Haircuts, naora & fart facts

Friday October 2

Hope you’ve had a pleasant week. My week has had its ups and downs.

On Monday, Mr A said that Week 9 of this term would be the last week of lessons. He said they’ll do revision in Week 10, hold exams in Week 11, mark exams in Week 12 and write reports in Week 13.

I suspect Mr A was delegated by the other teachers to break this news as he came right out with it the moment he hopped in the car as if he’d been rehearsing what he had to say. He might have been concerned about how I’d take the news given the number of interruptions we’d had to the school year but he needn’t have been worried. I’m not too worried. Despite the lost time, many of the kids have made fairly good progress in reading this year. They’ve done better than I expected.

Next Monday is a public holiday which means that I have a total of eleven days of lessons left in the year and probably, in reality, less than that number because events such as funerals, rain or gone-to-Vila-itis are bound to chew up some of that time.

After Week 9 I’ll collect all the readers, putting them back in their plastic tubs in the library. The tubs will need to sit on top of the big table in the library in case we have a cyclone and tidal surges over the holidays. I also want to finalise student reading records then retrieve all the laminated sounds charts that I put up on classroom walls as part of my lessons.

It’s starting to get hot. Soon it will be the season to do whatever needs doing in the early and relatively cool hours of the morning and then lie low from about lunchtime onwards for three or four hours until the sun starts to dip, the shadows lengthen and the temperature drops a little.

This week was fairly normal. I taught lessons as scheduled and ferried people around as usual.

Monday morning, six thirty and Tim’s phone rings. It’s Mr D requesting me to collect him at Epau and take him to school. Now. At six thirty!

No can do, I told Tim. I’m picking Sophie up at Epule at seven thirty so tell Mr D that I can pick him up after that.

I’m trying to be careful about setting precedents. Running out of the door at half past six in the morning to transport people who haven’t organised their personal arrangements ahead of time is not even close to making my ‘to do’ list.

And here’s another thing that didn’t make the list. Mevis messaged me via Facebook on Monday afternoon.

‘Can I borrow your laptop to type up my school report?’

‘No. Find the laptop Tim gave you. It has a word program.’

‘Okay.’

Elsa has had a busy week too, here she is, ready to download the photos she's taken

I managed to break the bench seat under the tree at school on Monday. I’ve been using the bench and table setting for guided reading groups. The wood was rotten and snapped without warning which sent me and a student sprawling onto the ground to the delight of most of the school population that witnessed it through their classroom windows.

It didn’t hurt too much at the time, just a bit of bark off the elbow and a sore lower back but I’ve had twinges in my neck, legs and back since then so I must have shaken things up a bit.

Now I’m back to sitting on the ground in reading groups. It’s much safer there, not as far to fall.

I cut my hair last Sunday. I made it very short this time with the heat on its way.

I used to cut my hair standing on the end of the verandah where the wind would blow the offcuts away from the house and into the jungle. I’d snip away, looking into a compact mirror balanced on the railing. It worked but it was a bit tricky trying to see what was happening as the winds whipped my hair around.

Now I just strip off and stand on a sheet in front of the one and only mirror in the house which is between the bedroom and the bathroom. I can see what I’m doing and my hair stays still which is a bonus. I just pull handfuls of hair out straight and snip at what I judge to be an appropriate length away from my scalp. Thank goodness for curly hair, it just bunches up and hides all the uneven ends that I am sure must be there. Afterwards, I bundle up the sheet and shake it outside. Tim tidies up the back of my hair, trimming it with the clippers. Job done! I can’t believe how easy it is.

I’ve never been game to cut my own hair before moving to Vanuatu. Admittedly there were decades when I let my hair grow to my waist so there was no need for hairdressers but after it went grey I decided to keep it short and that involved regular trips to salons. I thought I’d botch it up if I had a go at it. I remember several times in Menindee; the nearest salon was 110 kilometres away and was booked up for weeks ahead, me standing in the bathroom with a strand of hair in one hand and scissors in the other, desperate to get rid of my sheep fleece and yet not quite brave enough to make the first cut.

The kids were fascinated that I’d cut my own hair.

“You cut my hair?” asked Zeth.

“No, I’d better not in case I make a mistake. Ask your mum to cut your hair,” was my response as a vision flashed before my eyes of a queue of people streaming down my front stairs wanting a haircut. At six thirty in the morning.

Tim went to Vila on Thursday to lodge our share of the visa paperwork with the Teaching Services Commission. They now have four months to do their bit of the paperwork and lodge it with Immigration. The only tricky bit will be that we can’t exit and re-enter the country as is normal practice on the expiry of this type of visa. They have a hundred and twenty days to figure it out.

Silas rang on Wednesday night. He has just returned from a few weeks on Malekula and he has brought back some naora, crustaceans that are very similar to yabbies. I haven’t had them for years. A garlic aoli would go very well with naora.

During one of my visits with Rona at Amel Toro bungalows up in Norsup, north Malekula, she had a booking for a party of five people who requested one of her famous feasts. They didn’t show up so I ended up with a whole table of food to myself which included a huge bowl of naora. After my second trip to collect more naora from the smorgasbord, Rona moved the bowl to my table. She could see how much I was enjoying them.

I’d like to go back and visit Rona sometime; gorgeous bungalows, wonderful food and Rona too of course, a very special and interesting lady. If I ever go back to that part of the world, I’d love to take another trip up the road from Rona’s to stay with Juliette on Vao Island. You did stay with me at Rona’s at least once but I don’t think you made it to Vao. Perhaps we’ll slip up there together one time and leave the boys to cat-sit.

Speaking of boys…

Last night, while sitting at the table after dinner, someone farted. It may have been me. Tim informed me in all seriousness that he’s been doing a bit of reading about farting. I think he said Nature had just published an article on the topic. Apparently there are people who have done a lot of research on this subject. Imagine being a professor of flatulence! They’ve measured the quantity and quality, frequency and Richter levels. Talk about a shit of a job!

Here’s just one of the fun fart facts that Tim shared; due to estrogen levels, female farts have a more intense odour than males. Living with a lactose intolerant male, I would dispute that. I have been woken from a deep sleep by his noxious gases more than once.

The article finished up by saying that farting is a regular and normal bodily function and the more you do it, the more it benefits your health. Farting is very good for you! Now, when one of us lets loose, the other has to say something like, ‘Congratulations!’ Or, ‘Well done, that one really rocked my world!’

Today it’s raining but I’m off to the clinic to see how much Jo-tu has grown over the past fortnight. Because it’s raining I’ll only have a cab full. The interested onlookers that normally tag along can stay at home today.

Have a lovely day today and a great weekend to follow. Do you have a long weekend too? Think I saw something on the calendar about that. Labour Day perhaps? I’m sure Suki would enjoy a long weekend with you. Give her a big rub on the belly for me, wish I could come over and do it myself. I can’t wait to meet her. Say hi to Stef and give him a rub on the belly too if he wants one.

x x x x x x x x x x x x

Friday October 9

The Time Warp

It’s astounding! Time is fleeting. Madness takes its toll.

Headed off to school at seven thirty this morning to the sounds of Santana rocking the stereo, returned half an hour later with The Time Warp in my head. I wasn’t even playing that song; it manifested itself, inspired by the events of that first thirty minutes.

I don’t normally go to Ekipe School on Thursday or Friday. On those days I either visit other schools or create resources. Only seven weeks of school remain this term and the last four weeks are dedicated to revision, exams and reports. I need to finalise my data before everything falls apart as it does in any school at the end of the year, some falling apart faster than others. I thought that I’d dedicate the next few Thursdays and Fridays to taking reading records with the hundred students that I work with. As I collect Sophie from Epule and take her to school on those mornings anyway now that she’s seven months pregnant, it makes sense for me to do assessments on those days.

My projections match reality about fifty percent of the time. For instance yesterday I went to school and did the reading records as planned. Today I collected Sophie and we arrived at school to find it utterly deserted. Not a soul in sight, not a shutter or door open. Skul i finis. Again. We couldn’t think of one reason as to why school might not be open today.

The secondary teachers have been making lots of concerned noise about the Year 8 kids being behind with their studies due to all the lost school time this year; Covid, cyclones, births, deaths, marriages, road openings, the fortnight long public holiday for Independence Day and the like.

From the start of this term Tim and I have been hearing whispers of night lessons being planned for the Year 8 kids. Great idea, if you have lights and if you have transport to get those kids back to their homes which are up to ten kilometres away.

Tim was on super alert when this exchange occurred between him and Mr D a few weeks ago.

Mr D: So how are you going driving at night?

Tim: I don’t like to drive at night unless there is an emergency.

Mr D got Tim to design and price a solar lighting system for one of the classrooms. Great idea, if you have the money to pay for it. So far this year only forty percent of the forty percent of the whole years’ funding that was due in March has been received and that was in August. (I’ve just re-read that last sentence a few times and it seems a bit crazy but that’s exactly what it is so I didn’t delete it.)

Rumour had it that the kids were each asked to bring one thousand vatu to contribute to teacher’s overtime for the night classes. I don’t think that idea got off the ground.

So no lighting, no transport and no money put an end to the plan for night classes.

Undeterred, the teachers came up with another idea. Starting on Sunday and running for the next month, the Year 8 kids are expected to come to school on Sunday afternoon and board for the week, returning home on Friday afternoons. They’ll sleep in classrooms and do extra lessons in the early morning. You can imagine how well rested they will be after a few nights of chatting and mucking around instead of sleeping.

Now this is what I can’t wrap my head around. At best, every Friday is a ‘half’ day of between two and four hours. At worst, Fridays are cancelled due to lack of interest and we seem to be getting less interested as the year wears on. I keep calculating how much teaching time could be generated if only schools worked a normal working week of five full days. If school is only open four days a week, it functions at only eighty percent capacity. If every Friday was a full day of learning this would be the equivalent of thirteen extra days per term (almost three school weeks) or thirty nine extra days over the year (eight full school weeks!) If you were so concerned about progress, would you not work every day including Friday? Especially Friday?

When I attempt gentle conversations with teachers about the mathematics behind all that lost time, the response is crickets and crickets; apparently there are no native frogs in Vanuatu.

Joseph just came to the door to ask for cold water for workers in the gardens. He didn’t try the juice scam today. Joseph tells me that school is closed because there is no water. The kids must have been told that yesterday afternoon. I’m feeling a bit cynical about this news, it smacks of convenience.

We did run out of water on Tuesday afternoon so kids were sent home at lunchtime. Apparently the pump stopped and the one and only man that can start the pump had gone to Lamin. I suggested to Mr D that it would be a good idea if other people were able to start the pump in case that one man is ever away from Ekipe. He agreed. Wonder if that will ever happen? Uh oh, here comes cynical again.

Okay, I’m nearly done with the school news but before I leave the topic, let me share with you the week of an unidentified teacher at an undisclosed school.

Monday: Public holiday of Constitution Day which coincided with International Teachers’ Day. Went to Vila to celebrate Teachers Day and consumed a large portion of two cartons of cheap red wine with other teachers. Got really drunk. Went home. Couldn’t find phone.

Tuesday: Hung over, couldn’t face work so stayed at home.

Wednesday: Went to work but still hurting from Monday. Happily, its Year 8 Fundraising Day at school so only two hours of lessons today.

Thursday: Didn’t go to school; went to Port Vila to find phone which might have left at the markets in Vila. Would have looked for phone before today if hadn’t felt like shit for past few days. Spent hours looking but didn’t find phone. Went home. Principal rang that night and told me my phone was at school where I left it charging on Monday before I went to Vila and got drunk.

Friday: No water at school. Hooray! Luckily told my class yesterday not to come to school today. Went to Vila with friends.

Onto other jocularity!

Sometimes we watch The Chaser on a week day afternoon. It’s much more entertaining than the news. If we want to be depressed, we’ll watch a bit of the news. Anyway, this morning, at four thirty, I woke up giggling in memory of a moment from yesterday’s show.

Question: In which sport would you be doing the scissors?

Response: Horse jumping.

Every time I get the mental image of a horse scissoring its legs up to and over a jump, I start laughing.

Here’s the kick. That contestant was a teacher!

It was Jo-tu’s first month celebration last Sunday. I made arrangements on Friday to make a cake for the occasion. Yes, they’d like that. Yes, they’d be at home, nothing planned on Sunday except possibly church in the morning.

I made the cake on Sunday morning. Edmond and his new ‘wife’ came up for lunch which was very pleasant, Anna is a lovely lady. Anna brought along her three year old niece from the island of Epi who was initially terrified in the presence of us ghosts as she’d never seen a white man close up before. Soon she was drawing and laughing and being utterly engaging and adorable.

They were still sitting on the verandah late in the afternoon so we all hopped in the truck and took the cake down to Bethel only to discover that everyone had gone to Vila. We bought the cake back home. Everyone said, ‘I want cake’, so we cut a slice off the end and ate it.

Ten minutes later, Michel rings and tells Tim that the Bethelites have just returned. Oops. Back down to Bethel we went with most of a cake. I blamed Anna’s niece for the missing bit; it’s okay, she doesn’t understand English.

We had a nice afternoon tea and Tim took some photos which he made into a slideshow.

Jo-tu at one month old! This is the slideshow Tim made from his photos - turn up the sound!

Elizabeth wouldn’t come down for the cake, lolly, biscuit and Bongo smorgasbord. She couldn’t look at the food without wanting to eat it and she is trying to drop her blood sugar levels.

“Afta, mi dring kava,” she said to me.

“Kava is better for you than cake,” I agreed. Better for her, not for me.

Silas came up the other evening to pick up his phone which had been charging. As usual Silas likes to take a peek at what Tim is cooking on the Weber. Tim lifted the lid. There lay sizzling, three smallish forelegs, much smaller than a cow or a pig.

“Too many dogs round here,” said Tim. “The three legged one wasn’t as quick as the others.”

Silas’s jaw dropped to his knees. Silas, avid consumer of flying fox and beach worms could not believe what he was seeing. And hearing. For once, he was speechless.

I was the one that tried to explain the joke, Tim was happy to let Silas go and spread the news that the waetman were eating the village dogs.

“Leg blong sheep,” I explained. “Legs of sheep. Tim got them from the supermarket in Port Vila.”

I’m not convinced that Silas was convinced.

OK, I’ve got to hang the sheets out as I want them back on the bed this arvy. It’s a good day for drying here, warm and sunny with a steady breeze.

Have a good one and hopefully we can talk this weekend or soon. x x x x x x x x x x

Friday October 16

Mangoes on my mind

Quarter to nine here and even though I slept in and missed dawn, I’ve already done a trip to Epule and cleaned the bathroom from top to bottom.

I went to Epule to pick up Sophie and take her to school. Yesterday morning we’d had the following conversation.

Me: So tomorrow is ‘Good’ Friday.

Her: Yes, it’s Good Friday.

Me: So there’s no school. I won’t need to come and pick you up in the morning.

Her: No.

Tim took Sophie home in the afternoon. When he came back, we had this conversation.

Him: Sophie asked me if you could come and pick her up to take her to school tomorrow.

Me: I talked with her about this already. It is Good Friday so there won’t be any school.

Him: Sophie says there will be lessons in the morning and then she’s going into Vila with the teachers. She asked if you were going into Vila but I said no.

Me: Okay then, I’ll pick her up in the morning but I’ll be annoyed if she’s not there waiting for me.

So this morning, I was annoyed.

I was cranky that Sophie hadn’t rung to tell me that she didn’t need a lift because I’ve asked her to do that but when I checked my phone for a message I saw that TVL service was down so I couldn’t be too cranky, maybe she did try to phone.

The Sophie run is only valid for the next few weeks. I’ve suggested that she gets a bike next year. With her long legs it would only be a ten minute ride from Epule to school.

Tim tells me that we’ve managed to rack up one hundred kilometres in the truck in the last few days just in local trips. I’m not surprised. I did a clinic run on Thursday, full up with mamas, babies, one little kid with an infected tooth and one big kid needing stitches removed from his thumb. After dropping everyone at the clinic I headed further north to take Leikarie to the bank at Emua. She wanted to put some money into her son’s bank account but when she does this in Vila, she is charged a fee. She’s discovered that Emua doesn’t charge fees so she put her class on hold for the morning and asked to come on the clinic run. After the transaction we headed back to the clinic, waited until everyone was inspected and injected then headed back to Ekipe.

I stopped lessons at school this week. I’m taking running records on the hundred students that I work with.

Mr A told me a few weeks ago that lessons stop at the end of week 9 and revision begins in week 10. I was thinking of revision in the literal sense, honing different skills and concepts taught during the year in preparation for an unseen written assessment. I thought I’d be able to continue withdrawing students during that week.

On Tuesday morning, I had a mini revelation. I was in the library sorting books before the bell rang when it hit me; when Mr A said ‘revision,’ he meant practising the actual exams so I must finish my data before revision begins as I don’t want to disadvantage any child by causing them to miss exam practice.

Our garden is growing well. I have enough carrots to feed a hundred rabbits until Easter. The capsicum are huge, locals can’t believe how big the fruit is as they usually pick them when very small. Just leave them on the bush for longer and they will grow bigger, we tell people. We have a steady supply of tomatoes, parsley, rocket and spring onions. The snow peas are almost finished but we’ll have beans shortly. Lettuce and cucumber seedlings have just been planted in the garden beds; Tim grew them from seed in a seed tray. The watermelon and honeydew melon vines have recently started to run across the beds and the pineapples seem to have taken root, their spikes have got longer and turned a deeper green.

The broccoli was a waste of time. We ended up with only one head as the other plants were all attacked by a horde of caterpillars that devoured the flowering centre. This happened over night. We look at the garden several times a day and hadn’t noticed any hatching until early one morning and by then, the damage was irreparable so we pulled out most of the plants.

I bought my first mangoes of the season yesterday from the Emua roadmarket while Leikarie was in the bank. I ate one last night and even though it was green on the outside, it was orange under the skin and tasted good. We won’t have a landslide of mangoes this year as it must have rained when the trees were flowering but I’m sure there will be more than enough to go around.

I must have had mangoes on my mind recently because the day before I bought the fresh mangoes, I remembered that I had one container of diced mangoes from last year still in the freezer. On the lid of the container was written ‘Apple mangoes for Georgia & Stef 3.11.19’. I’d saved them in the hope that you would be visiting us sometime during this past year. As it is almost mango season again, I took them out of the freezer and we ate them with pawpaw for dessert that night then I made mango and banana pikelets for lunch the next day. The frozen mangoes were pretty good, not as nice as fresh, but better than canned. They would have tasted even better if you had been here sharing them.

There was a lot of action on Elizabeth’s new outdoor kitchen yesterday. I don’t know how or why but E told me that she was paying the builder that she’d hired, 5000 vatu each day, the same weekly wage as a casual teacher, equivalent to about $60. That is a helluva lot of money to be paying a builder who has no offsiders. So far, the wooden frame is complete. E may have run out of money to pay the builder. Yesterday, Jimmy arranged for two mates to come and give him a hand to put the iron on the roof. Three people, one hammer. We discovered that bit of classic organisation when one of the men wandered up to ask Apu Tim if he had a hammer or two to lend.

There’s been no sound of hammering today. Hope the little ones haven’t wandered off into the jungle with the hammers.

Have a lovely day and I’ll talk with you soon. Love Mum x x x x x x x

Saturday 24 October

Just re-read my last email to you and remembered that Tim lent Jimmy and the boys his hammer eight days ago. It hasn’t been returned yet so Tim will need to track it down which is annoying.

Didn’t get around to writing an email to you yesterday; it really didn’t feel like Friday, I realise how stupid this sounds as I write it but yesterday felt like next Tuesday. My head is full up with reading records as I’ve been doing them all week.

Not much else seems to have happened. I actually had a clinic free week. Better touch wood as the week isn’t over yet.

Okay, just a quickie today. If you are up and about in the morning, we usually skype with M & D from 8am (sharp!) to 9. If not then we’ll talk to you later in the day. x x x x x x x

Friday October 30, 2020

Hello, how are you?

I’ve had another week full of running records, going to school Monday to Thursday to finish the 3 classes before revision week starts next week. I have all but two done, those kids have been absent for a week or more. Found out two kids have recently dropped out of Year 4, no doubt a few more will not return to school next year.

These big weeks take me back to pre-retirement days, with less stress, sure, but I can’t stop my brain from constantly thinking about work, results and future directions which leaves no room for other, personal things. I’m pushing myself to finalise this stuff asap as I’d like to then forget about school for two and a half months and get on with things other than school. Maybe even find the time to go for a swim! Two more weeks should finish it up I reckon.

Tim has been to Vila today. He just rung, he’s on his way back so I thought I’d dash off a quick email to you before he comes back. When he does, there’ll be an hour of unpacking supplies from the car and putting them in their storage places. Hope he remembers the brandy. I’m ready for one now.

We had a major weevil attack in the dried foods in our storage. Think they started in the wholemeal lasagna. They were so bad, they got into rice, chick peas, noodles, pasta and even sugar! Couldn’t believe it, they chewed through thick plastic bags to get into the sugar. We had been putting bags of rice into the freezer for a week to kill any weevil eggs. Tim has googled it & says that we should have kept them in the freezer for three weeks. We think it will be even better if we just keep all that stuff in the freezer permanently, until we use it. With the big chest freezer, should be enough room.

Cyclone season officially starts the day after tomorrow so we are trying to ensure that we have more than enough supplies on hand. It is predicted to be a much wetter year so we are expecting flooding rains over the next five months too. The ring road is cut quite quickly in heavy rains.

The garden is going really well. Beans have just started. Watermelons are flowering. The current star is the capsicums, they are the freshest I have ever eaten; the juice explodes in your mouth when you bite into a piece.

Mary came up this morning with a bag of freshly dug kumala for me and I was able to give her a pawpaw, capsicum and carrots in exchange. Nice!

Won’t be many mangoes this year – less than I expected although apparently there are plenty further north and around to the north-west of Efate, probably because they get less rain than we do even though it’s only a distance of 15 – 20 km away. The tree right next to our house seems to only have two mangoes on it. Last year, there were too many to count and I could reach bunches of them hanging low to the ground. Flaen fokis (flying fox) will be disappointed this year. The apple mango has less than a hundred and the two trees below it have none at all. Interestingly, the trees are covered with a soft red flush of new leaves, really pretty but out of step with the season I think. I can see flowers on parts of the trees at the same time. They won’t turn into fruit as we have had, and will have, rain.

Edmond popped in for a visit last night, and ended up having dinner. His big news which he hasn’t told anybody in the family, is that…. yes, surprise, surprise…. the new missus is pregnant. One month gone apparently. They’ve been going out for 8 months or so.

We’ve taken a second stand on not recharging anyone’s phones/tablets/laptops/sound boxes/torches/power packs this week. Espel arrived on Monday morning at 6am with her sound box and Sila’s phone was the last thing to be collected at 7pm that night. Enough! It’s getting as silly as last year when we had to cease all charging. Bottom line is that Joel & Jimmy need to replace the inverter that Tim bought and installed about two years ago. It lasted about two years.

The power itself is not a problem for us, we have plenty, it’s the continual flow of people bearing items that we charge up day after day because they seem to flatten the devices over-night, every night. There are constant interruptions and it doesn’t matter if you’re trying to have a little nap, people will continue to sing out until they get you up. Sending the littlest kids to run the equipment around is also a problem for us, it suits the adults very well as they don’t have to do any running around.

Tim made a comment this week saying that people only seem to visit us when they want something. I thought he could be right but then Michel came up the next day and had a social visit for a few hours with him which was nice.

OK, well he’s back now, the shopping is packed away: 200 rolls of loo paper, 10 cans fly spray, 20 UHT milks and six packs of poppadums amongst other things. We discovered that poppadums go really well with Mexican mince, salsa and rice and oh, so easy to puff them up in the microwave!

I’m sipping on a brandy with the first of the season’s Tahitian limes. Can’t wait until my tree is bearing.

All righty, hope you had a great day and we’ll talk soon. Maybe Sunday?

x x x x x x x x x x x x x x

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