Trip to a nearby village

A combi

Two weeks ago I went with my family to a village near Gaborone called Gabane ["Ha-ban-ee"]. To get there we went in a kind of bus that is called a "combi." A combi is a big white van that takes people to towns and places outside of Gaborone. They are not expensive.

Me and my family waiting for the combi

Inside the combi

We rode in the back seat

The seats in the aisles fold down so that people can sit there

In the village, there were lots of little stands that sold fruit and stuff like snacks. There were lots of dirt roads. The only paved road was the main road into the village. All of the combis went on that road and stopped at the end of it at a big combi stop.

A store in the center of the village with a bar and butcher

There were big drainage channels that went through the village with lots of garbage in them. There are lots of donkey that walk around. We saw some donkeys with their front feet tied together so they would not wander away.

A drainage channel

A fruit store in the center of the village

Donkeys

When we got to Gabane, we went to this place where people make pots. One place made clay pots and another place made aluminum pots for cooking. I played soccer with a kid there. At the aluminum pot place they melt old aluminum and pour it into molds made of soil [mixed with a chemical called bentonite to make it firm]. They make pots one at a time.

Playing soccer outside the aluminum pot place

Inside the aluminum pot place

Where they melt the aluminum

We hiked up this big hill that was outside the village. It had this big stone path that we went on, but when we got up to this water tank that was there, the path ended, so we hiked the rest of the way to the top through the bushes. And then when we went down, we went through a dry riverbed and then we went up a little ridge and went down that. When we got to the bottom, we went to a store and got some cold drinks [fortunately it was overcast and not too hot].

Hiking up the hill

The view looking back towards Gaborone

Looking down on the village from the hill

Some houses in the village

On top of the hill

Can you see us coming down through the bushes?

One the way back to the combi stop, we saw some people who had killed a goat and they were skinning it so they could eat it. They said that it took them two hours to skin and prepare the goat.

Skinning the goat

Letter to Japanese class and school photos

Cricket lessons

The front of my castle

The back of my castle

My classroom

The School I go to in Botswana

I am in standard 2, which is second grade. All of the standard 1's and 2's have assembly first thing on Wednesday. At the assembly you like practice songs about different things. One song is about saying hello in different languages. It goes something like "hello, bonjour, buenos dias..." but I don't remember the whole song. Sometimes the standard 1 or 2 class sings a song at assembly and sometimes we get awards. My teacher gave me an award for "Super Work." It said on the back: "A very creative shield and castle! Well done. You are also trying very hard to improve your handwriting. You read so beautifully!"

The standard 2 classes sit in lines before class starts

Each class gets up to walk to the classrooms

My class walking to the classroom

Well, we are learning about castles and knight. One thing I am doing in class is making a castle out of lots of milk cartons and cereal boxes and stuff. I also made a picture of a knight and a shield and a knight jousting. Jousting is something where knights have these big poles and they're on horses and they try to knock each other off the horses with the poles.

A knight that I colored

I also have these handwriting books that I practice cursive in. The school thinks that having good handwriting is very important. I also do this thing where I write about what I did on weekends and draw pictures to go with the writing. I have this math book too that I do times tables and stuff in. In music I practice the songs that I might do at assemblies and the songs that everybody does at assemblies. I also play "boom-whackers", which are these plastic tubes that you hit on your hands to make music.

The swimming pools

We swim a lot at my school because it is hot here. The pool is outdoors also. When I swim, I practice like breaststroke and diving. Sometimes I have to swim across the pool the long way, which is like 100 feet.

Swimming class

Swimming class

In computers I play different games on the computer. One of them was called "Globs." In Globs there's six different colors; the first one's green, then yellow, then blue, then purple, then orange. Those colors were spread out across in different places, so you had to connect the globs by clicking on the different colors and getting them to squish together.

My class lining up for Setswana class

We also have Setswana class. Setswana is the native language of Botswana. I practice songs in Setswana and learn some words. This is how you say hello to boys: "Dumela Rra". And this is how you say hello to girls: "Dumela Mma". We also have library and PE.

The library

Outside of my classroom

In the afternoon after school on Tuesdays and Wednesdays I do afternoon activities. On Tuesdays I play like chess, tennis and basketball. On Wednesdays I am learning cricket. I have learned how to bowl, which is where you like pitch the ball to the batter.When you bowl, you have to keep your arm straight. You also have to make the ball bounce before it gets to the batter.

Cricket lessons

There's four different playgrounds at my school. Me and the rest of the standard 2's go in one of them. There's a game called "stuck in the mud" that we like to play. There's two people that are the mud, who try to tag you. If you get tagged, then you get stuck in the mud and the people who are the mud try to tag all of you, and if somebody gets to you and tags you is not a mud, then you are free. If you get tagged three times, then you are permanently stuck in the mud. Then when the mud gets everybody, the game is over.

One of the playgrounds at school

Playing in the playground

Near the front of the school

My teacher is Miss Mackay. She is from South Africa. She is really nice and has helped me a lot with my handwriting. Some of my friends are Tokelo, Nicholas, and Rhaino.

Miss Mackay

Me and Elliot getting ice cream after school

Biking in Botswana

Me and my brother's bikes

To get to school and stuff in Botswana, my dad got bikes for me and my brother.Our bike ride to school here is different from our bike ride to school in Seattle. First of all, we have to get up really early if we are going to bike to school because school starts at 7:15 AM. Coming home from school on our bikes, it's really hot, so I get tired and bike slowly. Today it was 90 degrees coming home!  In Seattle it totally isn't as hot as it is in Gaborone, but here there are no steep hills to get up like there are in Seattle. Another thing that is tricky is that people drive on the other side of the road here. When you are crossing streets, you can forget which way to look, so you have to be careful and listen to your dad.

 Me and my brother on the street in front of our house (this street is being widened)

This is me riding on the side of the street called Independence

We ride on the edge of the street, the side of the street, and on the sidewalks mostly, but the sidewalks are not really sidewalks because they are like sandy dirt paths. When it is windy, sand gets in your eyes.

This is a little dirt path that we take to go back to our house

This is on a sidewalk next to the street.  The wall you see is the wall around our apartment complex.  The big tower of dirt you see is a termite mound.

This is a dirt sidewalk near our house

The president's house is near our school. The street I like riding on the most is the one that goes to the president's house because there are like no cars on it (because only people that live in the house can go there). On that street, you don't have to watch out for traffic and stuff.

Another place we ride is this like long grassy area with dirt paths that go through it and trees, but no cars go through it.

One day before you guys did the Move-a-thon, me and my big brother did the Move-a-thon. I rode 27.9 miles and my big brother rode 32 miles.  We biked around our school. We counted by kilometers, not miles.

Me and my brother doing the Move-a-Thon

Me and my brother after the Move-a-Thon