Duck, Duck, Mouse

Monday, August 11, 2008
Last week Monday, August 4, John, Scarlett, and I spent the day at the Community Care Center, a day care center in KwaMhlanga. The Center is run by Emma, a nurse at Nakekela and her husband, Amos (pronounced Ah-mose), who is a minister. The Center is a ministry of his church. John and I both absolutely love Emma, who is one of the sweetest women I’ve ever met. She and Amos have a real heart for kids. They have several of their own children, plus an adopted son, whose mother had died of AIDS at Nakekela. Emma had promised his mother that she would take him in if something ever happened. Mrs. Miskin explained to me that the fact that Emma and Amos stay in KwaMhlanga is also very special. Both are intelligent, educated people who could easily live a middle class life here in Pretoria. Rather than taking the easy way out, however, they stay in KwaMhlanga, caring for the people who live there. At one point, there was no church building for Amos’s congregation, so rather than live in the parsonage that had been built for them, Emma and Amos used it as a church, and were living in a tiny shack in one of the township settlements. When Mrs. Miskin found out about that, she worked to get money donated so that they could move into the parsonage, adding on so that it could still also be used as the church. It is people like Emma and Amos that give hope for the future here in South Africa. They are an incredible couple who are an amazing example of God’s grace and provision.

We arrived at the center a little after eight. The kids arrive between 7:30 and 8:30, some dropped off by family, a few walking, and many being picked up by the Center’s truck because they have no access to transportation. When we walked through the door, the kids were all lined up, waiting quietly for directions. One of the teachers told them to start singing, which they did with much enthusiasm. Since they were not singing in English, John, Scarlett and I decided that perhaps they were putting Zulu curses on us, lol. Kids kept trickling in. Scarlett must have looked especially motherly that day, because two of the little boys came up to her and handed her money, which we figured out later was for candy that the kids could buy.

When all the kids had arrived, they separated into two groups, one of five and six year olds, and one of those younger than that. There were about 40 five and sixes, maybe 10 toddlers, and two or three who could barely walk. Each classroom had two teachers, and the three of us went into the older kids’ room. I was very impressed at how well behaved the kids were. I kept trying to imagine forty five year olds in a classroom at home, and I got a headache just thinking about it. There were one or two loners, who kind of hung back, and a couple who had a bit of trouble staying on task, but by and large, they all followed directions and stayed organized extremely well. Furthermore, as I watched, I noticed that some of the kids took definite leadership roles, and that they helped out Alice, the teacher, out quite a bit. One little girl, Precious, especially stuck out to me. She led the songs, she went after wandering kids, she helped bring food, she was the one that Alice called on whenever she needed help. The whole dynamic was just different than what I would typically expect of a forty child kindergarten classroom.

After a quick breakfast of porridge, Alice had prepared a lesson on vegetables. She jabbered away to the kids, while the three of us sat in the circle, utterly bemused, except for a few words (tomato, lettuce, carrot) here and there. After that was done, I told the story of creation, complete with big pictures. The kids don’t speak English, so Alice translated for us. We mostly understood Alice, and I think she mostly understood us, but there were definitely moments of confusion, so John and I were a bit concerned about what was getting “lost in translation”, so to speak, but hopefully most of it got through. Later on, John told his story, of Zaccheus. His story went smoothly, except for when he lost his train of thought at one point, and informed the kids that, “The Pharisees couldn’t figure out why Jesus was hanging out with Zaccheus.” We all started cracking up, imagining how many ways the literal translation of “hanging out” could be taken. Scarlett’s story of Jesus and the little children also went quite well.

After my story, we went outside to play. It made me sad to see the “playground” the kids had. I couldn’t help picturing recess when I was little, the huge yellow and blue swing-set with countless varieties of swings and slides, at least three sets of monkey bars, a couple merry-go-rounds, not even to mention all the balls and jump ropes and hopscotch grids we had, plus the basketball courts and baseball diamond, and the huge field of green grass to play on. This playground consisted of two swings that were of questionable safety, an old jungle gym with a little slide, a jump rope, several inexplicable bowling pins, and a flat soccer ball. That was it for forty-something kids. The yard was mostly dirt with a few scattered patches of weeds and dead grass.

I suppose kids see things differently, though. They ran around, playing the games children everywhere play. Scarlett and I drew a hopscotch game in the dirt with a stick and tried to teach them how to play. Some of the older kids figured it out pretty well, but the younger ones…well, they got the hop part, but that was about it. Poor Alice wanted them to understand it so badly, it was almost comical watching her help the kids throw their stone and then count, one, two, one, one, one, two, and get frustrated when they skipped entire sections or just happily ran through the whole game. After hopscotch got boring, we showed them how to play duck, duck, goose. This turned out to be the highlight of the day. It took a couple rounds for them to understand who got to run, and when, but they all caught on to that part eventually. What was absolutely hysterical was the ducking part. They understood the duck, but they were a little shaky on when to say goose. For awhile there was a lot of duck, duck, duck, DUUUUUCK, with the DUUUUCK part really signifying goose. Also, Mrs. Miskin reminded us that our English is accented differently than what they are accustomed to hearing, and she turned out to be correct. Once they understood that DUUUUUCK is not equivalent to goose, somehow, goose got translated to mouse in their heads, so it became duck, duck, duck, MOUSE! It was SO funny.

We headed inside for lunch after duck, duck, goose. Lunch for the kids consisted of pap, the thick mashed potatoish stuff that we had eaten at Nakekela, and beans. They ate with their hands, which, needless to say, got pretty messy. When they were finished eating, they all carried their plates to the kitchen, and then found their backpacks, in which each had a washcloth. They brought them to one of the little girls, who washed their faces for them. It was easily one of the cutest things I’ve ever seen. John, Scarlett and I had brought our own lunch, which we hungrily devoured.

After lunch, we all hung out in the classroom. Scarlett told her story, and we taught the kids to play patty cake. That was a big hit, wow. They all were arguing over who got to play with us. They also loved playing with Scarlett’s hair, and I was thankful mine was up that day. I found myself talking to them like they understood English, which must have been pretty comical. It was equally hilarious watching them talk to us, clearly asking us questions, and just nodding in agreement, with absolutely no clue as to what we were agreeing to.

Mrs. Miskin came around 1:30, and I for one, was completely exhausted. When we got home, I had every intention of taking a nap, but alas, the best laid plans, and all that. I went with Gordon to Spar, and got some much needed chocolate and some pineapple Fanta, amazingly good stuff, fyi, for myself. I also located the toy aisle, and bought a ball and some bubbles, and another jump rope for the kids at the center.

Sadly, Scarlett had to go back to school, so on Tuesday, John and I went around with Dori, which John is going to tell you about. On Wednesday, John and I split up. John went to Mukanyo, the seminary where Mr. Miskin teaches, which he will tell you about, and I went back to the center. The kids appeared to be really excited to see me, which made my day. They immediately started trying to play patty cake with me, so apparently that was the game that stuck the most in their minds. There weren’t nearly as many kids on Wednesday as there had been on Monday, because there was a strike going on, something about high food prices, so the families were at home, and kept the kids home, as well. There were still about 20 kids to hang out with, though.
I showed them the stuff I had brought them, and I thought they were going to have heart attacks they were so excited. I blew bubbles for so long that I got light headed and felt faint, at which point I decided it was probably time to put them away. We played soccer, sort of. I say sort of because the kids only wanted to kick the ball about half the time. The other half they were chasing it and picking it up whenever they saw fit, making soccer a bit difficult. We also played a whole bunch more duck duck mouse, before it was time to go inside.

Alice had the kids making paper carrots, so I helped glue shredded cardboard to the carrot shape, and take them outside to dry. The other helper, Mama, the kids called her, had written names on each carrot, so later, when we went back outside to get them, I tried to help by reading the names. The hysterical laughter that greeted my pronunciation of the words told me that I was mostly unsuccessful. We painted them orange once the glue had dried.

I hadn’t prepared a story, but instead planned on teaching them a new game, or maybe a song, depending on how the day went. While we waited for the carrots to dry, I taught them the Itsy Bitsy Spider. I sang it through about 900 times, I’m pretty sure. I wrote it out for Alice, which I think helped her understand what I was singing, because, again, my accent was weird to them. The kids figured out the hand motions quickly, and the first few lines, but I decided that it was going to take a little longer for them to learn all the words. We sat looking at books for awhile, and I discovered that some of the kids knew their colors and numbers, along with a few animals and foods. They also knew their body parts, which inspired me to start teaching them Head and Shoulders Knees and Toes. Mrs. Miskin came for me a little after 3, by which time most of the kids had left, and by which time I was completely exhausted. It made me have a lot of respect for Alice and for kindergarten teachers in general; kids tire you out!

We went to Mukanyo and Mrs. Miskin gave me the grand tour. We peaked at John and some of the students, and I took a few pictures. Mr. Miskin wasn’t done teaching until 5, so we went over to the farm to visit Dori and the Kuivenhovens for awhile. On the way, we spotted two people who Mrs. Miskin recognized, friends of Rose and Randy who were staying at the farm, so we gave them a ride home. We picked up John and Mr. Miskin right on time, and headed home. Since it was pretty late by the time we got home, we ordered pizza for supper, which was SO good. I had no idea I could miss pizza as much as I apparently had.

John and I spent the day at the Care Center again on Thursday, doing much of the same things as we had the previous times. The kids were all back again, so there were more than enough to keep us busy. At lunch time, John and I were in charge of washing faces. It turns out the water they use there is just short of BOILING. I’m pretty sure it took off a layer of skin from my hands. Mama, the teacher, had warned me that it was hot, but the look on my face must have comically displayed my surprise and pain, because she laughed pretty hard at me. By this time, I had definitely fallen in love with the kids. We played more duck, duck, goose, a little bit of catch, practiced the Itsy Bitsy Spider, and officially learned Head and Shoulders. This last turned out to be pretty funny, because the kids, for some reason, turned “knees and toes” to “knees and shows”. They said it right if we made them do it one word at a time, but as soon as we started singing, it got mixed up again. John somehow decided that the louder he bellowed it, the more quickly they would catch on, which made me laugh even harder. Later, we figured that maybe they were trying to say “knees and shoes”, but at the time we were SO confused, it was hilarious.
When we got home, we went with Gordon to pick up Scarlett from school. We stopped at the side of the road and bought sweet presents for our moms. Mrs. Sikma, let me tell you that John had no intention of getting you guys ANYTHING until Mrs. Miskin and I got on his back, so right up until then, even if I’d left extra room in my bag, there would have been nothing to put in it, haha. Back at the Miskin’s house, it had started to occur to the five of us that John and I were going to be leaving soon, and none of us liked that prospect very much. I dragged Gordon on a walk around the block. Fyi, no one assaulted us, and not once did we have to run from angry people with pitch forks or anything. It was so nice that when we got back, I made the other three come with us on another one.

On Friday, John and I finally got the chance to go with Gordon to his classes at university. As soon as we got on campus, I was struck by how similar it was to Grand Valley. Gordon had a difficult time finding parking (sound familiar?), and then we had to rush to class because we were running a bit late. His first class was packed full, so John and I just hung out and soaked up the atmosphere. Just like GV, there were all kind of people to watch, and we fit right in, in keeping with Gordon’s admonitions that we be careful not to embarrass him. His other class of the day was Accounting. We had a couple extra minutes in between, so we took the scenic route to the class. There was a commons area similar to Kirkhoff, and benches, tables, and grassy areas all over the place. The buildings were beautiful, many of them pretty old, so those were nice to see. It occurred to me that it would be SO nice if winter at GV was as nice at home as it is here in Pretoria. No snow drifts, no black ice, no panicked clutching of the arm of the person you’re walking with to keep from falling on your face…it would be awfully nice. Accounting class was in a big lecture hall and conducted by a very enthusiastic professor. While he blabbered away about selling prices and profit margins, I worked on this post. The class itself was very similar to a class at Grand Valley, just a bit bigger.

We had plans to go to the apartheid museum on Friday afternoon. I was really excited to go because of everything I had learned in my Africa class about South Africa right at the end of the year. Gordon and John weren’t quite as enthusiastic, but they were good sports. It was quite an ordeal to get there, let me tell you. First Gordon had to figure out where he was going, then we couldn’t leave the house until we had the map, which he spent a good twenty minutes looking for, until he decided it must have been with his mom in KwaMhlanga, at which point he tried to Mapquest directions, but the Internet was to slow…I thought he was going to punch someone. Once we finally made it on the road, the trip was about an hour long, but it turned into an hour and a half because we missed our exit not once, but about 5 times all told. I was trying hard to keep from laughing, but I don’t think poor Gordon, who hadn’t wanted to go in the first place, was quite as jolly about the whole experience.

Apartheid was the practice of “apartness” that was implemented in South Africa by the Afrikaaners in 1948. It separated people by race, and told them where they could live and work accordingly. It lasted until the early 1990’s, before officially being abolished in 1994, when Nelson Mandela was elected in free elections. Under apartheid, the native people were severely oppressed, and are still suffering the effects from both an economical and social standpoint. The museum itself was extremely interesting. It was a lot of reading, so it took quite some time to go through. In fact, we ran out of time, because we had to leave at four to avoid traffic. They showed movies throughout the museum, including several speeches of both men who condoned apartheid and those who fought it, some of the resistance efforts, interviews of people affected by apartheid, and one of the rioting at Sharpsville.

This last moved me to tears, as I watched young black men and women being beaten by white police officers. The senselessness and unfairness of the cruel violence was extremely upsetting. I have such a hard time understanding the ideas behind apartheid. Who are we to say that we are better than anyone else? God created every single one of us in His image; no one is superior to anyone else. I hate violence; I always have, though I understand that sometimes it is necessary. I hate the fact that, despite years of attempted peaceful protest against apartheid, the people finally had to move to more extreme measures to be heard by the government. The museum was very effective in showing the events that led up to apartheid, as well as the efforts to abolish it. I learned a lot, and I think John and Gordon did, as well.

Even though we left the museum early, we still got stuck in traffic. The trip home ended up taking just as long as the trip to the museum. We took the scenic route home when Gordon took the wrong way when the highway split. I had started feeling the effects of a cold on Thursday, and by the time we headed home, I was feeling it in full force. Allow me to tell you that lotion Kleenex is one of the necessities of life, and in the past couple of days, I’ve determined that the toilet paper here, which is definitely not Quilted Northern or anything remotely soft, is NOT a viable alternative. By the end of last night, it literally brought tears to my eyes to blow my nose with that stuff.

Anyway, we got back to the Miskin’s a little before six, and picked up the girls to go out for dinner to a place called Spur. Our poor waitress was much better at speaking Afrikaans than English, and I think we succeeded in completely confusing her. Scarlett got her words mixed up, making it sound like she was ordering 400g of fries, along with her 400g of ribs, which made Morgy crack up. The waitress laughed also, though I’m not sure she fully understood what was going on. Then, when they brought our food, somehow we ended up with an extra set of ribs. We tried to explain that no, those were NOT ours, but when the bill came, we were charged for them anyway. Gordon eventually got it sorted out, and we left her a good tip to make up for all the confusion.

By the time we got back to the house, I was NOT feeling well. As I’m sure most of you know, I’m NOT a fun person to be around when I’m sick. John had given me the cold, so he was definitely in the dog house. We had rented two movies, which we watched to end the evening. I’m going to miss cramming the five of us, all cuddled up on the couch in the TV room.

On Saturday, we headed out to Gold Reef City, which, incidentally, was right across from the Apartheid Museum. Gold Reef City is an amusement park similar to Michigan Adventure. Nathan came with us. It was a beautiful day. The Miskin fear of heights was again brought front and center. John, Nathan, and I probably should have teased them a bit less, but it was hilarious. I rode next to Gordon on the Golden Loop, and could NOT stop laughing at his bellows of fear when the ride started, “Mooooooo-mmyyyyyyyyyyyyy!!” We waited for an hour and a half for the Tower of Terror, which basically takes you straight up about 6 floors, and then drops you. I was definitely terrified, I HATE that free fall (and I’m freeeeee, free faaaaaaaaallin’…) feel. On the Ferris Wheel, John and Nathan had the three Miskinvich’s completely terrified rocking the basket we were in, and John made Scarlett shriek in terror when he bellowed, “aaaaack, the BOLT!” All in all, the day was a great success, and we all had a ton of fun. It was a perfect way to spend our last weekend.

I had felt fine until around 1, at which point I was pretty sure I was going to die at any minute of acute cold-itis. We got home tired and hungry, only to hear the Drs. Miskin were going out for dinner, and we were on our own for food. Not a single one of us felt up to cooking anything, so I proposed pizza again. We were all feeling quite broke, but in the end, our laziness won out and we took up a collection and ordered pizza. John and I both noticed that the large pizzas here in Africa are maaaaaybe the size of a medium pizza at home. In fact, almost everything, right down to the shampoo bottles, is smaller here. The six of us, with Nathan, finished our two pizzas in record time, and sat down to watch Rat Race. Six of us crammed on the poor couch made it a bit cozy, but we managed. I think I’ll laugh at that movie no matter how many times I see it (“It is a race. I’m winning, I’m winning,” and, “Look, a drifter, let’s kill him.”). We stayed up for awhile longer and watched SNL. You know how when you’re sick, all you want is your mom? Well, I was pretty much crying for my mom, by that point, so I figured it was time to call it a night, and went to bed.

Sunday morning rolled around and poor Scarlett had to wake me up. I almost clobbered her for her efforts, as I had absolutely NO desire to drag my sorry butt out of bed, but, luckily for her, I restrained myself and got up. I walked in the kitchen, only to smell the strong odor of wine. John had opened the fridge too fast and broken a bottle on the floor. By the time he finished cleaning it up, we had less than 10 minutes before we had to leave, but John hit the shower and got ready in record time. Rev. Kuivenhoven, from the farm, was preaching that morning. We had everyone from the farm over for lunch, and we took a bunch of pictures that afternoon.

We all took naps, though when I say we, I actually mean they. Mrs. Miskin had given me Dayquil, and about 20 minutes into my nap, I woke up, and couldn’t fall back asleep for the longest time. Then, just as I was about to drift off, the stupid dogs started barking. This, of course, lurched me back into consciousness, until they stopped, at which point I started to drift off again, and they started barking again. This happened about five times before I decided that sleeping was futile, and started packing, instead. I also turned my phone on and found a couple voicemails, and called my house. Luke answered the phone, and it was your typically chaotic VanDyke Sunday lunch. By the time I finished talking to Linz and my mom, everyone else was finally awake. We sang a few songs, ate our last Sunday night French toast, and just hung out until bedtime.

Today was our last full day here. We had planned to go out to the Child Care Center one last time, but we had to switch to Plan B when we found out that the road to KwaMhlanga was closed for reasons that I never did actually piece together. Instead, we did most of the packing up stuff that we planned to do tomorrow. I didn’t have that much to do, so instead I spent most of the morning working on this amazing post, which I’m sure you’re all very thankful for. We went with Dori to the store to get a few groceries, and I was overjoyed to discover Kleenex. Unfortunately, my glee turned to sadness when I opened the package, only to discover that the Kleenex here is pretty much as unforgiving to the nose as the toilet paper. I nearly burst into tears right there at the end of the checkout lane, before it occurred to me that crying would only make my nose run more, a prospect that I was not willing to chance.

Since we had going to Gold Reef City on Saturday, rather than to the nature reserve that was our other option, Nathan had offered to take us to some lion breeding place today, which was what we did in the afternoon. Nathan came to get John and I around 2:30, and the three of us plus the girls and Handsome, the guy that we met our first Friday here, headed out. The place, whose name I’ve forgotten, though I know it starts with a U and it has a K or two in it, was an hour away. Handsome regaled us with stories about his days out on a lodge similar to the one we were headed two, telling us about lions and such.

We arrived and met our guide, who wasn’t much of a talker. He first showed us two little lion kittens which were 8 weeks old. They were SO cute; it’s easy to see why people would try to make pets out of them. We petted and played with them for a bit, until they got tired of us and kept wandering away. From there we walked toward the enclosures where the bigger lions are kept. For obvious reasons, we couldn’t go pet the big ones. A few of the “teenagers”, lions who were about the size of dogs but a lot stronger, were in another area, where we could go, and one of those jumped on John and tried to eat his arm off. The good news is that he was unsuccessful. The enclosures were big, and the lions all seemed happy. The lions were enormous, and I developed a healthy respect for them. Our guide informed us that they only eat about once a week, but that they eat the equivalent of Scally or Morgy each time. Handsome told us that even though the lions might seem nice, and even trained, you can never completely remove the wild streak from them, and should never trust them. Despite this, they were magnificent, and I really enjoyed seeing them up close.

After the lions, we hopped in an open air benched safari truck thingie. Handsome was our fearless tour guide. He spotted almost every animal that we saw. Our first spotting was of an ostrich. Handsome hopped out of the truck to get a good picture for me, but was hesitant to get too close. He told us about a time when he had gotten chased by a daddy ostrich, and that he wasn’t enthusiastic about repeating the experience. We also saw antelope, springbok, zebras, water buffalo, a big cow-like guy, and something that looked kind of like a llama, the latter two whose names have obviously escaped me. Scarlett spotted an antelope which was quite dead, and had been mostly eaten. We got a few good pictures of the hapless creature that I’ll have to post. I saw several birds, and couldn’t help but think of Scotty and the Bloks, lol. The sun was mostly down by the time we returned to the lodge, and we headed out shortly thereafter.
On the way home, we stopped at McDonalds, and, though this is completely insane, I think I like African fries from Micky D’s better than the ones at home. Don’t tell Ronald. I even got a sweet red balloon…they don’t give those out in Michigan, either! When we got home, Gordon was happy to see us. We took all the pictures I’ve taken this whole trip and transferred them onto Gordon’s computer. He also gave me a bunch of music, and took some of mine. Mrs. Miskin helped us figure out our paper work and all that good stuff, too. We were all pretty tired, and everyone headed to bed early. I’m finishing up this post in my bed, actually. Most of my stuff is packed, and I’ve said goodbye to most of the people I’ve met here. I can’t believe that it’s been a month already; it has flown by. Expect at least one more post when I get home.