Here are the photos that I have taken so far.
This was the view flying into Salt Lake City at sunrise. Not a bad way to start the trip.
This was the view flying out of Salt Lake City. One day I'd like to stay longer than 45 minutes!
The beach in Kenton-on-Sea, where some friends took me for the day.
The beach had a great combination of sand dunes . . .
\. . . and gigantic rocks!
I jumped off of the ledge halfway up the rock in the middle,
but some of the crazy boys jumped from the very top!
The view from the Antrobus Farm, which I was fortunate enough to be able to sketch.
Not bad, eh? I like it.
A huge tortoise who came to join me as I was sketching at the farm.
I think he was lured by my singing.
Beautiful Xoliswa, with her equally beautiful (but blurry) brother Xolani making
sure he gets into the photo.
Sethu and Xolani. That kid is in focus some of the time -- I promise.
Anelisa doing her homework with the other Grade 2 students.
The monastery overlooks a valley between lovely green hills.
This is the building where we have the after school program (in the left half of the building).
One of the many gorgeous views from the monastery.
Grahamstown from the top of a nearby hill. If you look very closely in the middle of the photo,
you can see a tall brown pointy building. This is the Anglican Cathedral, which is a central point in town
and is one of the churches I attend.
On the outskirts of Grahamstown.
We took the kids from the after school programme on a hike to a nearby dam.
Siphokazi and Asisipho at the dam, or in it, rather.
There was much running around and general frivoility. These kids can really book it!
The railway right next to the monastery on the way back. The owners of this farm are planning to build a huge retirement community on this land, which would be such a disaster to the peace of the area. The brothers are hoping to fight the plans on environmental grounds.
Thembelani and me working on reading "A Fly Went By," one of my favorite books, and now one of his.
Anelisa working hard on her reading.
Numbers make me do this too.
Ntombekaya usually works with the older guys while I work with the younger ones.
It's finally time to sit back and enjoy a story that someone else reads!
An end-of-the-week treat: painting the windows!
It was right before Easter, so Thembelani painted Golgotha. It looks a bit like a sunrise to me, which I interpreted as a nice bit of unintentional foreshadowing.
A view of the ocean from the dunes during our hike in Alexandria. We spent half the time walking barefoot on the sand -- gorgeous.
A dune.
Lots of uphills.
We approached the cabin where we stayed overnight as the sun was setting.
The sunrise the following morning from the deck at the cabin. To the right, literally hundreds of dolphins were playing in the waves. It was definitely one of those "Am I really here?" moments.
My cousin Johno and me on the beach in Plettenberg Bay.
My aunt Liz and me at Sievers Punt in Hermanus, a special family spot.
A man fishing at Sievers. During whale season, this is also good spot to view the Southern Right Whales that come to the bay.
On a drive along the coast near Cape Town.
Table Mountain from the Waterfront area. When we sailed into Cape Town on Semester at Sea, we sailed into this port and had an equally stunning view of the mountain.
Bean, the newest member of the Smith family (some of our oldest and dearest family friends), was very eager to help me journal.
The new soccer stadium (as seen from the Smith house) that is being built in Cape Town in preparation for the World Cup in 2010. I think it looks a bit like a round table discussion of cranes.
A view in the Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens.
Some nice purple flowers.
My favorite flower, the Bird of Paradise, which is the symbol of the Gardens.
A particularly shelly patch on the normally smooth sand of Grotto Beach in Hermanus.
I was planning on going on a short walk to the beach, but I accidentally turned around and saw how green these mountains were. So I went on a four and a half hour hike up and in them instead. You can see the switchbacks going up the side. What you can't see is how windy it was. When I got to the top, I blew over, and then had to cling to rocks so that I wouldn't blow off!
See? Who wouldn't want to climb these?
Sunrise from Sievers Punt in Hermanus. I kind of fell in love with this cloud.
I'm sure this is not the same exact swingset, but it's in the same place as the one I used to play on when we lived here when I was four. I loved it so much that in college, I even wrote a poem about it. Click here to see it.
At the Mother and Child waterfall in Hogsback. The crazy kids were so eager to swim that they did here, even though it was freezing!
Teamwork on the Low Ropes Course. This is stuff you can't exactly teach in the classroom.
Bongiswa as she waits for her turn on the zipline.
I let the kids use my camera, and they came up with some wonderful candid shots.
Here are a few of them:
Bongiswa was not at all looking forward to repelling, so we went up the tower together. She did a great job! (By the way, that's Alan, our driver, in the background.)
Siphokazi repelling down the tower.
We ended the time at Hogsback with a dance party.
Exploring at SciFest
One school set up a really great obstacle course for the kids.
The conclusion of the obstacle course
The reading corner I set up at SciFest. It was a pretty busy place.
On the beach in Port Elizabeth with the younger kids from the monastery. Nina, a volunteer from the U.K. who was staying at our house for two weeks was able to join us.
Ntombekaya and some of our kids considering the ocean. Sometimes it helps to face the unknown by holding hands with friends.
As it has done for people all over the world, the ocean elicited a variety of responses from our kiddos:
thoughtfulness . . .
hesitancy . . .
thrill . . .
and finally, delight.
By the end, we were all appropriately soaked.
Watching the dophins at the Oceanarium.
More dolphin watching.
This is either the most welcoming or the most menacing penguin in the world.
The girls at the dolphin and seal show.
It was a quiet ride home.
The biggest Taco Night we've had, where about 25 people showed up.
At a game reserve outside of Mthatha.
The one elephant we saw at Addo.
One of the hundreds of warthogs we saw at Addo. We decided they should rename the park Addo National Warthog Park. I thought it was cute that they often kneel down before eating. It reminds me of kneeling to pray during Anglican church services.
Kudus are really beautiful animals. One cool kudu fact is that when the males lower their heads, their eyes line up with the spirals in their horns so that they can see through them.
On my last day at Luzuko preschool, the teacher played various ring tones on her cell phone so that the kids could have a cell phone dance party.
Hanging out in the school.
As the sun has started to set earlier and earlier, we've been greeted with some spectacular light as we head home after the after school program at the monastery:
The view from our hostel in Chinsa.
The beach at Chinsa. If you look hard, you can see some red steps which disappear into the hill. They lead to a path which emerges in a magic world with a teeter totter, a trampoline and an entire campground where we decided to have an uninvited picnic lunch.
Playing at the ARV clinic. Because of legal reasons, I cannot put any photos of the children's faces online. [Photos of the hospital and clinic were taken by another volunteer, Megan.]
The stairs to the pediatric ward are covered with paintings of some of the best known children's characters. They terrify me.
The hospital which houses the ARV clinic.
After a nice storm at the monastery.
Kathy Johnson, the kindergarten teacher at Saint George's, generously donated a ton of books to the kids at the after school program. Here they are ready to open the box. Drum roll please!
Plenty for everyone!
Making a wonder box, which insulates hot food so well that it continue to cook as it sits.
The five adults at the after school program. The four of us on the right are teachers and Nomamiesi, who cleans the school and makes the food. Not to mention the fact that she raises many of the kids.
Matt's grandparents sent a huge box of hats they'd collected. They were a huge hit, and now half of Grahamstown is wearing them, including these guys.
Beautiful Bongiswa and her new hat.
Two of the three little pigs trying on costumes.
My favorite time of day is prayer time.
Bongiswa and Thembelani watching their peers perform on the last day of term.
June, Matt and Nomamiesi enjoy the older boys' gumboot dancing.
The three girls in our class and Ntombekaya. Possibly the four most gorgeous females on the planet.
Our gallery of portraits. On the left are the ones we did of kids at Saint George's and on the far right are the ones of Saint George's kids holding their portraits of our guys.
Matt and our good friend Jeremy, who came up to the monastery once a week.
The bride at the Xhosa wedding I went to in Mthatha.
A few of the high school volunteers reading to the group of kids who attended the literacy program I put on during Festival.
Kids playing "Letter Twister"
These kids had worked out the story of "The Little Red Hen" with the felt pictures, and here the boy is retelling the story. It was an added bonus that the room we were using happened to have walls to which felt stuck easily.
Some of the jewelry and other items being sold during Festival.
Charmaine, one of the campers at Reading Camp, coming out of part of the obstacle course.
Siyanda -- one of the many children whose face I could watch for the rest of my life and never get bored.
Thandolwethu, a girl in my room, as she watches the python. Another of those kids with watchable faces (hers, not the python's).
A giraffe's head as he looks for food. There are significant benefits to being tall.
A nice tree.
I sometimes wondered if writing was physically painful for this kid because he was thinking so hard!
The view from our accomodation. Stunning. And for the kids, a refreshing change of scenery from township life, I'm sure.