Hello!!

A lot has happened since we last blogged..... (This is being written at midnight, every dog in Durban seems to be up and barking- maybe they are discussing todays election result....)
As many of you may have heard we have had some problems with our car recently. Let's start from the very beginning (its a very good place to start)
We have had a lot of issues with our car from the beginning.... For the first couple of days in SA Abi and Pippa spent most their time at the airport trying to hire a car which was a long process due to problems with licences and funds being in the wrong account and took a lot longer than hoped. We had a car for a month and all was well but then in our second month we reversed into our gate causing damage which we fixed using 'panel beaters'- a local company. We were impressed with the result but the hire company weren't and when they discovered the damage withheld money from us. Once we returned from our holiday it was uncertain if we could get another car as the company didn't want to give us one but once again this was resolved and we had another car (an automatic this time- a new experience for everyone!) Then last week whilst we were painting a wall at the safe house a woman reversed into our hire car, we reported this to the police (another new experience) and then took the car back to the hire company. They said that we needed to pay 17000 rand (about £1000) in order to get a car, if we paid and the woman paid at a later date we would get our money back but there was no guarantee she would ever pay. We sent messages home asking for prayer and refused to be defeated, that night we went home and praised God, struck by a song saying 'I will praise you in the storm'. The next day we were overwhelmed by people offering to cover the cost for us but this wasn't needed as tearfund found that our insurance will cover the cost, praise God!! Those days were filled with lots of emotions!! Please continue to pray for the car.

Me and Pippa are back in amaoti 1 (the primary school) and the craziness began on day one. We were helping Sbo to cover a grade one class and what follows is not exaggerated..... We won't tell you every detail but this is a 20 minute snippet of our day. Sbo had to go photocopy some sheets for the class so we were left alone with a lot of Zulu speaking children, after a bit of learning the names of shapes the chaos began, we don't really know how but Pippa ended up with half the class round her asking for toilet roll which she was distributing with a confused look on her face- hec-tic. A child then began crying so Pippa went to find Sbo leaving me alone.... In a attempt to keep the classes attention I began a copying game we had played earlier, it didn't take long for the whole class to be clapping but they then began to all sing a Zulu song, marching seemed to be a crucial part of the song and soon half the kids were marching on the tables.... My very limited Zulu doesn't stretch to 'get off the tables' and they then started copying my action which was meant to mean get down! Order was resumed when Pippa and Sbo returned! The rest of the team seem to look forward to hearing what happened on our mad days but we are hoping that next week meetings will happen that allow us to take struggling children out to help them with English. We are also aiming to get photos of all the 'back to school children' who are sponsored and get letters/ pictures from the children to the sponsors. We have a manageable target of 44 children in our school but as an organisation we need to find around 500 from many different schools!! Forming contact between children and sponsors is vital in ensuring sponsors continue to support LI and finding new sponsors.

Thats all for now, see you next time (on the blog Kez has promised to write!)

Byeeeeeee

Catherine

Xxx

HOW COULD I FORGET??! you might remember that last time we blogged we mentioned a singer called Matthew mole... Well last Monday we googled to see    If he was playing in Durban soon but Google failed us, luckily though Kez spotted a sign when we were out and after  driving round in circles to see it again we got the details! Next thing we know its Sunday and we are at a outdoor gig seeing Matthew mole and just jinger! Not only did the ticket cost convert to just £6 but we also all got photos with Matthew! Maybe in Kez's blog she will write something profound about some of his lyrics.... Pressures on girl!!!

P.s temperatures have dropped to 22° this week meaning we have experienced what its like to be cold (a problem we used to only have in the shower!) The 3 fleeces Emma packed along with a number of scarf's are finally being used and I'm hoping that it won't be long till I'm not ridiculed for bringing a wooly hat....