March 6 Update

I really gotta invest in some tape:

I will not feed the monkeys.
I will not feed the monkeys.
I will not feed the monkeys.
I will not feed the monkeys.
I will not feed the monkeys.

People reeeeeally don’t like it when you feed the monkeys. Some people just shake their heads and say, “You’re not supposed to feed the monkeys.” Other people give lectures. For instance, “Monkeys are wild animals; when you feed a wild animal there are only two possible results – you die or the animal dies.” That’s very sad – but have you seen the way they dart their little eyes around and zero in on the food and sometimes take it from your hand? It’s adorable.

Matt loves to tell the story of how I got (lovingly, I like to think) boo’ed at the year-end meeting where all the volunteers gave presentations, for showing this video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dTi-UU3SWHw

of me feeding the monkeys. I loved the fact that I got boo’ed – who else gets boo’ed while explaining their missionary activities? That’s gotta be a first!

However, I will not feed the monkeys on the property, because people are often hanging around and don’t want to be harassed. I get that. But that’s as much as I’m going to agree to. Anywhere else I see a monkey I will do everything in my power to get it to hold my hand, ride in the basket on my bike (I don’t have a bike), and be my best friend. I’m sorry. Kick me out of Africa if that’s a problem. I like monkeys.

Back in BEC

I went to the BEC on Tuesday. My introvert corner was still there, and when I ventured out, Matt, Siphwe, Maxwell, and I had some good discussions. I escaped to McDonald’s for a little while to drink coffee. Just like old times.

There’s usually some entertainment to be had at some point during the day at the BEC. That day it was a guy who came in and preached to Siphwe. He talked non-stop for about 15 minutes. I was in the corner working on something else, so I had pretty much tuned him out until he stood up and walked around, shaking all our hands and giving us a title as he did so. There were five of us in there, and for some reason he deemed Matt “the king” and then wandered over to my corner and said, “Ahh, and the queen.” I couldn’t help myself. I said, “Wait, why are the white people the king and queen?” He didn’t appear to hear me. As he was leaving, he summed up by saying, “You know what they say, ‘The heart is willing but sometimes you sleep.'” “That’s what they say,” I agreed cheerily. And just like that, he was gone.

Fashion Freak

I always wander across the street to this store. I almost bought an outfit for the equivalent of $1.99 US, but I couldn’t tell if it was a shirt or a dress.

[This made me giggle.]

Happy’s – School for the Physically Disabled

This week we went to Happy’s during school hours, something I’d never done before. Our Friday afternoon Bible class is done after school, when the kids are pretty much left to their own devices. It was nice to see some structure going on in the daytime. I got to meet Happy, the awesome Zulu lady who’s the school principal. (The school isn’t really called “Happy’s.” That’s its nickname because of this lady.)

Before I came back from the US, Crissie and Yvette took some time to go to a couple of Occupational Therapy schools, to observe what they do with the kids and try to bring what we can to Happy’s. I’ve observed a lot of OT, and implemented some basic therapies with the kids I’ve worked with throughout the years, so I was happy to be a part of this.

Yvette was a little nervous about working with kids with physical disabilities in a hands-on way. I don’t have tons of experience in this area, but a few of my kids have had dual-diagnoses – autism and cerebral palsy, for instance. I told her it takes a lot to break a kid.

Five of us went – Yvette, Crissie, Sonya, Helen, and me. When we arrived, Yvette informed the teachers that we were new at this and kind of nervous, which was a good decision – it’s nice when the teachers retain ownership of the class and are active in participating, interpreting, and offering suggestions.

Most of the kids had good use of their hands; some were missing a finger or two, but were well able to participate in the activities – which included exercises with rubber bands, Play-Doh, and shaving cream. Yvette noticed one kid whose hands were turned in and he could barely move his fingers – no functional use of his hands at all. I zoned in on him and tried to figure out how to adapt the exercises.

It’s not a good thing, but I have a tendency to assume the children at Happy’s have intellectual disabilities as well. Some do, but many do not. I don’t talk down to the kids regardless, but sometimes I’m surprised when one of them suddenly displays a level of intelligence or awareness I was wrongly assuming they didn’t possess. This kid was one of those.

I was using my high-pitched, “I’m talking to a young child” voice, which there’s nothing wrong with in general. But then I realized he was responding to quite a lot of my instructions and prompts in English, which told me he was older and more aware than I thought. I asked his age and he said 13. He was still quite immature in his responding (one-word replies or no reply), but I started interacting with him like a 13-year-old, asking – somewhat rhetorically – how he thought we could adapt certain things that the other kids were doing. I just jumped in and started manipulating his arms and hands as best I could, gauging his facial responses to make sure I wasn’t hurting him (I wasn’t). At one point I whispered to Sonya, “This kid’s got potential for a much greater range of motion.”

While working with Play-Doh, the kids were told to poke it with their pencil. I picked up this boy’s pencil and it was wet. Oh. Sure enough, when I held it out to him, he opened his mouth. He was able to poke around on the Play-doh, and did impressively well; but I doubt he could ever functionally write this way. I kept looking at his hands, wondering how hard they’d tried at getting him to hold a big fat pencil. He seemed to have somewhat of an ability to pinch, which I want to play around with next time.

When it was time for snack, I (not wanting to assume) asked him if I needed to put the food in his mouth. He nodded. I noticed he had a “weak manding repertoire,” meaning low ability or inclination to request what he needed/wanted. The biscuit was laying right there but he waited for me to ask if he wanted more. The ability to request without someone saying, “What do you want?” is important, for basic human dignity reasons, but also for safety – everyone needs a voice and the ability to tell what they do and do not want without thinking they have to wait for permission. If this had been a child with autism, I would have expected it to take days/weeks to teach this skill – through a precise method of prompting and prompt-fading – but this guy clearly didn’t have autism, and after just a couple of gestural prompts he was saying, “biscuit” consistently when he was ready for a bite. Smart kid.

Also in this class was the little (9-year-old) girl who had told us she was thinking of killing herself. She recognized me, but we couldn’t communicate. She seems to understand a little English, but her words – whether English or Zulu – seem unintelligible. (She had told us through the interpretation of Teddy, another student.) Today she was all smiles. I said, “I remember you!” and then asked if I could see her hand, where she had fallen and had a cut that stayed open for a while because it wasn’t being taken care of properly. She had a scar but it looked like it had healed okay. I whispered, “You weren’t doing so well last time I saw you. Are you feeling better?” She just grinned and continued with the activities.

Afterwards Yvette and I went to talk to Happy about the autism classroom, which we’ve just discovered. The kids were on a break, but I’m looking forward to seeing what goes on in that class and if I can get my hands on some kids. : ) I’m going a little crazy having been out of the ABA field for several months.

Lamontville

Tuesday afternoon I got to see Masande and Anele for the first time since being back. After being tackled by them, I couldn’t help but notice something different.

[They had both had their hair buzzed.]

“When did you do this?” I asked. Masande played it perfectly, declaring, “when you left me,” while wearing her saddest face. A few minutes later she brought me this picture (I’m not sure if the “lost in the ‘forset'” part is a reference to a story I told them when they slept over, about how I got lost for several hours at night once – that I’m pretty sure they slept through – or if it was just a coincidence).

Not long after, she and her sister made me close my eyes so they could lead me outside (there’s a trust exercise for sure), where this was waiting on the chalk board. I think they were buttering me up, because they persistently asked when they could come sleep over again and weren’t satisfied with my first answer of “never.”

Of course, after two months of not seeing me, the most common comment I got from every single girl was, “Oh, did you get a new phone?!”

I used to do a Bible discussion class with the older girls on Tuesdays. I didn’t know if they would be there, so I hadn’t prepared anything; but I took the oldest two (ages 12 and 13) and we went out into the youth room. I asked if they’d read anything interesting in the Bible lately.

One of them immediately popped out with, “Did you know there’s a place in the Bible where it says there is no God?” I knew what they were talking about and recognized it as a psalm, but couldn’t place where it was (Psalm 14:1, they quickly informed me). Then they both mentioned some verses in Romans and we read a couple of chapters there. I’m always impressed with how much they know biblically.

I read them part of Psalm 91, a psalm I’ve been thinking about lately, and asked them what it means for God to shelter us under His wings. We weren’t really in class mode this week (I was half-asleep still and one of them was biting the fingers off a plastic frog) but we had a pretty good discussion. Then I asked what they wanted to talk about next week.

It’s always either boy issues or friend issues, wrapped up in different names. This time it was “truth and trust.” Okay, got it. Somebody’s being a bad friend. They were able right away to give me several biblical examples related to this topic (“I am the way, the truth, the life”; Peter denying Christ). And, “Jessie, you know Jezebel?” “Yep.” “She was a lying evil woman. Did no good all the time.” Pretty much.

I don’t know what kind of resources they have at home, or if they have the ability to look up verses on specific topics; but I asked Noci, the one whose idea the topic was, to prepare a 1-2 minute summary of what she could find biblically that relates to the topic. Next week the word will spread and there will likely be 8-10 girls. Especially if I bring chocolate.

We were technically there for “Homework Club,” which runs simultaneously with my class with the older girls. After a few minutes I sent the girls in to help Matt with the younger kids. Since I’ve been gone, someone made the mistake of buying coloured balls like you’d find in a ball pit. I’ll admit that I practiced my juggling as much as I helped with homework. But several of the girls seem to have juggling potential, so maybe we’ll put on a show. Hmm, how to tie that in with the Bible.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UEh2TX5cyiA

Finally (Mostly) Over The Jetlag

I think I’m pretty much back on schedule (I am typing this at 2:30 in the morning, but I’ll probably be able to go back to sleep). So far, so good on getting up early. I’ve eaten breakfast 2 days in a row. That’s probably never happened before. It’s hard to eat breakfast when you don’t eat pork and you’re not overly fond of cereal. I also try to avoid just fruit in the mornings, and I’m trying to limit animal products. Not a lot of options left. But Spar has a deli counter and I discovered that I can get a plate of sautéed mushrooms and tomatoes for 9 Rand (90 cents). This morning I also sprung for a ginger beer, since I hadn’t had one since I’ve been back.

Mariannhill

We went to the Mariannhill crèche Wednesday. (On the way, I found myself saying this phrase, “The road signs [on a particular trip we had taken] were rubbish.” My American English is taking a beating here.

There’s a new batch of crèche kids, along with a few familiar faces.

This little girl…

…kept coming up and kissing my hand and then looking at me lovingly and rattling away in Zulu. My standard response to this behavior (the Zulu-speaking, not the kissing) is to just start making faces. They inevitably imitate. She turned it around and started initiating the funny faces, making me imitate her. She was quite enjoyable.

Tim told a Bible story and then we let the kids climb around on us. I found a good back workout. It goes like this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HRvHcdXzyGs

In conjunction with this I learned three new Zulu words: “asambe” – “let go”; “ima” – “wait”; and “bamba” – “hold on.” I asked Vester how to say “later,” since I could only do this so many times in a row. She paused, then replied, “We say ‘later’ too.”

Wednesday Night Class

It was good to be back at the BEC class. This is a class taught by Bro. Barry, attended mostly by Zulu and Congolese brothers who have gotten baptized after going through the BEC correspondence courses. It’s a really in-depth class and I get a lot out of it.

[My good friend Maxwell and me]

Barry’s currently out of town, so Glenn (volunteer from Australia, husband of Crissie) was teaching tonight – about Jonah. It was a good class, the highlight of which was when he asked the class, “Have you read Moby Dick?” Silence. “Have you heard of Moby Dick?” Silence. Then he muttered something into his hand and continued. After class I told him I found that moment hilarious, but I wasn’t sure I could transcribe his phrase onto my blog. “I said, ‘Heaven help us,'” he informed me. Okay, we’ll go with that.

Several of the guys were discussing going to Zimbabwe for a Bible conference in a few weeks. I quickly invited Matt and myself along, and I’m really excited about the prospect. One of my goals was to go to another African country while here, so it looks like I might get to check that off early!

Matt and I have a standing invitation for dinner at Barry and Wendith’s on Wednesdays after class, but they’re gone for the month of March. I suggested we go out somewhere, so as to maintain the night as a fun thing. Matt informed me that Wednesdays are two for one night at Waxy O’Connor’s, a nearby pub. So off we went.

Interesting South African fact: the car guards are drunk about 50% of the time. “Good thing it’s not valet parking,” I said to Matt, as we left our car in the care of a guy who claimed to be a soldier and warned us that we were likely to be “stabbed, shot, or killed” if not for his skillful intercession. Then he yelled after us, asking why we weren’t wearing shoes…

A Few Extra Pictures