It's been a long time. We had a holiday!

After a long time, which has included a visit from friends from home, malaria (for Bridget), Christmas and New Year, we are back to normal again.
We also had a lovely holiday with our daughter Rose in Muizenberg, just outside of Cape Town.  So here are some holiday snaps...


Cape Town



Frisby on the beach



Up a mountain!



The view

 

Rock pooling

 

Surf's up

Garden update

 

The garden is growing well, but you can see from the arid surroundings that all this green represents a lot of watering:

 

Bridget's water melon and cabbage

Amos's tomatoes

Amos's beans

Bridget's pumpkin, onions, carrots, beans and cabbage

Some interesting bugs

 

A big praying (and dancing) mantis:

 

 

 

And a stick insect:

 

SPIDERS!

 



First there was this one by the tap when we went to water the garden:

 

watch added for scale

Then there was this one trying to get under the door one evening:

We thought that the shiny black on its back was eggs, but if you look very closely you can see that they are tiny tiny spiders.  When we flicked it with a stick to discourage it from coming into the house it was like a cluster bomb going off!  -Tiny tiny spiders all over the place.

Bridget does not like spiders, which has been news to Amos.  Whenever  a big spider turns up, he has been saying "well, I never knew this about you" as Bridget shudders in a corner!

Some lessons

We thought you might like to see some of our lessons:





Bridget teaching her adult literacy class the day's English saying!

Amos teaching in the library



Bridget and the pre-grade class making spiders with their hands

And finally, we are having some intensive Chitonga lessons:

Ba Nelson a Ba Amos mu ciyo wa Chitonga

Water

Most houses or groups of houses in the compounds near where we live, have a well.  The well water is used for washing and watering gardens - drinking and cooking water is brought from either the hand pumps or from stands where mains water can be bought.
Now that the dry season is taking hold, many people's wells are dry.  This means that water must be carried daily from the pumps, often meaning a wait of two hours now that the pumps are busy.
Gardens are drying up.
Life is difficult here.

The well.  You can just see a splash of water at the bottom

Verily and Mildred looking for water



There was about a cup full of water in the container when it came up



Sad un-watered garden

Waiting your turn at the pump

Gardening News

Sorry it's been so long since we posted here.  Life goes on as usual here, although we are having a bit of a break from some of our teaching for the school holidays (until early September), and Rose is with us, so we're having a good time with her.
Gardening news is that a week or so ago Amos chased 5 piglets out of the garden, but not until they had eaten some of the greens and dug up some pepper seeds. 
So far, from the garden we have eaten rape, carrots and some cabbage leaves.  Still to come, whole cabbages, onions, beans and peppers.
Here are some pictures (but not of pigs):

Carrots

The garden so far.  Amos is watering beans in the back ground

Daily watering

Transplanting onions