Lesotho Lovin'

So, I just got back from Lesotho- Wow! Its' still as amazing, the people still as welcoming and the work just as rewarding! Its the second trip Ive been able to weasel my way onto, and I loved it! Its a 17hr drive from Capetown (so add another 1hr-1hr1/2 onto that from Simon's Town) but worth every leg cramping minute! On that note, whoever the bright spark who invented the Toyota Prado Middle seat was and said at the end 'Well there's a job well done guys! Practical, comfortable and beautiful!' needs a serious slap around the chops and evidently never actually sat in the thing, much less for 17hrs and DEFINITELY not on Lesotho roads! But that aside, it was a good trip up. The Prado's starter seized and had a loose connection but with the men applying liberal amounts of blows from a spanner, it finally submitted and started! Then we were on the road until the Lady Grey Mountain Inn- a fine establishment with warm beds and showers! Then it was off to the boarder post at TelleBridge where we took the opportunity to give out some bibles to the boarder guards- they were chuffed!

So after that it was on to Mt Moorosi and then on to Pulane! We made a very slight mistake and overshot our turnoff by a tiny bit but it afforded us a superb view of the site from above, it was an oasis of green in the brown landscape- and the most amazing fresh apple green you can imagine!

So we turned back around and headed back the way we had come until we found our turnoff, at that point things started looking a bit more familiar! We crossed the river, which was very low, and turned the corner into the driveway of the orphanage to see an amazing sight. The cross which we had put up in July, made from two trees that we chopped down, with no roots, a bolt through them and no water, was sprouting new growth...even on the cross bar....there's life in the cross!

After recovering from that one, we set up camp and settled in to our new home. We chopped some wood for a camp fire (I managed to get two blisters and it was only the first day) and had a fantastic meal courtesy of Errol. Then after a good nights sleep it was time to go to morning devotion up at the Shepard's school and then on to work! My first job was to repair the roof struts in the Lapa, as they had been ripped out sometime in the past 30 years and Errol was concerned that they had been put up there in the first place for a reason and that they might be missed...

So I put back all the diagonal struts that you can see, which involved me swinging around in the rafters for most of the day and earned me the name of sweni (monkey).

After that I had to climb up on the top of the roof to patch a nasty hole on the river side end of the Lapa.

So with some scrap aluminium sheeting, some bitumen tape, and a little ingenuity I performed one of the biggest bodge jobs Ive ever seen- I will be interested to hear if its actually water tight...

And then to my next task of roofing, and building walls for the little kitchen area at the back of the Lapa. I needed to put a window in the back wall and another on the side wall facing the orphanage. I basically made a stud wall on top of the existing concrete wall, extended the roof beams from the main roof out to cover the kitchen area, fitted the window with a cross piece above it and a couple of noggins on either side, and then hammered on the asbestos sheeting. I felt bad. Maggie Thatcher seemed to spend a large portion of my childhood trying to get asbestos removed from all the schools in Britain. There I was building with the stuff...hopefully its not as bad as they say... So when the walls were up, I climbed up and nailed the roof on, a 'skill' I learnt in July, putting the orphanage roof on. We then added the side wall facing the orphanage and put a second window in. Then it all got a lick of green paint and it was good to go! Here's some pictures of what the other folks were doing... The floor reads 'Jesuke Morena' (Jesus is King) and was a fantastic piece of work by Sean. BUT the construction work, although fun, is only a part of the reason we were up in Pulane. The main reason was to meet, talk to, build relationships with and evangelise to the local people. I wasn't involved with this part of the trip very much as I was busy building, but I did manage to make it to Shepard's School a couple of times in the evening which was cool. We watched ice age 2 on a projector with them- the first time many if not all of them had seen a film. And then we came back on the Thursday to give out bags of toiletries, sweets etc and had a really nice time giving them cooldrink and apples! We also gave them a sweater, T-shirt and jeans each (some of them only have a blanket and maybe a T-shirt and if they're lucky a pair of trousers as well.

After we had finished, the guys (led by Bongani) did a dance for us to say thankyou, its a standard Lesotho thankyou, and one of the best ways I can think of of showing your gratitude. Here are s few pictures of the finished site- the first two are a before and after of the Orphanage.The obligitory team photo- Vincent wasn't dead...it was just how he likes to pose...

And here's a couple of pictures of the local guys we were working with-

Samuel my very good friend

Thomas- a very funny man, very easy to get on with

Bernard- Blosoming in his relationship with Jesus-amazing and obvious growth from last year!

Joesph- always there at the football, and Ezekiel- a budding translator

Bongani- A TOTAL FRUIT LOOP! Love him to bits!

And of course Vincent! A trainee carpenter, a living legend- his favourite sport- FOOD!

Lights Out!

So once again, we woke up without power this morning! The auto re-closer (whatever that may be...imagine a giant trip switch) tripped again in the middle of the night- according to Vyan at about 4.30am- I was in no state to comment at that time! But luckily the lovely people at Escom managed to pop it back on again by 7.30am, so its not the end of the world. Except, that I didn't get any toast this morning...or coffee! So I started the day a little grumpy but its fine, I can have a cup of coffee in 15 minutes, finishing packing, and then I'm of to Durbanville, staying at a friend's house and then its off to Lesotho again tomorrow! Plenty of time to sleep in the car tomorrow! So no blogging for a week or so, but rest assured that I will be back on Monday with LOTS of pictures!

Storing up more trouble...

Yeah! we get to clean out another storeroom today! Hehehe! I don't know why, and I'm sure my parents would scoff at this after 20 odd years of telling me to tidy my room, but I derive great pleasure from taking a cluttered space (normally not my own) and making it WORK. The programming store was very satisfying and I had high hopes for the Adventure Centre Store too... So we cleared out all the junk- as per usual, piled it all up- as per usual and stood and looked at it in a slightly horrified way for a few minutes...and then decided it was lunch time....

After procrastinating over some toast and peanut butter (if you're going to procrastinate, at least do it on a full stomach!) we decided that it would only be right to procrastinate still further by going to see a pod of Southern Right Whales that were in the bay near to Simon's Town...so we asked the boss and were granted permission on the condition that the store was tidy by the end of the day...

Alas- my photography skills are such that, out of about 8 whales, in 20 minutes...this is the best picture I got...BUT I finally got to see a whale breech for the first time in my life- and an awesome sight it was too! I do feel truly blessed to live here- not so many whales breaching in Bingley...

So back to work, there was an entire store room of stuff to put back in some semblance of order before the rains came...so a quick sweep, a couple of minutes of resuscitation, a couple of minutes with an oxygen mask, and we were ready to start putting it all back in...that is when the dust had settled enough to see again...

We stacked the VAST quantities of very nice wood in a sensible way, stacked the 5 doors we found, the window frames, the meters of piping, the truckloads of fertilizers, gallons of paint and the spare mattresses. We tidied, sorted and threw away well past 3.30pm knock off time, and then stood back to admire the fruits of our labours. Hey its dirty work, and someones got to do it! But I love every minute of it and it CERTAINLY beats sitting in an office five days a week typing at a computer...for me at least!

Monkey See Monkey Do...

A day is never going to go well when it starts by hearing Baboons ripping each other a new one mere hundreds of metres from your back door. Especially when you have 120 men women and children due to descend on your campsite in an hour. Living on the mountain here at Rocklands is a privilege, I wont dispute that, but some of our neighbours (the hairy variety) leave something to be desired! We could see them moving down the mountain all morning, until a camper politely said 'Erm...did you know there's a baboon in the dining room?' 'Oh, OK thank you, we'll deal with that now now.' *camper leaves* 'Aarrghhh! Paddy Come, now!'
So we chased him out of the dining room (sugar in hand...the baboons hand...not ours...sugar doesn't make a particularly good weapon against the apes) and chased him down off the games field. Silence. 'He's down there somewhere...' Silence....*pop* a sugar lid is removed, followed by a hail of marbles from the catapult into the nearest likely looking bush. Vyan, feeling brave, decides to go and confront Stanley (the baboon) who is sat on the drive eating the sugar that he has now spilled in the drive during a duck and cover move to avoid flying marbles. He however, is not backing down this time, and turns to walk towards Vyan...who doesn't want to back down...a scuffle ensues and Vyan gets pushed in the knees a couple of times before I lept down the bank (albeit a little late) and scared the life out of a car full of campers by leaping out of the bushes and running full pelt across the driveway in front of them catapult in hand on the heals of a ticked off baboon.
I then chased them all the way up the hill and caused a minor scuffle between the Alpha Male and a challenging male. So I could just stand and watch them chase each other around screaming at each other. Unfortunately I think there may have been ticks.....
Still, keeps things entertaining here! Siya then had to chase the whole troop away at lunch time - I swear they have watches...

Sunshine On A Rainy Day...

So once again the weather here has decided to bless us by peeing on us all day- so much so, that as regularly happens, the electricity tripped off. 11am-6pm without power. Its not quite as fun as it used to be when I was a kid- get the candles out, play monopoly, have the obligitory fight after the game had been going too long...those were the days! Luckily, before the power went out I managed to make a stack of pancakes for one and all! Hurah for pancakes, Hurah for days off!

Like a kid in Candy Store...

A bit retrospective but I thought I'd post a couple of pictures of the Tuck Shop transformation that happened earlier in the year! It's quite a thing when your bosses not only go away for a week and trust you not to burn the place down but also let you loose on redecorating something especially in pink and green...

So this is what the Tuckshop used to look like- a bit tired and erm...well uninspired shall we say?

To put it another way- it needed some lovin! So we cleared it out, fridges, shelves (which weigh a ton by the way!) and everything else, and set to work giving it a new lease of life! Darla came up with a funky 50's theme, and so we cracked open a tin of pastel pink and a tin of mint green and set to work on the walls! She came up with a cool idea of different sized circles in patterns on the walls- although dubious at first, I agree it looks awesome!

After that, I got with making some new shelves out of super wood (MDF) which went together quite nicely. A lick of yellow paint and a coat of varnish and they were good to go!

The same had to happen on the existing shelving to give it a bit razzmatazz, and we were getting there! The desk got a 'Cash Rap' an MDF front (painted yellow of course) and a custom made bespoke chequer board top. I was insist ant that chequer boards had to be used somewhere- if only we could afford to redo the floor....

When that was done, there was but a few finishing touches to complete before we were ready for customers. Not least our huge and possibly illegal Coca Cola poster rip off which adorns half of one wall...hopefully its altered enough to get around most copyright infringement laws...

And that was us pretty much done- from tired old camp shop into a rockin 1950's Candy Store in a mere week! I think its probably the most unique shop on a campsite I've ever seen!

We did get the seal of approval from the kitchen ladies though...so all is well...