Biohazards and purple rice

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Woke up this morning with a cold. Drank a cup of coffee, a pot of tea, half a box of juice, used up a whole box of tissues, and by lunch I was A O K. Now that’s how you battle a cold! It was no doubt from one of the children, as they spend all day breathing in my ear, coughing under my chin, and wiping their hands on my face. Tom quite succinctly describes them as biohazards. Biohazards with cute little faces: the deadliest of hazards! A hazard with a cute smile-filled sugar coating. Ok, now I’m going overboard. But you get the picture: kids are germ-bags!

This morning the children sang a lot of songs, and then had to do an alphabet maze which they struggled with. Some children just coloured in the whole page, and ignored the maze all together.

Today Rebecca and I took the children in their two-by-eleven line to the local park. I carried a box of toys along (sand-pit toys like cups, sieves and pans) and the moment we got to the park, a dozen little arms started pulling on my clothes for me to put the box down. Before the box hit the grass, the wolves ripped into their prey, grabbing as many toys each as they could carry.

One arm filled with toys, the other hand gripping someone else’s toy, one little girl would not let go. Next thing, there are four little girls fighting over the same sieve. It was dirty, old, and a little broken, but there was something special about it. Rock paper scissors put a stop to the blooming bud of war. Five minutes after the battle, the sieve was tossed aside unwanted.

On the walk home, a man had parked his car, and we had to move around it, (not the simplest thing with 400 children). The children were stopped and told ‘Do not touch!’ Twenty one of the children walked past very neatly and nicely, but the twenty-second couldn’t resist poking the man in the bum on the way past. I nearly choked. The man pretended it didn’t happen, and the little twenty-second went back to walking nicely, totally un-phased by his actions.

Lunchtime brings out the drama-queen in a number of the students as they refuse to eat their lunch. One method to get them to eat is to treat them like a baby and put the spoon to their mouth: this is usually met with a huff and a snatch of the spoon to feed themselves. However, two of the students were quite happy to be fed by the aeroplane spoon. Whatever gets them to eat is fine by me. After they finish, they have to show their teacher their empty bento box, and put it in the big tub. A few children tried to sneak past me, but if they’re not going to let me cheat at UNO, then there is no way I’m going to let them cheat at lunch!

At about 2.30 I headed home, and spent the afternoon making a red-wine risotto (AKA purple rice!)

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