Once again I have taken my volunteer’s name out for anonymity
Swimming like fishes
“After the yesterday’s previous outing to the forest it was decided on-pretty much by the kids- that the beach would be the outing for today. I use the term “beach” very loosely as in actual fact we ended up going to the “Green Hole” at Leisure Isle which is really just a shallow type of moat which circles the island on the one side and is really safe for little kids especially as our local municipality and 4 lifesavers on guard. That in itself was a great relief as ALL the kids were in the water apart from Lamla, one of the teenagers, who was not feeling 100% that day.
As soon as we got there my volunteer smothered the kids in factor 60 sunscreen before they all ran down to the water’s edge and started splashing around. Some of the kids are really good swimmers considering they have had no formal lessons and there is no public pool in the township for them to practice swimming. They were like little fishes apart from little Beauty who was a little bit more cautious and got really animated every time she saw a crab.
I had bought my laptop with so caught up with work leaving my volunteer fully in charge with the kids which is no mean feat when you have 11 kids ranging from 4 years old to 17 years old but she coped like a natural. She is actually so good with the kids, firm yet gentle and patient and the kids are already showing trust and respect with her.
After quite awhile the kids got tired of splashing around and came back for cool drink and to dry off. On the way back to the safe house we could not resist to just let them have a little bit more fun and stopped at a local park where the kids got to play on the swings, slide and round-about. Little Beauty was particularly enthralled with the slide-which seemed abnormally high to me- and went sliding down it repeatedly. Even little Toffee got into the “swing” of things and braved its heights and finally slid down it after a bit of nervousness.
Slide in the sky
My volunteer and Lamla then spent time working on their biceps and triceps pushing the younger ones on the swings while I got to bail out of the hard work by taking photos.
Once again on the drive home-just like the day before- heads started nodding, everything went quiet and the kids started dropping off drained from expending so much energy”
Loves and life on the Garden Route in South Africa 