January 9, 2012

The beautiful, peaceful and sunny Arandis greeted me on Saturday afternoon after an amazing journey east to Europe and south spanning the entire Continent of Africa to the other side of the Atlantic Ocean.  I had the unique surprise of coming in to the last moments of the final gathering at the town hall of all the Children of Promise Children, who when they saw me, greeted me hugs and kisses till I was up against the wall, slightly taking my breath away – it was completely satisfying, bringing tremendous joy! It’s always my first desire when I enter Namibia, to meet the children, it was a surprise because I didn’t think I would see them until school starts on the 17th. The families were at the tail-end of a week-long camp with a team from AIM – Africa Inland Mission, composed of volunteers from Germany, USA and Canada. These amazing young people, came on their holiday from wherever they were serving to work together for this one week in Arandis. Several of them will be returning to different cities in Namibia and other countries in Africa for the rest of their term. They came together to unite parents and children in different activities throughout the week.

 

There is nowhere else I would rather be. I am anxious to get to my class tomorrow and the rest of this week and get organized,  set up my fifth grade homeroom where we’ll do Religion each morning; prepare for my 4^th-6^th grade English classes to include reading, writing and language competency. There are slots in the day for some additional required classes that they have not found teachers for so, we’ll fill in the gaps. There will be an art/music component to the week – we need to arrange that this week too. I hope to get a guitar for music at some point, but for now we have various rhythm instruments and if you have any ideas, let me know. Art and creativity is not typically my strong point, but thankfully Naomi sent me with some cool ideas for projects and we will manage. Let’s see what they come up with! Also, it covers a broader scope of drama/music and other things. I have the “OK” from Nan to follow through with the writing buddies plan to encourage the children to keep up with typing skills. I think we are setting up a computer in my classroom that the kids can take turns on each day learning. We may even have a class on basic computer literacy at some point during the year.

 

Just a quick update. Let me know what other things you want to hear about. I saw my class today, it’s next to the library, some administrative offices and the science lab. We are still looking for a Science Teacher for a few months as well!! Not that I am thinking of this already, but the first school break is actually for five weeks in April. Wow!