We're in the Mountains!

Hello all! We've finally gotten access to internet! One of the people that run the bed and breakfast that we are staying at also has an office with 7 computers so we're able to use them for a short time!

So, we arrived in Kokstad on Wednesday. I'm very impressed with the place that we are staying in. The meals are incredible :-). I'm pretty sure I've gained about 10 pounds since being in S.A. even with the running! Anyway, amazing meals...soup every night to begin and then something else delicious to follow. It is very cold here though! We're in the Drakensberg Mountains and it's winter here. Thankfully, we have heated blankets on our beds.

On Thursday, we went to a rural primary school. I am amazed at how few resources schools are provided with. They hardly had any books. There was a funeral in town that day and many of the teachers went to that. There aren't any substitutes though...so most of the students were left on their own. There were hardly any students actually in classes. Many of them were just running around outside and they were just being given busy work because they didn't have a teacher. The kids were awesome though. Very cute. We had two little boys that just sat in a seat in our van the entire time. They were young and didn't know English, but they loved just sitting there. All of the kids were asking about Beyonce and Chris Brown :-) We just had to keep reminding them that America is very big and none of us know any celebrities!

After that we went to the secondary school in the same town. They also had very few resources and you could tell that they weren't as trained in English as some of the schools in Durban. I did, however, get some very good questions from the grade 12 students. They asked about inflation in America and other different things that I cannot imagine a 12th grade class in the States talking about! I love to see kids asking so many questions. I got contact information from the principal here in case I want to make this part of my program in 2010 that I have to come up with all by myself because they aren't running any official programs here in S.A. that year!

Then yesterday, we went back to the primary school to paint one of their buildings. It was hard work but the community loved us! It took until 1pm to paint the whole thing but I talked to a lot of the kids there too. One boy was telling me that he would really love to come to America to do music. He was so sweet and hopefully he will get to fulfill his dream, although I have been trying to convince all of the kids here to stay in S.A. and become teachers!

Today, we did some more painting at a quintile 1 primary school. A teacher there said that about 80% of the students are orphans. This is just unbelievable and very sad. I wish that there was more I could do. They seemed very happy with our painting job but I felt like I should be doing more. We gave all of the kids there (there were only 5 because it's Saturday and there wasn't school) sandwiches and apples that we had from lunch.

Anyway, that's all I have for now. Next we're off to Mthata for homestays which should be very interesting. Take care!