Well, this week's going to be a short blog entry - I left it too late this week, so I've forgotten half of the stuff I've done since my last post!
This week has had a few interesting highlights:
IRONMAN - My dad (some of you may have met him, he is crazy) competed in the Half Iron Man this past weekend in East London. It's his third one, and it has kind of been a tradition for us to go and support him. To off I trekked to East London last weekend, just me and my Corsa Utility (we made good time might I add). It was great to see my family, my dad had a good race, and my mom and I got to spend some good time together! It was nice to see my little brother Dean too... although he is not so little anymore, it seems that every time I see him he is so much taller, I think my dad's giving him Steroids under the table.
I OFFICIALLY GOT RURALIZED - So those of you who have been following my facebook status updates will know this. On Wednesday morning we woke up to a very-quickly-diminishing water supply. By the time we got to work that morning, the hospital and all our accomodation had no water... How does a hospital cope without running water? Fairly well actually, they did it for a total of 5 weeks last year! I used plenty of De-germ, and avoided the Hepatitis and Pneumonia patients :) That afternoon we also had a power cut. So there I was in the middle of the Transkei, no running water, no power. It was a rural experience all right! I am happy to report though that we now have running water (and it's not too muddy at the moment either) and a constant electrical current... life's good!
THE SOCIAL SIDE OF THINGS - It's been great to spend time with some of the staff here! On Monday night just after I got back from East London (yip, I have already taken a day off work, don't judge me) we had our usual Ultimate Frisbee game. We had 3 teams of 4-5 people each, so we played a round robin (cough-andwewon-cough), oh how I do love that sport! I then rushed off to watch Greys Anatomy at some friends - Shannon and Lisa, the OTs. Then on Wednesday night we played more Ultimate Frisbee, and we also had a Bible Talk (or Cell group), it was great. There is a really great group of Christian staff here, who want to make a difference to the community both spiritually and physically. It was so encouraging to be around like-minded people! It helped me re-shift my focus a bit :) Last night about 12 of us went off to Coffee Bay to the infamous Pizza restuarant there... It was really good pizza and really fun! There are 2 volunteer girls here from England, who are doing community projects around Zithulele for the year, so they were there. A group of 4 UCT medical students have also been here for 2 weeks, they are leaving tomorrow so it was kind of like their goodbye dinner. Then the other 6 of us were the "local" staff - doctors, pharmacist, community project OT, Jabulani (NPO) staff, and me - token Physio hehe. And then today, I went to Karen and Roger and chatted for a bit, then to Lisa. It's really nice, everyone lives here on the property so as you walk past peoples houses you inevitably stop and chat :)
So, tomorrow I'm off to Mthatha again for a lunch with all the Comm Service Physios around this area (I'm hoping it's free hehe - who knows when I'm going to get paid, so these things are important) , and then it's church on Sunday - a Sister dropped by yesterday to say hi at work which was so sweet and encouraging - she was just in the neighbourhood!
I will leave you with a few more Xhosa phrases i have learnt this week:
Linda apha - Wait here
Ndicela Tata - Please Father (refer to older man)
Ndiyabona gomso - I will see you tomorrow
Bhuti, uyafunda iball? - Brother, do you want the ball? (random hehe)
Yes, this is still one of the most beautiful places in the world, it's so still in the evenings... you can hear people talking and children playing, the frogs croaking and crickets (ummm, "cricketing"), and watch the sky being painted orange over rolling hills, sigh.
This was my extra water source when we had none in the pipeline, phew, what a precious commodity!
Haha, Sarah-Jane, this picture is especially for you... there are some pretty huge flying things here :)
"Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up."
Galatians 6:9
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