a typical day

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A Typical Day

Not really, so let’s make one up from lots of other days with all the best
Alarm goes off at 5.45 giving me a bit of snoozing time while the temperature is still pleasant.
Getting Geoff out of bed is just as hard here as at home!!!
Luckily we have a good bathroom with a shower and a western toilet. Plus geckoes and fireflies and cockroaches!! But we think that problem may be solved for abit due to nasty chemical spray, try not to stand on crunchy nearly dead bodies when visiting the bathroom at night in a power cut!

Early morning is a good time to do the washing again due to cooler temperatures. I have a big plastic bowl and we put the clothes in water overnight -the soak and hope method of washing—the water is always very grey as the dust is a big problem. Infact my typing finger are black having just written this short piece and even having dusted the key board before I began. Anyway, washing gets hung up on hangers from the trees or draped over the bushed and part from the odd bird footprint it is dry by the time we get back after lunch.

Breakfast-it is lovely to sit in the veranda and listen to the birds, the mosque and the world service while we eat fried eggs with hot greasy paratha. Remember the malaria pills and drink lots of water . The cooker we have access to runs off a bio gas digester and some days there is gas and other days none so on good days we boil water like there is a big baby due! The unreliability of the gas is why we don’t cook our own food. I think I may have forgotten how to do it!!

Off to school—such a long walk—in the VSO guidelines you are advised to vary your route to work but unless we climb over the wall or walk backwards we can’t complie with that advice!
The farm yard is always interesting and at the moment we have to walk round huge mountains of wheat that are being shovelled into gunny sacks and loaded on colourful lorries to be taken to the seed merchants.

At the High School the girls have organised themselves into assembly and this part of the day usually runs without the help of teachers who arrive on the transport at anytime between 8 and 8.30 depending on, well, the weather, how fast Uncle driver drives, how many donkey carts or buffalo have to be passed or if anyone needs shopping etc!! Time seems to have a different meaning here and yet most things appear to get done eventually! You are either waiting around for something to happen and then -‘lets go!’ and it is all happening.

We all have a group of girls after assembly to work on oral English—I have written a simple programme of introductions and conversations and circle games. Everyone seems to be enjoying the games!

Today Geoff spent much of the morning trying to load the very cheap, so probably not legal, copies of Encarta and Encyclopaedia Britannica onto the 2 computers that actually work in the High School! It is so frustrating ,we bought 4 but 2 have had to go back and due to transport and language problems it is hard to know when/if they are coming back. It is usually the case that everything is nearly nearly loaded when----opps -power goes off!
We really hope that he can get all the computers up and running before we leave. We have been promised a UPS and a printer by Syed Barbar Ali’s son ,who visited on Sunday with his all male entourage.
{this meant that we had to be about to join the school/farm /dairy tour come inspection and to eat lunch while making polite conversation and trying to ask in a round-a-bout way for fans and more staffing for

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Photos

for DAD!
Thought you might like to check out the electrics!

tea and biscuits!
It is nice to sit here as a breeze often blows through.

garden view
the white building is the guest house where are room is

mending the pump
think I told you about our 30 hour power cut! No water either so they fixed this pump to get water for washing and toilet

little owl
a pair of these live in the beautiful huge pepil tree just outside the kitchen door

wheat mountain
the yard has been full of wheat it threatens to take over completely!

buffalo pool
we go past the buffalo pool on our walk and am almost inclined to join them on really hot days!

jackal
there are lots of these about. we see them everyday when walking and hear them howling at night

straw lorry
they send the wheat straw to be made into paper. it is a pain when you meet one of these on the road!

buffalo ploughing
ploughing with buffalo between the rows of sugar cane

corridor classroom
local girls school we took a science/art lesson in this space based on leaves

science lesson
this is rabia she is my hope for child frtendly education in Pakistan!

kerry
another vso volunteer who came the same time as us came to stay for a week it was lovely havung a friend to talk to!

leaf rubbing
I got some wax crayons in Lahore and as part of our work on leaves we did leaf rubbing and made trees!

Comments

[judy brown]

great blog
I loved reading this, the best yet you are really getting the hang of this! Keep it up. xxxxx

[Tony P]

Liked the photos
What a shame your adventure is to be brought to a premature end. How quickly time goes by - it doesn't seem all that long since you left. Still, we'll all look forward to your stories (over a bottle of wine perhaps?). Actually, we've been pulling your leg - we've won the lottery and all handed our notice in, so you'll be on your own next September. AND you've shot yourself in the foot because we can see how well you can cope in difficult conditions... Ha, ha! Love Tony.