South Africa Valentines

So last week was the week of Valentines Day and we were pretty excited to see how South Africa deals with these kinds of hallmark holidays especially since I am teaching in a high school. I have learned that South Africa definitely does not have as many holidays as America and they especially do not celebrate them like we do. Holidays in South Africa have made me realize how holidays in America are a little over-celebrated! In America weeks before the holiday there are already advertisements, products on shelves, and decorations set up whereas in South Africa holidays are not "money makers." It's more like "Happy Valentines Day now lets get on with the day" rather than in America kids make decorated boxes for all of their valentines and time is given for kids to hand them out. I didn't even see any Valentines being passed around or candy anywhere during school.

NMU Rugby game

 Monday one of the student teachers (Devon) at Liz and Nicole's school invited them to the first NMU (Nelson Mandela University) Rugby game of the season. We live just less than a mile from NMU campus and decided it would be fun to go see a collegiate rugby game. Devon (who lives two doors down from us) picked us up and took us to the game with his roommate Niel and another friend. It was really cool to see how the college students get so excited about Rubgy just like we would football. People were "tailgating" and running around just like a UK football game. The crowd was a lot of fun and it was really cool to hang out and meet other college students at a social event like this.

Devon (right) student teaches with Nicole & Liz and Niel (left)

Emily and I chowing down

Wednesday night Niel invited all of us girls over to cook for us! We live a flat away from him and Devon so we definitely don't pass on offers like this! Especially when all we normally eat is grilled cheese. Niel cooked us an amazing pork belly meal with squash and cheesy bread. I brought some cucumber/veggie salad and we all stuffed our faces with deliciously juicy pork and veggies!

Liz, Devon, and Nicole

"Team America"

Thursday was Valentines Day and it was just like any other day at school. One of the teachers made brownies and brought them in for all the teachers. Another teacher owns a cucumber farm and brought boxes and boxes of cucumbers and gherkins (pickles)! Since I eat 1-2 cucumbers a day I was happy to grab a bag! I am going to pickle some of the gherkins. Today I taught my first practical in front of the students. Since I have been teaching photosynthesis I did an experiment where you boil down a leaf, break the cell wall, and drop some iodine on it. If the leaf has been exposed to sunlight, CO2, and H2O then it should have produced starch and the iodine should turn the leaf black! It was cool because I had never done this starch test before and it was my first time teaching a lab. The kids loved it and I loved the discussions the students started!


Emily got a package in the mail so we had to take a taxi to the post office and go pick it up. This was a terrible experience. The lady at the post office would not give Emily her second package because she said it hadn't gone through customs yet... which is impossible considering in order for the package to get to the post office it would have gone through customs. After arguing for a good 20 minutes with the worker we ended up just leaving with one of the two packages and would come back the next day for it.

Niel invited us all out for a relaxing dinner for Valentines day but Nicole wasn't feeling good, Liz had just ate, and Katharine needed to plan so Emily and I took him up on his offer and we went out for dinner. Niel took us to this beach shack down the road  from us called The Island for dinner and it was perfect! The restaurant played Jack Johnson all night and the food was so cheap! We got a full slab of ribs, two salads, 6 queen prawns (jumbo shrimp), fried calamari, two huge steaks, tons of chips (fries), and 9 drinks between the three of us and the bill was R750 which converts to $75!! So cheap!!

Friday we walked into the staffroom and started telling our friend Alizma (a student teacher at Pearson from NMU) about our post office ordeal and she offered to take us back to the post office after school. She said that sometimes if the post office knows a package came from the US and could have valuable things in it they will sometimes just take it or try to grab things out of the sides of the box. Alizma walked straight up to the post office worker and we got the package within 5 minutes! We have already been here for month so I needed to pay rent again so Alizma stopped at our leasing office so I could pay rent. I had a beautiful bouquet of roses behind the desk waiting for me! Joey had sent me roses for Valentines Day and my leasing office (where our mail goes) hadn't brought them to me yet!









Friday night was pretty relaxing, there was a Valentines Dance going on at Pearson so Emily, Katharine, and I walked up to Pearson at 8pm to go check it out. The students all arrive at 6:30 and are locked in until 11pm. No students can enter or leave until 11pm. There were only about 5 adults present to the 500 students at the dance. "The hole" (The auditorium) was decorated beautifully and students were dressed as if they were going to a night club. It was really cool to see our students out of their Pearson attire and see how they interact outside of school.

The hole decorated for the dance!

Emily and I have been helping coach the Sycronized Swimming team every Thursday morning from 6:10-7am and they had a meet Saturday morning at 9am. We helped out at the meet by entering scores, calling out names, and organizing the line-ups. We were done and out at the beach at noon! The sun here is insane! My dark skin gets pink even after just two hours even with sunscreen on so we didn't stay out too late!

Team America before going out to dinner Saturday night!

Emily, Liz, Nicole, & I being goofy

Sunday morning Niel took us to lunch at a place called The Bridge Street Brewery. The food, view, and vibe was perfect for a relaxing fun Sunday. There were people playing the guitar and saxophone very calmly and mellow. The food here was amazing as well! I came here thinking I would loose weight because I wouldn't eat that much but the food here is always so delicious and fresh and not to mention Cheap thanks to the exchange rate!

Nicole's chips (french fries) were bigger than her hand

Very relaxing Sunday

Perfect Sunday weather

This week I am getting observed by my University Supervisor from NMU and I'm not too worried about it at all. I feel very confident in the classroom especially with the students at Pearson. They're so respectful and interested in what I have to say it truly makes teaching a lot more fun and easier which is good because I have a hectic schedule.

A week of MANY firsts!

Sorry I haven't updated lately! We have been so busy with school, after-school stuff, and crossing things off of our "South Africa bucket list".

Two weeks ago started our days of many firsts! I finalized my schedule at Pearson, got copies of textbooks for the classes I will be teaching. Their textbooks here are very interactive; including pictures, diagrams, activities, and assessments. The week before I had been observing four different Science teachers classes to get a feel of how each different teacher teach and whether they follow along with the text or not. I was happy to see that almost all the teachers follow the path of the textbook as well as leave time for discussion and relating the content they are learning to the student's lives. Right now the grade 8's are learning about the ecosystem, photosynthesis, food chains, etc. and the grade 9's are learning balancing chemical equations and leading into acids and bases.

Sunset outside our window one evening

Some classes I will stick with; teaching them every time we meet (which I usually meet each class of students 3x a week) and some classes I do not teach them every time I see them. I am working under two female science teachers and two male science teachers. I chose Mr. Jansen (pronounced Yansen) to be my "official" Cooperating Teacher, which means he will do my official evaluations that will be sent back to NKU. I made copies of the evaluation forms so that the other three teachers can evaluate my lessons as well so I will have more feedback of my teaching from four different teachers.

Planning isn't so bad when this is my view :)

Out of Mr. Jansen's classes I chose to teach the grade 8E2's. The students are grouped by grade level and language. Some groups would be 8A2 (A standing for Afrikaans speaking). I came to school ready to teach my lesson 4th block and ended up teaching it three times to three different classes. The other science teachers heard I was beginning to teach and asked me on the spot if I could also teach their classes as well! I was anxious and a little nervous but I went for it and my lessons went great! The students here love us American teachers and they love our "accents". They are extremely curious about America so when I taught my first lesson I introduced myself and explained where I lived in the states but also made sure they understood that when I am teaching they must not ask me irrelevant or personal questions. The students here are so curious and have so many questions we can actually bribe them by saying "If everyone is quiet and productive I'll let you ask me questions about America the last two minutes of class". I haven't used that one yet but it will come in handy! The students are so eager to learn and have SO many questions and when I taught my first lesson of the day it threw off my lesson because I got distracted by wanting to answer all of their questions. I feel like sometimes I have to pull teeth to get my students in America to ask the questions these students were asking. The next day when I taught I was MUCH better at holding off answering questions until the end and was able to stay focused on my lesson.

My Xhosa notes!

Murray from The Freewalkers invited us over Thursday for Xhosa lessons and our very first Braai. When I first found out I was coming to teach in South Africa a couple friends teased me saying my students would speak in "clicks" over here, wear animal hides as clothes, and all those other first world country thoughts that comes to some peoples mind when they think of South Africa. Come to find out there IS a "click" language and some of my students do speak it. It is called Xhosa (pronounced K-osa). We told Murray when we first met him that we would like to learn some of the clicks so he arranged lessons for us from Murray and Jordy's good friend Thando. Murray and Jordy's house is amazing! It looks like you walked into a farmhouse/rustic/African Pinterest board! Murray gave us girls little notebooks to write new words in and all of us girls sat around while Thando began teaching us the three basic "clicks". It's really hard to describe the language so I made sure I included this video that Murray made of our lessons:


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We learned A LOT about Xhosa culture, history, and traditions from Thando. He taught us all about how children are named and every name has a meaning behind it. He talked about his family and how when a boy decides he is ready to become a man they must go live in the bush (woods in the middle of nowhere) for a month by themselves and during this time they are circumcised and must not be visited by a female at all during this time. At the end of the month there is a ceremony where the boy becomes a man and the women paint the man red which must stay on them for six months, this is so when they go home they are respected and known as a man. Anyone younger than them must refer to them as "Boetie," which means brother in Xhosa.

Nicole, Emily, and Thando sitting around the fire.

After an hour and a half of Xhosa lessons we all sat around the fire and Murray began to braai all of the delicious meats he had prepared for us to eat! Huge steaks, chicken breasts, and sausages as well as garlic breads and vegetable salad. Since Jordy is from the states and understands some of the girls "need" of ranch on everything Jordy made us girls some ranch dressing from a Hidden Valley packet her mom sent her. We enjoyed our first Braai, good conversation, and amazing company! We were all slipping into food comas and we all had to teach the next day so we packed up in "Big Red" (the Freewalker van) and Murray took us home.

 Another first I had this week was seeing a water polo match. Pearson High School was hosting a water polo tournament  Friday and Saturday and the first game started 10minutes before school let out.

The students all gathered around the Olympic size water polo pool on Pearson campus

I am NEVER going to a zoo again! Safari Saturday!

Once again an amazing week and weekend thanks to the Freewalkers!!  This week I finalized my schedule! I am working under 7 different teachers; six different science teachers and one Life Orientation teacher. I have a total of 13 different classes of students; some classes are grade 8’s, some grade 9’s, and some grade 10’s. My schedule is INSANE! I see each class a total of three times a week. Their schedule consists of six classes a day split by two twenty minute tea breaks and their weeks run in 10 day cycles. I’ve taught a couple classes already and taught a lesson in one of the grade 8 science classes about the scientific process and the kids got to write and do their own experiments! We finished Friday and now I have my first round of papers to mark (grade). The students here are so amazing and respectful. When I teach a lesson I have to remind them that they need to wait till the end of my lesson to ask me questions about America! They’re so interested and curious about everything in America its sweet, just cannot interrupt class. J Friday we went to dinner at an Italian restaurant on the pier then headed upstairs to Barneys to listen to the live band!

Saturday Jordy from the Freewalkers picked us up at 5:50 am, we picked up the Brit girls down the road, and headed to Addo National Park. Addo National Park is about 20,000 acres and since it is a National Park only local animals can be on it; lions, elephants, zebra, warthogs, ostrich, buffalo, kudu, honey badgers, leopards, etc.

 Jordy was the best tour guide we could have ever had through Addo because when she came here to complete her masters she lived on Addo for three years studying elephant behavior and breeding. There are over 500 elephants on the park and she had to be able to identify each and every one by their names. She followed certain families of elephants and collected urine and stool samples to analyze their hormone levels.

  Jordy's list of elephant names and how she identifies them!

 

One of the bulls just walking along the road

An elephant letting the zebras get some water but not for long

She knew the park like the back of her hand and took us straight to one of the watering holes where there was about 50 elephants playing, drinking, and covering themselves with mud. One of the elephants there was the “bull” which means he was the biggest and baddest elephant in the park. He definitely was the BIGGEST standing tall above all the other fully grown elephants with the largest and longest tusks I have ever seen in my life!














Jordy educated us on all kinds of elephant behaviors and how they were communicating and even recognized the elephant family. She was amazing to have with us because she knew each elephant’s story and commentated all the elephant’s behaviors. As you can see we took lots of pictures and got extremely close to the elephants, I took a video of them surrounding our vehicle which is uploading and I will post when it is done! Keep in mind that we were NOT at a zoo and these were wild elephants in their natural habitat.

This is a video of all of us being surrounded by wild elephants in Addo. Please excuse Shannon zooming in while the elephants was going to the bathroom.

All our elephants lining up to greet us at Kwantu

 After Addo we headed to Kwantu private game reserve and rode elephants for a little bit. I couldn’t imagine riding an elephant for longer than a half hour because your legs are so spread apart and it’s not the most comfortable thing. Also after learning SO much about elephants from Jordy I gained even more respect for these majestic animals that riding them wasn’t the coolest thing anymore. After we rode the elephants we got to feed and take pictures with them! They were so playful, taking treats straight out of our hands. We got to feed the elephants by putting a handful of treats into their trunks or straight into their mouths!

feeding the ellie I rode straight into her mouth!

Kissing the elephant I rode

Emily, Liz, an I on the safari jeep

After Kwantu we went to Schotia (pronounced Sko-sha). Murray (founder of Freewalkers) grew up with the owner of Schotia’s son so when Jordy dropped us off we were welcomed and grabbed coffee and snacks before our safari started. It was 230pm at this time and our day was only half way over! Jordy left and it felt so weird to not have her or Murray their guiding us but we met our Safari guide Scott and hopped into his jeep to begin our Safari! The jeep was wide open, no windows, and some seats didn’t even have side doors or anything holding them in and let me tell you this was a VERY bumpy ride! The first part of the tour we saw an elephant, and lots of ostrich, impala, kudu, waterbuck, wildebeest, springbuck, eland, and red hartebeest. We each got to take turns riding in the trekker seat while Scott drove. The trekker seat was a seat with handles on the very front of the car where you held on for dear life and hoped we didn’t get too close to the big five animals.

Way too close for comfort to the rhinos!

Scott spotted a giraffe and let us get out of the jeep and walk over towards it where we were literally on the other side of a tree from a wild giraffe! We felt fine and safe until we looked down the hill and realized the only two rhino in the park were right behind us. We slowly (cannot make sudden movements near wild animals) walked back onto the jeep and drove up to the rhino. Rhinos are nearly going extinct because the Japanese want for the rhino horns. They believe they’re medicinal but really a rhino horn contains the same things as fingernails and hair, but since it’s seen as medicinal thousands of these animals are being killed for their horns and rhinos cannot reproduce fast enough to save their species. We got a little too close for comfort to these rhinos in the park! Rhinos are herbivores so they only eat grass but if they feel threatened they will charge. We were within an arms length of these rhinos and don’t let our smiley faces fool you, we were scared for our lives! I was holding onto Emily at one point because they were SO close!

Riding on the trekker seat on the front of the jeep

Don't let our smiles fool you we were scared out of our minds!!

After our rhino encounter we stopped at the old farmhouse on the reserve and had a tea and toilet break. We got back into the jeep and headed back out looking for lions since it was sunset and the lions were waking up and coming out. There were about 6 jeeps total on the safari and between the six jeeps covering over 40,000 acres none of us found the lions, just more giraffe and lots of “deer”. On our way to the “restaurant” on the reserve we stopped at a waterhole to see the hippos and alligators.

Once again these creatures are so amazing and breath-taking to see in their natural habitat. The place we ate was a huge circular hut that is surrounded by a fence to keep us safe which we needed because during dinner we heard the female lion roar and looked out the window with a spotlight and there was an entire family of lions sitting under a tree right outside the place we were eating! I wasn’t feeling too great at dinner and I think I had motion sickness from being in super bumpy cars all day. I tried to get down some mashed potatoes and couldn’t. I ended up getting sick and took an Imodium and felt a lot better just in time for our night ride! It was pitch-black out because there were obviously no streets, roads, or lights other than what was coming from our spot lights on our jeep.


 
We were able to find the lions right away this time thanks to the female roar and them being right outside where we were eating. Lions eye structure is different from other mammals including humans so they are able to see better at night and the spot lights do not bother them. When our jeep was next to the lions we had to be completely still and silent. At one point the lion pack crossed our jeeps path and the lions were surrounding our jeep and within two feet of my door. I was honestly too scared to even take a picture with flashes so it was hard getting good pictures when the spot lights hit them. We were out following the lions for a good 45 minutes and it was finally time to head back to the main gate and head home. Jordy had set up for our safari driver Scott to drive us all home since he lives in port Elizabeth too. The drive home was 45minutes long and all of us girls talked and played name games the whole way home. We were home by 1130pm and were in bed by midnight.

 We were so happy to be able to sleep in today (Sunday) for the first time since we have been here! We slept in till 930am and it was a cloudy rainy day so we watched some movies on our movie channel and sat around planning lessons, marking papers, eating fizzers (candy), and relaxing for the first time since we have been here. Tomorrow is another athletic day for Pearson. It is held at Nelson Mandela University again and we were recruited to work the events so hopefully I get to become a track judge with Shannon again and sit under a tent all day and avoid the sun!