a tour. It was unbelievable how big that hole was! Especially considering it was all dug with shovels and pickaxes. The mine was closed in 1914 because of the war, and it filled with water. Because they didn't have the technology to pump out such a large volume of water, mining ceased.



We arrived at Lesoba, which is on the edge of Lesotho, after dark on Wednesday. Lesoba is a family farm situated at the foot of the mountains! One funny memory is when we, stumbling around in the dark, mistook an unused, delapidated trailer as the washrooms. In the morning we found out that a few feet to the left was a beautiful stone building with flush toilets and showers. Oops.

On Thursday morning we fed the lambs, which was so cute! Later we drove to a little town called Clarens and window shopped. After a while we continued on to Golden Gate National Park. It was beautiful! I took pictures, but they don't do it justice. The road we were on wound through huge rock cliffs and rolling hills covered in tall yellow grass. We saw a group of mountain zebras and a herd of eland. It scenery was unlike anything I have ever seen.

I'll have to check with Jerome on the its name of this bird. They are so beautiful!



On Friday we went on a hike near the farm. The ground was black from a recent fire, but I could see green shoots poking through the ash. There were even bright orange flowers that were blooming out of a burnt and seemingly dead base. At the top we saw the "hole in the mountain", which Lesoba is named after. (Lesoba means "hole in the mountain") Here is a picture of it:



The girls played on this island for hours on Friday morning. I love these pictures!





Saturday morning I worked on an English essay. After lunch we went trail riding, which was fun. Unfortunately we didn't get to gallop, but I still had fun and the view was stunning.

I forget where we saw this sign (and I can't read it to tell you...), but I found it quite amusing. I love how all you can see of the top one is "-stad", which means city. Well, that narrows it down! Only in Africa...



Sunday morning we left Lesoba and drove to Mountain Zebra National Park, which I will write about next time. Enjoy the pictures!

On Sunday night we camped at Twee Rivieren, which is on the edge of the Kalahari desert in the Kgalagadi National Park. After grabbing a spot, we went on a quick game drive before the gates closed at 6:30pm. In the first ten minutes of the game drive we saw a leopard! We also saw a lioness, lots of springbok, gemsbok, and wildebeest. After we got back from our game drive, Jerome and I went swimming with the girls while Andria cooked supper. That night it was very windy, and it even drizzled a little (in the desert!)

On Monday morning we went with Jerome to see the Kalahari Bushmen, as he had a meeting with them. One of the things Barbara, the lady who was showing us around, showed us was the rock caves the Bushmen used to sleep in. Later on that day I met Laspar. You may think he was barely clothed, but I was just glad he was wearing something - later we saw a topless woman and a man with "buttcheeks flashing in the noonday sun", as Emily so delicately put it!

Here are a few pictures from our game drives. This first one is a Black-backed Jackel. We saw quite a few of these at Addo as well.



This is a Crimsonbreasted Shrike. I think these birds are absolutely stunning. I love seeing God's creative hand in his smallest, but incredibly beautiful, creatures.



The next day we drove for to Kimberley, about an eight hour drive. The Kalahari was beautiful; I loved the red sand. I felt especially priviledged to have seen two of the big 5 there!

Over the next couple weeks I plan to write about our two week holiday. We left Saturday, September 18 at about 5:30 am. I had stayed up till past 4 doing school work, since I wasn't sure when I would next get internet access. For this reason I don't remember much of the drive...I roused myself a couple times to take some quick pictures, and then resumed my snoring :)
I got a kick out of this next picture. On the freeway we passed one guy driving his bakkie with two ostriches in a trailer behind. I got this picture when we both stopped at the one gas station for miles. You would never see that in Canada!


One of the highlights of the drive was when the three girls in the backseat (Esther, Bethany and Alicia) formed a band to play along with the music. Alicia was playing piano, and Esther and Bethany used a hairbrush and toothbrush to make a violin and microphone! Here Bethany switched instruments and is now playing the flute.


We reached Augrabies Falls National Park, which is in Northern Cape, at about 4:30 pm. There were vervet monkeys everywhere! We had to close up our trailer and guard the car as we took out food, or they would come and steal it out of our hands.


After setting up the tent, we went to see the waterfall. The land was quite flat, and I couldn't understand where the waterfall could possibly be. We walked a little ways from the campsite, and were suddenly standing on the edge of a huge canyon that came out of nowhere!

I could honestly reply that I loved Augrabies - it was a beautiful start to our holiday! Sunday afternoon we drove to Twee Rivieren, which is on the edge of the Kalahari. We listened to a sermon on Psalm 77 in the car. It was nice understand a whole sermon. I'll write about the Kalahari next time.

Here are a few pictures from before holidays when we hiked Lion's Head:

The best part was climbing the vertical stretches using chains and ladders.

The view of Table Mountain from the top:

I hope you enjoyed the pictures! I'll try to put up a blog about Table Mountain or the Kalahari soon.

I just realized it has been almost a month since I have posted anything. Sorry! I have a lot of catching up to do! I had to write a narrative essay for English about an encounter with a unique or unusual person, and I thought meeting a Kalahari Bushman fit the bill. So I am going to kill two birds with one stone, and let you read my essay instead of making a new post!

It was nine in the morning as we packed up our campsite and left the Kalahari Desert. We had stayed for a couple days, enjoying the diverse flora and fauna and the stunning scenery. The sun was low in the east, but was already shining brightly, accentuating the red Kalahari sand. As we drove, we were surrounded by the song of the weaver birds, occasionally punctuated with the call of a crimson-breasted shrike, as they welcomed the morning sun.

Just a few kilometers out of the National Park, I suddenly spotted a Bushman and his family on the side of the road. He stood out from the other Bushmen I had met in that he wore the traditional clothing; namely, a small leather loincloth. He had an animal skin draped over his head, and was holding a walking-stick. Small creases formed around his deep brown eyes as he welcomed us with a cheerful smile. I was intrigued by his clothing and lifestyle that was so blatantly different from my own. Eager to meet this unusual man, I asked my brother-in-law to stop the car. Together we went over and introduced ourselves. In fluent Afrikaans, he told us that his name was Laspar. I was impressed by his command of the language, as his first language would not be Afrikaans, but San. Since I was still quite new to Afrikaans, I understood only some of what he was telling us. However, my brother-in-law has a fairly good grasp of the language, and kindly translated for me. Though my first impression of him was that of a primitive Bushman, there is something to be said for the fact that he was fluent in more languages than I.

Laspar stood in front of a little grass hut, which was only about four square feet. The door was open, and I could see blankets inside. Curious, my brother-in-law asked where he lived. Laspar responded by telling us that he stayed in his little hut on the side of the road year-round. I was surprised, and felt a strange twinge of shame. I admired Laspar for his humble lifestyle. Mine felt extravagant in comparison.

Though the sun was shining, there was a stiff, cold wind, which was quite unusual for the Kalahari Desert. I could see goose-bumps covering Laspar's chest and arms. He commented on how cold the morning was. His perseverance impressed me. He was obviously enduring some suffering to attract tourists driving by. It had worked. Near to the hut behind Laspar was his wife, wrapped in a warm blanket, cooking over a small fire. Laspar's son, who I guessed to be two years old, was seated comfortably in her lap. He wore nothing but a small piece of leather across his chest. My brother-in-law gave a small candy to the boy, much to his delight.

Laspar wanted to show us all his handcrafted necklaces, eager to make a sale so early in the morning. The materials he used were unlike anything I have ever seen – ostrich egg shells, seeds from Camelthorn Acacia trees, porcupine quills, sinew and horns from Steenbok antelope, and burnt pieces of wood and bone. I admired his skill at making such beautiful, intricate designs on the bone. Laspar explained that he hunts for most of his food with his handmade bow and arrow. In the traditional conservation area, the Bushmen have hunting and fishing rights (similar to the First Nations in some parts of Canada). The small amount of money he receives from selling necklaces goes to buying items he can't hunt for, such as cornmeal and medicine. I had a strong suspicion that some of the "medicine" he uses involves a large bottle of whiskey.

I would guess that, like many of the Bushmen, Laspar was an animist. This was yet another thing that made him so different from me. I must confess that I was a little cynical concerning the Bushmen religion. It seemed far-fetched – something conceived out of the imagination of men. But then again, I suppose most religion seems inconceivable to an outsider.

Before we left, I had a picture taken with the Bushman and his son, a souvenir of this strange experience. As I climbed in the car, I glanced back at Laspar and his family. He stood with his son, watching us leave, as the weaver birds sang overhead. With one final wave we drove off, leaving his world behind. I felt strangely fulfilled for having met him, though we had only talked for a few minutes. I felt a small connection with the Bushman, despite our vastly different cultures and backgrounds. As I returned to my fast-paced, industrial world, I took a small part of him with me in my memory.

Here is the picture of Laspar and I. If you are wondering why Fred is in the picture, it is because Fred has always dreamed of going to Africa. Now he is here, standing right next to a Kalahari Bushman! I hope you like the surprise Fred J