a few large game animals

We took the students to Kragga Kamma Game Park a little way outside of P.E. and got close up and personal look at some wild animals of Africa. Since it was such a nice experience we took Jessica and Todd there even though they had seen these animals in Kruger but these views were much closer.

Springbok - floppy eared

The animals shown above is a springbok which is the national animal for South Africa. They are quite prolific so they have a nice population at the park. The little fellow in the middle is one the guides have gotten to know because it has a floppy ear. None of the rest have one so it serves as nice marker.

Giraffe - Mrs. things are looking up!

The park has a pair of giraffes with two young, one male and one female. In this case the mother gave birth to just one at a time. The animal pictured above is the female (mother), which can be identified because they have a hairy fringe around the horns on their heads. It is hard to see in this picture but I know that this is the mother because the father had a much darker color coat. They are a very funny animal but graceful when they walk or run.

I'm a gnu how are you?

These are familiar animals to anyone who has watched wildlife films of large migrations of animals in Africa. The vast migration of wildebeest is about to be a thing of the past. Hunting and more importantly the loss of habitat has caused most of the herds to shrink. They have a small herd here in the park and they seem to be doing well considering there were several young around in the herd. Interesting looking beasts but this was as close as we could get to them.

male ostrich

There are a number of ostriches in the park, which you will see as you drive around. They have built a little shelter to protect the female when they are on the nest. The females are greyer so they blend into the ground consequently they sit on the eggs during the day when they cannot be seen easily. The male does the night shift on the nest when they would not be noticed because of their black feathers. When things are going to get amorous the males legs turn red. I don't remember what triggers this or if it is seasonal. I will have to check and report back. I will keep it G-rated. There are some ostrich farms around but the emphasis is more on the meat than on the feathers which is what started the farming in the first place. Like all things there is more to the story than I can relate right now.

White rhinos

Both the rhinos above are white rhino (They are a male and a female.). I suppose you think that just because they look gray that they should be more like black rhinos or may be a cross but no it is not the case. White rhinos and have a square lips to help them graze on grass as they mover their heads from side to side. The black has a pointed lips and lives in brush since they are browsers so must be more weary because they can't longer distances. There can always be a predator sneaking up on you.

I have more pictures particularly cheetahs eating, which I will get off later.

Post 5

Post 5
23.02.2007

This post has been delayed for a week but we will catch-up with some of the news with this post and I will post some additional pictures on the blog.

Some of you may know that Jessica and Todd have been traveling around S.A. for about two weeks before they visited us. Originally they landed in Cape Town and looked around before driving up to Johannesburg to meet Todd’s father, brother and his brother’s friend. They left J’oburg to head for Kruger National Park to go on a couple of game drives. They had a good time and saw the big five which are rhino, elephant, lion, leopard and water buffalo. (By the way we had to look this up because neither of us was sure what constituted the Big Five.) They saw a rhino crossing the road in front of them on part of the trip. The park is getting overrun with elephants so they are everywhere. They are very destructive to the trees and shrubs so the park is deciding what needs to be done to control the population. As part of their trip getting into Kruger, they saw Blyde River Canyon, which is the third largest canyon in the world. They said it was very picturesque. From Kruger they went to the coast and scuba dived for several days at Sodwanna Bay. The diving was very interesting with the various corals and many different kinds of colorful fish. Some place along there, they took a course on the reef fish which meant that they now might know what they were seeing. This made it more interesting. On to Durban they went where they looked around for a day or so and put their guests on a plane for J’oburg and back home. Durban has a high percentage of people with Indian heritage so Jessica and Todd were looking forward to some good curry. They did find it. They did another dive near Durban and were going to do yet another but it was too windy so they headed down to P.E. Now the lady at the auto rental place told them that it was only a five or six hour drive. Obviously she had never driven it. The road is a two lane that goes through very hilly country with pot holes and cattle on the road, with very little shoulder and large trucks in a hurry so by the time they arrived here they were pooped! During the trip they found that it was over 900 km (over 600 miles). No wonder it took them all day to make it. They arrived about 10:30 PM and had trouble finding flats so the trip took about 10 hours. Yup, it was just an easy day’s jaunt.

We have gotten through the second week of classes and had our first days working with Pendla Primary School in New Brighton, a township, and the House of Resurrection, an AIDS hospice. I think those going to Pendla got the biggest surprise even though we talked about what is was like last fall before we came. You can not picture it until you are here. There is a fence around the school yard with barbwire on the slanted metal piece at the top of each post. There is some grass and weeds around the edges of the yard but mostly it is bare soil, which is very rocky and has a lot of glass scattered over it. There is no play equipment. The arrangement of classrooms is in a “U” shape with each building on the sides and end containing several classrooms which face out on the grassy court yard. This is the nicest grass in the school. The roof from the classroom continues out over the walkways to provide cover but otherwise it is open. At the top end of the “U” there is another building with the principal’s office and a room that has some miscellaneous stuff such as a copying machine and a fold up gas cooking stove. They have two sets of toilet buildings in the back with one for the intermediate grades and one for the primary students. The primary toilets mostly work and are a bit cleaner (this is relative) partly because the teacher hands out a little toilet paper for each student to use as part of letting them out for recess. Otherwise they are locked. The intermediate grades are open and in worse shape with no toilet paper and the stools having newspaper stiffed down in the bowl. A large number of stools do not flush. There are sinks but no towels of any kind. The smell is not pleasant. There appears to be no janitorial service whatsoever judging from the amount of dirt on the floor but time will tell if this is true. The children will, at the end of the day, pickup in the courtyard and will help sweep out the classrooms. I don’t think much other cleaning gets done. There are some shipping containers turned into additional rooms for the lunch preparation in one, computers are in another, library in another and one other that I don’t know what is in it. They had four computers at one time but two were stolen and only one of the two left works but there is no software for it. We are not certain how comfortable the teachers are with computers so utilization is an open question.

They are starting the school year without a full roster of teachers because of three retirements and one young teacher quitting during the summer. The school system has been slow to replace them and is an issue for most public schools around P.E. and in fact may be S.A. One teacher should have retired but is staying on to help until they get her replacement. Maybe two classes have a reasonable size but others are very large. The seventh grade has around 70 students in it. Can you imagine teaching that many students especially seventh graders? The teacher runs the classroom with an iron hand so things are not as out of control as you can picture a classroom back in the states with that many students. Monday we were there and everyone was interviewing to fill the positions. Our students were trying to keep the children occupied, which was a challenge! A couple tried to teach but the students were much too worked up to listen plus they do not look at them as teachers so listening to our students is not something that happens. Now try to tell a small child what to do when you only speak English and the child only speaks Xhosa. This is most true from kindergarten through second grades, since do not speak English and begin learning after those grades. Tricky! Our students come home drained because of the effort they put in to the process. Even when things are going well, teaching is a draining process, a fact not appreciate unless they have taught before. We hope that the hiring and class sizes gets worked out soon so things start getting into a routine. It will make it easier for the students to help the teacher more.

There are always broken windows in the classrooms so two students and I have started to fix the windows. This will not be too expensive so we could start on something and decide what other things were feasible to do. There are leaks in the roof, a switch or two that doesn’t work and of course the toilets to fix. We will have to decide upon what projects to do because there is only so much money. BD

Bruce goes to Pendla while I go to the AIDS Haven House of Resurrection. It is a cross between a nursing home, a hospice and an orphanage. It was previously a convent and about 8 years ago became an AIDS facility. It is sponsored by the Anglicans. It receives no public money from the government although they keep hoping! They do receive money from cooperate entities but, of course, never enough. Last year the government closed a nearby hospice that was publicly run. Now some of those patients are at the Haven.

Our students work caring for and loving on three groups: the infants (there are about 6), the toddlers (there are about 8…they move quickly so it seems like more), and about 6 school age children. They also help in the kitchen. There are also about a dozen adults. The facility, though very simple, is clean and friendly. I looked around to see what I could do and found that I could do hand and arm massages. I worked on three folks last Monday.

The people I met doing this were very interesting. Enoch was emaciated man of perhaps 40 years. He clearly wanted company and so I was welcomed. He had just come back from the hospital because his foot which was badly encrusted with scabs. He and I worked at conversation although we frequently misunderstood each other. I have always wondered what it felt like to be a masseuse and know, at least, one small part of another’s body intimately. Enoch’s hands and arms I knew intimately. I could feel very small muscles and it was amazing how small his bones were. His hands felt swollen to me. When I pushed on the fingers they felt full without much give. He has no feeling in the ends of his fingers and two fingers are clenched tightly into his palm. His hands and arms were very dry as with most of the patients. He apparently has no one left in his family. He asked me for an apple*. He wanted one to taste. I will take him one when I go again next week.

Dion, who I had spoken to last week, was my next patient. He had just taken his meds for AIDS and for TB…this is his second bout with TB…and he was groggy. He is the one who pesters the Matron to go home. He is hoping to get his Subsidy (like social security) reinstated…but that has not happened and he does not dependably take his meds. He is an interesting mix of races. His mother is Chinese and his father is Xhosa and something else. This gives a very angular appearance to his disease wracked body. Last time I had met him he was very loquacious and told me his father was coming soon to pick him up. He had reading material by his bed and seemed very alert. I did a pretty quiet rub and he fell asleep toward the end.

Bed 1, a female who had just been bathed, was the next on the list. She had her eyes closed when I started. She tried to communicate faintly but I could not understand her and she gave up after a while. She was very dry with some open fissures in her skin and I was told I could do her legs as well but I did not because I couldn’t...I couldn’t tell if I might be hurting her. She was not skinny and so it felt like arms I have rubbed before with flesh and a bit of subcutaneous fat. She had trouble rolling to her side and it evidently caused her pain. When I was nearly done she took my hand and held it tightly for about 20 minutes. Touch is a very powerful sense.

We had a church service in the very small chapel for internment of ashes. There had been a number of deaths during the past year and the Matron said the ashes were “stacking up”. Some of our students were very moved. There was no one there to remember the dead except the staff and perhaps the toddlers who also attended. A minister came and the service was filled with song. There was a lot of children’s hymns…it was the first time in a long time that I heard “Jesus Wants Me for a Sunbeam”. ND

We do not have any pictures of either the school or AIDS Haven because taking pictures at this point seems intrusive. I do hope that we get some pictures before we leave so everyone can see for themselves what both places look like.

*Very nice apples are grown in South Africa.

Some pictures for P.E.

I will show you some views from our balcany of our flat. The view across the park is very nice toward the dunes and the Indian Ocean. The path along the edge of the park has venders selling a range of items from homemade leather shoes, plastic shoes, bags of various sorts, African carvings on walking sticks and animals, bead and metal work, jewelry, clothing, food, etc. It all shows up mid morning on Sundays and ends by 4:00 PM. We have gone there frequently some of us more frequently than others.

If you walk further down the beach, you get to some rocks, which are not particulary spectacular but adds a little splahing when the waves get up. By the wasy this was a calm day in P.E., which is a very windy city. I am in my office the wind is whistling through a space in the window frame and this is not as bad as it has been at other times.

The Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University's south campus is where we are located for classes and our office. It is an interesting campus which originally was Port Elizabeth University but it was consolidated with a technicon next door north campus), a campus in the down town area (2nd Ave.), one in the township (Vista) and two further down toward Cape Town in the city of George with two more campuses there. One does specialize more in the study of forestry work. The south campus has a large area set aside for wildlife and we will get a tour next week so I can report more after that tour. As you can see in the attached picture that next to this one building Weaver birds built nests. They are quite the feat of engineering but this is not their breeding season so no birds are in the area. The picture below shows the center of the campus as it steps down via terraces toward a dinner area who's roof is part of a large plaza in front of the library. There is a lot of vegetation, which surprises most students.

This is small path that goes between the International Education building and the library. Once day I saw a couple of monkeys in the bushes here but they are never around when I have the camera.

I will send more pictures every so often. I have more of the campus but they are not on the computer at the moment.

BD

Post 4

02.10.2007

Hello all,
In this post we will not mention the weather. We do so because we have been getting the cold shoulder from some of our friends… But Norma said that we can still mention the bank. We were asked to investigate what needs to be done to move the College/Universities’ bank account into a new one. I checked yesterday afternoon. It will not be easy although it will be doable. Sharon if you are reading this before my next email gets to you. You now will be prepared to know that there will be a fair number of documents required. I bet you can hardly wait my detailed email. ; )

We are experiencing a very quiet weekend, if you don’t count the men standing beside their cars until 4:00 AM playing loud music and talking Saturday morning, because all the students decided on their own to go some place. A group of seven took the bus to East London which is on up the coast from us. The rest went to Jeffrey’s Bay which is known to have great surfing. There are some surfers out in front of us this morning with waves that are better than average.

I got a basic guide for our digital camera from one of the students and found the new “wrinkle” in downloading to the computer. It was easy just not obvious or similar to my old Cannon. As a consequence, I will finally get some pictures attached to this post and will put more on the blog. I can put more pictures on the blog so it will not clog your system. I can tell you that we are most relieved. I don’t know yet when we will get this off this weekend but sometime. BD

Thursday
On the 16th floor of the main building there is a terrific wind blowing through. We have one window looking out on the sea and the other opposite looking toward town. Wind is blowing very hard toward land and there is a mighty roar and significant breeze blowing through the ¼ inch gap between the window and sill. If it rains we shall surely be a mess. Also on the 16th floor they have installed a hot water tap for tea. I am absolutely delighted!

Today we taught our first class together. I was very apprehensive about how it would go. First I haven’t taught anything since last spring’s library use presentations and that was material so well known that it offered no “fear and loathing”. Well, it went fine. We didn’t even use all that had been prepared. Bruce and I are sharing the workload for administering and the teaching. The students have been doing magnificently! They got into the discussion very well. They make cogent remarks. What more could we ask for?

On my kitchen counter there are figs and mangoes! The figs were about 35 cents each and the mangoes only a bit more expensive. Life is good! We went back to the fish market again and once more will have hake tonight done on a George Foreman grill. I hope it turns out ok. I do not have a garlic press (okay some of you may not think that onerous) but I did find the grill. Who knows what priorities the landlords and the previous directors had. Having the grills is turning out to be an excellent thing but we would not have thought of it as option. I haven’t mastered the oven yet. All I figured out is to turn on broil and put the potatoes and squash at the bottom of the oven. One burner on the stove top knows high but nothing else. Cooking is a bit more of an adventure.

Bruce and I just took a walk down Happy Valley. It is a tiny valley with a nice walkway, some lawn area where small children were playing cricket, some pools with lovely yellow water lilies in bloom and a small clear stream moving along. There were statuary of Snow White and Dwarfs, The Little Mermaid, and other figures from fairy tales. They are lit up at night but apparently people don’t go there very often then as crime is an issue. It is sad really because I think it would have been very lovely! President Thabo Mbeki was taken to task for his State of the Nation speech. “Anger as Mbeki sidesteps crime” said the Weekend Post. He apparently is in denial about crime in his country at least that is what much of the populous thinks. There are guards in the grocery store parking lot who corral shopping carts and help you back out. They are meant to be tipped for that and making sure thieves don’t break your car window to get whatever they can see inside. The tip, however, is minuscule at 2 Rand or about 32 cents.

We went to Woolworths recently. It is a department store selling its own brands and a grocery selling upscale stuff. That is where I found the figs. It is in a mall with another large grocery chain, Pic n’ pay. There are many small and large stores and eating establishments and bank outlets. Bruce needed a couple of short sleeved shirts and we found them in a local department store chain. We bought the last of the shirts that were advertised as mostly cotton (70% cotton and 30% polyester). All of the rest of the shirts we looked at were all cotton. They were about $13 each – not bad. We have laundry service but it does not include ironing and as you may know I am inclined to do other things rather than iron. ND

Second Post

Second Post SA
2007.01.21
We have just ended our first week in Port Elizabeth and things seem to be shaping up satisfactorily. Some things such as computer connections and getting instructors and some early tours are going a little slower than we hoped but I think it will all come together when it needs to. Here are some additional observations so far.

Before we came down to South Africa, we knew that it was an unusual country. It is a combination of first (developed) and third (underdeveloped) world all in one. This was driven home Thursday when we got up took showers and boiled water for tea and coffee all with out incident. However, when we started to drive toward NMMU, we noted that all the traffic lights were off. At first we thought that it was a local outage but no they were off at the University as well. This day and age no electricity equals no work. Everyone has a computer and they don’t work worth a damn without it. It was suppose to last two hours but it lasted four. During the evening we learned that it was a power problem in the entire distribution system for the country. They expected it to continue and they would try to spread the outages around. Now our office is on the 16th floor of the Main building with four elevators. I would have been willing to trudge up the stairs but with the computers not working there was no point. One of the women in the Centre for International Education said, “This is why South Africans have to be tough.”

An aside from Norma: I need a good junior high school student who can walk around with me and can tell me what is the name of that tree or this bird or do I tip the parking lot attendant and where can I find ripe mangoes and what is that strange ship coming into port carrying (most so far have been container vessels which have a very fast unload and load times) and where can you buy flip-flops so we can walk on the beach. To whom do I give the little handshake that entails shaking hands, grabbing thumbs and then something else which I don’t get yet? Why are newspapers so large? They feel like at least 10 inches wider than I am used to. They make my arms tired just holding it out to read…but at least they have a comic section with Dagwood and Blondie and Hagar the Horrible.

We have eaten lots of fish, squid (we saw at least 3 squid boats with their bright lights on last night), shrimp and mussels…funny but no scallops that we have encountered yet. We have had a vegetable curry pie and lots of salad…interesting that there weren’t many lettuces…iceberg predominates. I can buy Lays potato chips in an incredible array of flavors. Also Kellogg cereal is here but no General Mills. Bruce has not found a favorite beer yet, nor have I a grand red wine but we are persistent in our search and will let you know when we have been successful. We are also doing intense research to find the most magnificent Crème Brule in the country. There is nothing as important as on the ground research! It is a good thing that we live on the third floor and have to run up and down several times a day. [B. We are not eating except at meal times which are excellent.]

This is the end of the second week and we haven’t gotten this off yet. We have 9 students here now and expect the rest in the next two days. That has preoccupied us mostly except for the technical problems which are frustrating beyond measure. Item #1 was when the school computer went down and a bunch of emails to the profs disappeared. My account at Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University doesn’t function yet. We do have the laptop and a desk computer but only one active network connection (there are three connectors that don’t work). Then the PDA locked up and we are glad that we are backed up on the PC. Then we went to download the new pictures from our new camera and there is a glitch that won’t let us. Did I mention that I left my jump drive at the internet café…at least it was still there when I got back. We were trying to bring up another cell phone that we had from Jessica and Todd’s adventure in Spain but it is locked up for networks here and doesn’t seem usable at least no one here can open it.

Then there is the matter of the bank. It could be a novel in its own right. We went to the branch bank where the program has an account. We activated that and had a check from the program to put into it. The branch couldn’t handle a large check in U.S. currency…we needed to go to the Walmer Park Branch. So we go there. They can’t accept the check because it is made out to Bruce and not made out to the Order of St. Benedict Inc. which is the name on the account even though we are the signed users. They suggest that we open an account in Bruce’s name, deposit it and transfer it over…Oh did mention that their computers were down and so they couldn’t do anything right then anyway. We went back to our branch to talk to the branch manager, whose name was Joy Hutton, for advice. We hoped her name was an omen of good things. We were informed that she is no longer with the bank. Bruce chatted with the teller and we will go back to Walmer Park Branch on Monday and cash the check and walk to other part of the bank and try to deposit it…God willing and the computers are working!

It is very hot and humid and we are a trifle cranky. I see a glass of red wine (for research purposes) in my future this evening!

From down and under
B & N

The next day…
We collected three more students (Yes, Peggy, Molly is here and didn’t look all the jet lagged.) with the bulk of them coming in tomorrow. We have tried off and on today to call Bruce’s sister and technology again befuddles the situation. We got a phone card but found we couldn’t activate it except during “regular business hours”. We discovered that yesterday (Saturday). We decided that we would just call anyway and pay for the call through the hotel. We dial out, get to a certain place out there in the ether and it yells, “BEEP, BEEP, BEEP”! Frustration beyond measure! The breeze has died down which means it is warm this evening! But a new thing was found today…fresh fish! Go down to the wharves where the big container ships come in and there are two fresh fish concerns. For less than three dollars I got a bit over a pound of Hake…the local deepwater fish. It was very nice!

NO PICTURES! Computer and camera are not talking more at 6:00.

Post 3

Saturday

Whew! We have finally met with all of our teachers and with the Aids Haven Director. We still have not met with the Pendla School Principal although we have tried. Today is Saturday and the classes begin Monday! This week we have gone through a full day orientation, an afternoon of getting ID cards and most of a day touring Port Elizabeth, a township and the Red Location Museum. The latter is a museum dedicated to the history of apartheid and the struggle against it. It was quite a heavy trip. Bradley Laveck, our colored tour leader, who helped set up the museum, could talk with experience and passion. The pre-apartheid the world was divided into whites, coloreds and blacks. We will talk more about the field trips and what we saw on our blog.

On part of our touring around we went to the Kragga Kama game reserve. We were divided up into 3 groups got up on flatbed trucks with benches. We started out and saw warthogs, a giraffe family unit, various antelopes (spring bucks, nyala, bontebuck and impala), zebras, and storks, who migrate between Europe and Africa. We went into a special enclosure and saw 8 cheetahs; three young males approached the truck very readily after the guide whistled. The people on the flatbed were told not to stand up as the animals perceive the whole truck as a unit therefore much larger prey than they could handle. We were advised that cheetahs only ate fresh meat, groom each other and had no noticeable smell. This makes them different than lions who eat fetid carcasses and actually stink. But the crowning moment came when we were observing the white rhinos who all blackish but with a square lip (This is the distinction not that they are white.). The male, all ton and ½ of him, came over and rubbed his horn on the side of the truck. The truck jostled a perceptual amount and travellers’ heart rates raised. It was a real thrill! ND

Sunday morning

It is another delightful morning but with one of those surprising happenings that occur when you stay in one place for some time. This morning the city is having bike races/tour along the Beach Road. I do not have a map of the route but the start was some place not far back down the road (maybe at Hobie Beach) and they come by here as part of the route. The first starting group was couples on tandem bicycles; second group must be the racers since they were in a tight, tense group with one brave soul willing to get out in the lead early. They are going in a circuit that takes them past us about every five minutes. There are some hills just up from the beach so they must go up and around the hill and back down to Beach Road for how many kilometers I do not know. I can tell when they are going by because it is like a swarm of soft sounding bees whirling past. With the street blocked off the area is quiet save for the waves breaking on the beach and some bird sounds. It was low tide this morning and the waves were dumping so you would hear the sudden crash as it tumbles over itself.

Port Elizabeth is a very windy city. One hears that Cape Town is windy but so is P.E. and we can confirm it. It was quiet this morning at the start of the race but as I sit at our dining table in the living room looking out on to the Indian Ocean, I can see the wind coming up. It is blowing the spray from the waves back out to sea. I would imagine the racers are not happy for it but those who live here must expect it. The swarm is getting more and more spread out so the angry buzz is getting softer but more prolonged as they go by. As I write this some time has passed and I looked out and saw a small band of bikers on the wrong side of the road peddling along leisurely so the race must be over, at least for them.

The sounds are changing more people are running and walking by for their exercise. I can hear the sounds of their conversations but not the words. Of course they are in Afrikaans so wouldn’t understand any way. There are some vehicles going by now. The clank of the aluminum poles is indicating that the venders are starting to put up their awning for their booths. Sunday morning is the day for the flea/craft market in King’s Park which is just across the street from us. They are beginning to setup early Sunday morning and tear it down by 4:00 in the afternoon. It has the unusual items such as the native carvings made with the woods of Africa, beaded work, interesting foods and stuff. Some of it would be like a flea market back in the states.

The sun is streaming in the open door off the veranda and it is hot. It was very pleasant this morning but it will get hot as the day rolls along. We visited the friends of the Saupes last evening, who live in P.E., and as we came home at ten thirty the temperature was 21o C (72o F). They had us over for a braai (Bar-B-Q) of unusual meats such kudu, ostrich, and warthog. They were all very good. The kudu was very tender. The piece of wart hog looked like a pork loin and it was very tender. Their braai uses wood. They have short split sticks that they start a fire with to build up a bed of coals. It is very dense wood more like oak but obviously not growing as large as oaks. They add charcoal to help keep the bed of coals going through the cooking process. How much wood versus charcoal has varied over the three braai that I have watched being done. It seemed to vary depending upon how much wood they had. The flavor was indeed enhanced by the use of wood. Some of the meat may have been marinated but most was not and it was excellent. I say good because the meat we had last night was the best that we have had. The meat that we can get in the grocery stores near us is not particularly good. It is tough and a little stringy but last night’s was great.

Classes start with South African music Monday afternoon for most of the students. Since not all of them are taking music class so for them Wednesday will the start. Their service learning times will be on Monday mornings and all day Tuesday but that will start the next week. I have met with nearly all of the instructors that we work with and they appear to be an excellent group. BD

The last are home!!!

Our last two students arrived. Martin got in tired but arrived on time at P.E. even if one of his other flights was delayed. Hinton arrived in early afternoon and all her flights were on time but she was sick to her stomack for part of her trip so she was a little tired and weak. She had some long waits in a couple of airports here. Norma is giving her a little food to start so she work up to the pizza tonight. We are having it delivered just before our meeting. There is a park acrossed the road from us which if the weather is nice may be where we hold the meeting.

These two postings were just to let parents know that there son/daughter is here and safe. I didn't mention the earlier students who have been here over a week because they would have called or emailed home by now. Later posts will be of more general interests.

BD