Ben and I have now been in my home state, Western Australia, for 3 weeks of our 4-week visit. The time has gone quickly, but we have crammed in a lot of time with family and friends, and have celebrated both of my parent’s 70th birthdays.
As we are over the hump of our time here and are winding down, I wanted to ‘take stock’.
Making: memories. Being with family and dear friends fuels my soul. Having Ben here with me, watching him being part of my family, makes me beyond happy.
Cooking: with produce from the garden. What a treat to stay at the farm, where my mum, aunty and uncle live, and pick figs off the tree for a delicious fig compote. Or, to trawl my dad and step-mum’s garden for fresh herbs and veggies to make a vegetarian pasta sauce.
We also stopped at the incredible Bunbury Farmers’ Market where we stocked up on corn, melon, and kale to share with the family. I couldn’t get over how beautiful the arrays of produce were.
Drinking: WINE! My uncle put down a Methuselah of his Shiraz 10 years ago to gift to my dad for his 70th. We opened it over the weekend. Stunning. We’ve also been enjoying some of Western Australia’s incredible offerings.
Dad with his Methuselah of Shiraz Moombaki Tasting Room
Playing: KUBB! This is an outdoor game that is kind of like chess meets boules meets horseshoes. We’ve been playing matches for days. Ben, Dad and I hold the equal record for the highest number of KUBBs knocked over in a row (4).
Even the dogs take KUBB seriously
Reading: Outlander #7. Diana Gabaldon’s writing takes my breath away. Her storytelling is outdone only by her dexterity with prose. She both inspires and intimidates me as a writer. Both prompt me to work at my craft.
Next read: One of the many chicklit nooks I have lined up on my Kindle. It’s great to read within the genre I’m writing.
Deciding:Believe it or not, I am still deciding what clothes/stuff will make the cut to go to Bali in a week’s time. The rest with be gifted or shipped off to the next port of call.
Loving: Kangaroos and other assorted WA wildlife. I am never blasé about seeing kangaroos in the wild – they are magnificent animals. We’ve seen quite a few on our trip as most of our family live in rural or semi-rural settings. We’ve also seen a possum, a quenda, some bush rats, a baby dugite (snake), kookaburras, cockatoos, parakeets, wrens, and too many other birds to mention.
company on an early morning walkkookaburras are my fave
Watching: Three Billboards outside Ebbing, Missouri. We watched it last night. It was a truly unique and excellent film. We also saw The Greatest Showman at the cinema, which was a lot of foot-tapping fun.
Wearing: a new dress I bought (oops!). I am supposed to have all my clothes for the next leg (Bali) sorted. i am also supposed to be economising, but I saw a gorgeous dress in a local boutique and it fit perfectly. Of course, I had to buy it. I’m wearing it in the pic with my Dad above.
Enjoying: I am LOVING writing book two, I Think I Met Someone. I’m about 10K words in (of about 100K) and it’s so much fun finding out what Sarah gets up to next.
Admiring: My family; they’re my village. Not only do I love my family, I like them and am fortunate to count them amongst my close friends. They are all incredible people, each with their own beauty. We’ve had a blast this past month.
Feeling: grateful, present, and excited. I am a fortunate person to have so much love around me and to soon be embarking on the next part of our adventure. I’m trying to soak up and live every moment – and I am doing a pretty good job of it.
With thanks to Ben Reierson for many of these pics, and to Pip Lincolne and Allison Tait for this fun idea. This meme also includes the following if you’d like to play along too:
Over the past few weeks and months, Ben and I have been playing our own version of Shoot, Shag or Marry – only with our stuff. We have literally handled and considered every item we own and have asked ourselves, ‘take, chuck or store?’ That’s every darned thing.
When we originally talked about taking this sabbatical, we discussed options at two extremes of the continuum: either get rid of everything and start from scratch when (if) we return, or sublet our apartment fully-furnished.
We opted for something in the middle. We rented a 2m x 3m storage unit for a year, set a moving date and started playing our ‘fun’ new game.
Take
I am proud to say that I have pared back to 5 pairs of shoes – and that includes thongs (flip flops). Those who know me will understand the extent of this miracle. Let’s just say, I have just a touch of Carrie Bradshaw in me. So, what made the cut? Thongs, sneakers, trainers, Birkenstocks, and ballet flats.
I also packed a small pouch with what I call, ‘very useful things‘. These include a small chef’s knife, a stash of zip and twist ties, command hooks (with two-sided tape), a sewing kit, Blue-tac, a portable clothes line, and carabiners. As, I said, very useful things.
Add to the shoes and very useful things, Summer clothes, a collapsible backpack, my stack of technological rectangles (laptop, iPad, Kindle, phone) and chargers, enough underwear for a month, a small stash of my fave (but not expensive) jewelry, and toiletries, and I am good to go!
Chuck
While going through all the things we own, we made the easy decision to off-load the bedside lamps that I’ve never really liked, and the more difficult decision to sell our couch, which was cherry red and made to order. I loved that couch, but am pleased to say it went to a good home.
Much-loved couch
In the end, we sold off, gave away, donated and binned about 1/2 of what we owned.
Hard rubbish inherited an array of things including my desk, which broke into three pieces when we tried to move it, our well-used and somewhat abused BBQ, our bedside tables which were on their last legs, and every chipped or mismatched cup, plate, bowl, glass and teapot.
Discombobulated IKEA desk
We even managed to eat through the bulk of our pantry, fridge and freezer in the weeks leading up to the move, which resulted in weird meals, like Dim Sum with Greek salad. The rest was bagged up and taken to our friend’s house to fill (clog) up their pantry and freezer – thanks (sorry), guys!
Who else has 3 open packets of sesame seeds in their pantry?
Store
Deciding what to put into storage – or rather, what we would pay to store – was perhaps the hardest set of decisions, but we quickly discovered what I will call, ‘the second drawer factor’.
Every kitchen has a second drawer, thedrawer filled with random, often costly, utensils and useful kitchen things. Some are used daily, some rarely, but when you’re paying for storage, setting aside 1/3 of a small box for these items is a lot cheaper than replacing them when you next set up house. I’m talking about you, ice-cream scoop, pizza cutter and citrus reamer. The same goes for other small, useful household items and tools. They essentially cost next to nothing to store and a lot to replace all at once.
Clothes were a little trickier. I kept quite a few of my work clothes, mostly because I tend to buy items that don’t date and that I look after. They’ll be great for those 2019 job interviews. We also sent a box of Winter clothes, coats and boots to the UK for the last 1/3 of our trip which will be in cooler or cold weather.
Art, artifacts and memorabilia were a no-brainer. When we travel, we buy souvenirs – paintings, photographs, ceramics, books and such. We also each have a collection of childhood memorabilia. These things will make our new home feel like ours.
Anything else we had room for: When I commenced packing, I started with books. Books are easy to pack; they have uniformity and you can stack them. I was really proud of my first few boxes – so neat, so organised, so easy to label: ‘books’.
By the time I finished packing, my labels read like this: ‘iron/hair diffuser/decorative rock/greeting cards/board game/lamp/place-mats’. It became less about ‘like things together’ and more like a real-life game of packing Tetris. In the end, we had the room, so I started to be less stringent with the culling. If we liked it and if it still worked, it got packed.
Final trip to storage after living in a near-empty apartment for a few days
The (real) lesson
When you start to sort through your stuff, and when you do a complete audit of everything you own, you tend to realise that we exist everyday with far too much stuff. We are each about to travel for a year with only a suitcase, a carry-on and backpack or handbag. No doubt, we will continue to do some ‘chucking’ along the way.
Last time it was about details, drowning in them, to be more specific. While I am still up to my chin in the minutiae of departing the country for a year, I have found myself in another not-particularly-comfortable predicament: I’m surrounded by chaos.
Our usually orderly home is a study in disarray.
There are boxes – flat; assembled, but half-filled; filled and taped shut – both tucked into corners and boldly sitting in the middle of rooms. There are crates dotted about the apartment filled with random collections of things, like electrical tape, climbing gear, extension cords, and unframed posters. I have piles of things that I move from one location to another as we consolidate, pack, use up and slough off. Post-its flutter in the air conditioning with messages like ‘take to work’, ‘give to [insert friend’s name here]’, and ‘donate’.
We’ve done countless trips downstairs to give strangers our things, sometimes for cash and other times for free. Who knew someone could get so excited about a bedside table? We gifted our mattress to a friend and are now sleeping on side-by-side single mattresses on the floor. We have filled the clothing donation bin on the ground floor and have contributed several times to ‘hard rubbish’.
Every day we move the chaos about in an attempt to make it smaller, and to give it order, shape and purpose.
My inner perfectionist is either on high alert, causing me to appease her with increasingly advanced lists, or she’s slacking off, beginning to ignore the chaos, at times embracing it.
And, maybe she’s right.
Maybe the chaos is a beautiful part of this journey, there to juxtapose against the simplicity of living a year aboard with a suitcase and a laptop.
Every year I like to write a list of things I absolve myself from doing, no matter how good they may be for my mind/body/soul/relationships/success/wallet, and so on.
This year I absolve myself of the following:
Eating spaghetti squash as ‘pasta’
While I am all for substituting healthier foods for less-healthy foods, like Greek yoghurt for sour cream, spaghetti squash is a heinous abomination and no one should ever have to eat it. Blech! ***same goes for making ‘noodles’ out of zucchini (double blech)
Meditating
Meditating is supposed to be really good for you. It also happens to be very stressful!!!!! I can’t do it. I have tried, really tried, but I cannot clear my mind. I end up going off on a crazy tangent about what a clear mind is or what ‘nothing’ looks like. It turns into Mr Toad’s Wild Ride in there. My brain is clearly not supposed to be clear.
Going completely paperless
This one is really hard for me. I am 100% on board with receiving emails instead of letters from insurance companies and the electric company, but I still like to write things down. Notes, lists, ideas, thank you cards – I even like wall calendars. Yes, everything is in my digital calendar and my phone beeps regular reminders at me, but there’s something lovely about walking past a (pretty) wall calendar and seeing that it’s only a week ’til our friends come to stay. Plus, I was a teacher for 14 years, and teachers love stationery – it’s in our blood. I will never, ever give up my notebooks, Post-its, or coloured pens. EVER.
Drinking kombucha, coconut water, or apple cider vinegar
Besides the fact that the science documenting the benefits of these drinks is either non-existent, incomplete or inconclusive, they taste bad. ‘Nough said.
I have seriously considered just letting the greys grow out. I colour my roots every 2-3 weeks (yes, really) and we’re about to live around the world for a year. It would be highly convenient to give up the root touch-ups and go grey. But if I did, I would look like the human version of Pepe Le Pew, as most of the hair on the top of my head is silver, but not-so-much on the sides or in the back. Plus, I don’t think I’d like it very much. I’m too vain and I like my hair not being grey.
We are now in the T-minus state of departing Melbourne, and then Australia, for a year. As in, T-minus: 17 days of work left. And T-minus: 33 days until we fly out of Melbourne. And T-minus: several hours until I lose my damned mind.
I woke up at 4am last night (or this morning). I finally drifted off to sleep around 6 – for an hour – and then staggered out of bed at 7. My body is exhausted, but at 4am my brain is doing gymnastics. It’s the details, you see. The details are both exquisite and excruciating.
For example, I decided at around 4:30am, that I should print and laminate a little credit card-sized card that says, ‘Hello, we’re staying at ROAM in Ubud,’ with the address and ‘thank you’ – written in Indonesian, so we can give it to taxi drivers while we’re staying in Bali.
It’s a brilliant idea, I agree. So, I did that today on my lunch break. But, did I really have to come up with it in the middle of the night???
In the past week, I have made multiple messes in our house while clearing things out. For some reason, everything I’m sorting through needs to explode and cover every surface in the entire apartment in order for me to make order from it. I have subsequently thrown out, gifted or sold around 1/3 of what I own. I keep reminding Ben and the cat to move around so I don’t accidentally put them on EBAY.
And the lists! Every time I check something off the ToDo list, I get to enjoy about 30 seconds of satisfaction before my mind starts panicking about the 75 million other things I need to do.
I keep reminding myself that in just over a month, none of this will matter. It will all be done – or it won’t – and I will be on a plane with my carefully-curated luggage tucked safely beneath me in the luggage compartment.
My sister and I grew up with young parents. Mum and Dad were 21 when I was born and 25 when my sister came along. They were both primary school teachers.
We grew up in the 70s, surrounded by 20-somethings – our parents and a slew of aunties and uncles – actual and honorary.
When I was in Year 2, I changed schools so I could attend the school where my mother taught. I gained more aunties, friends of my mother, women who I looked up to, women who were kind to me and let me be my precocious self.
They – and my mother – taught me that working in a professional role was normal for a woman. I had no idea then the type of blatant sexism they faced. Embarrassingly, I had no real idea what they faced until recently when my mum sent my sister and me an email.
This is what she wrote about her early years in the teaching profession:
I know you love stories about the women who work hard to make equality a reality. As you probably know, when your dad and I started our careers, women earned less, even though we were both teachers and had started working at the same time. The gap was significant – about $5000 per year.
Female teachers had to wear dresses, or skirts and high heels. No pants. Women were not entitled to maternity leave. Instead, we could resign and then re-apply for our jobs when we wanted to come back to work. I was fortunate enough to have 3 months at home with both of you before I had to go back to work. In staff rooms, we had assigned seats. There was an obvious and patriarchal hierarchy and at my first school. The men sat together and the women sat together.
Early on, I became a union member to help expedite a shift to equality.
What I did:
1) I worked diligently at my first school to ensure the female deputy principal allowed women to wear pant suits, especially with those who taught smaller children, and needed to sit on the floor at times.
Eventually, this policy passed and we could wear pant suits – on the proviso we did not just wear slacks and a top. When other schools found out, women there were allowed to wear pant suits a those schools as well. I suppose those women spoke up about the practically of it, like I did.
2) In the staff room, I refused to sit in ‘my spot’. I kept sitting in different chairs, because I knew that women should be able to talk to whoever they wanted, including the male staff members. Eventually, everyone moved about daily, and ignored the assigned seats policy. It was much more pleasant – we were all teachers, after all.
3) At another school, I worked hard to convince the principal that I could teach Science to all the senior primary students (Year 4, 5, and 6). At that time, this was considered a man’s job. I was successful; I got to teach Science.
4) As a Union Rep, I lobbied for better pay, better conditions, and more opportunities for women. I marched and I went on strike, along with many of the men and women I worked with. We lost pay, but we didn’t care. Our cause was too important.
5) At a rural school, only boys were allowed to wear pants, while girls had to wear skirts, even during the cold weather of winter. After many meetings with the administration and with the Parents and Citizens’ Committee (the P&C), we had a win and girls could also wear pants to school.
6) I initiated non-gender-biased clubs at every school I worked at. If girls wanted to learn about science, or if boys wanted to learn to sew, great. Any interested student was welcome and encouraged to develop their skills and interests.
7) At a school I taught at in Queensland, some sports were girls only or boys only. I fought to change that by working closely with the administration and the P&C.
8) As I taught in a lot of rural schools, there was often the issue of not having enough of one gender to fill a sports team. So, I introduced mixed teams at these schools. Then other schools started to do this. I was criticised, but again I didn’t care. Students were able to compete in sports that with other schools – that was what mattered.
9) For too many years, women were not considered competent or skilled enough to teach upper grades. I rejected this idea, and was fortunate to have support from many of my principals. I would ask for an upper grade, so I could prove that women could competently teach those grades.
I worked very hard to get equal pay equal and equal opportunities for women over the years. It wasn’t just me, but I was there, putting up my hand and speaking up. I was called names, told off, and ‘put in my place’. But that didn’t matter. I believe everyone deserves the chance to be equal in all things.
My conquests were small and some would say insignificant, but change happens when individuals – many individuals – stand up. The voice of one becomes the voice of many.
Thank you, mum, for leading the way, for taking a stand and surrounding us with wonderful female role models.
Thank you also to our dad, who is one of the most fervent feminists I know and who was an outstanding teacher. And thank you to our step-mum, who has only just retired after nearly 40 years as a teacher, and has also been a wonderful professional role model.
Side note: I taught for 14 years before changing professional direction in 2009. My sister is still a teacher – and so is her husband. #familyprofession
Every year I think of the (sometimes silly) promises I have made to myself – or the albatrosses of obligations I have somehow bought into – and absolve myself of them. This is in the spirit of seeking (only) joyful, authentic, positive pursuits, and releasing myself from the pursuits that make me resentful, angry or bored.
My absolutions for 2017:
Reading books that are boring. I have actually become good at this: putting down books that are not engaging enough. Specifically, I absolve myself of finishing John Grisham’s latest, The Whistler, about a (yawn) whistle-blower. I wanted to like this book. I have read and liked Grisham for 25 years. Except that this book is boring. I got 30% in and was using it to put myself to sleep each night. It’s still on my Kindle, but I will not finish it.
Watching TV shows that I don’t like – or stop liking. It’s 2017 and we are spoiled for choice. We can watch anything and everything. We can watch across genres and on demand. We can binge watch – binging on TV shows like they are giant bags of potato chips. In 2016, I started watching Mr Robot. It’s good TV – really good TV – only I got sick of the premise. I didn’t like characters. I can appreciate the writing and acting without liking the show, but I no longer watch it.
Instead, I watch shows I continue to enjoy because time is precious and life is too short to watch ‘bad’ TV (which also applies to good TV that you don’t enjoy anymore). In 2016, I also stopped watching Scandal, Grey’s Anatomy, Rosewood, and Last Man on Earth. TV I am (still) enjoying: This is Us, Designated Survivor, Outlander, Madam Secretary, Modern Family, and Brooklyn 99. Oh, and the 4 episodes of Gilmore Girls that popped up recently.
Eating vegan/gluten free/organic/dairy free/Ayurvedic/Paleo. For about 20 years now I have subscribed to the 80/20 rule for eating/drinking: 80% of the time, I eat low-fat protein, whole grains, fresh fruit and veggies and drink tea (green, red and black) and lots of water. 20% of the time, I eat and drink what I like. This works for me. I don’t need to be dairy free because I am not lactose intolerant. I don’t need to eat gluten-free because I am not celiac. I have IBS, which means I have to be careful about eating uncooked fruit and veggies, but other than that, I’m good. If you need to eat differently to me to be or feel well, I will wholeheartedly support you. But I will not subscribe to a new way of eating just ’cause – Pete Evans, you lunatic.
Moving up the corporate ladder. I don’t want my boss’ job. He spends the majority of his time creating spreadsheets, writing tenders and taking meetings. In fact he spends more time in meetings than I do out of them. This is not what I want to do. I work in education; I want to educate. Like most industries, moving up at my company will take me further away from the thing I love. 2017 will be about exploring the breadth of my role, and discovering what my counterparts around the world are doing and sharing with them what I do. I want to make a difference more than I want to make a profit. This does not bode well for someone who wants to move on up, so, it’s a good thing that this isn’t me.
What I do want to in the next year: I want to travel widely. I want write across genres and for different audiences. I want to be fit and healthy. I want to make more of an effort to see my friends and family. I want to make solid plans to live elsewhere, and/or to expand my role, and/or to take on another role. I want to continue to learn and grow and be challenged. I want to give. I want to love.
Absolving myself of these things and more will give me time and space to pursue my loves, my dreams, and the things that will make me happy.
On that note, Happy New Year, everyone. May 2017 be grand, full of adventures and challenges, and replete with love and laughter. Be well, and be happy.
When you get a pet, you know that it is very likely that you will outlive them. You risk the inevitability of them dying sometime in the future, because you know that before that happens, you will have the wonderful experience of being a furrent.
We had our little Lucy for nearly 5 years and she died peacefully at the vet’s office yesterday afternoon because her kidneys failed.
We adopted Lucy from a shelter in Seattle in 2011. I had been asking Ben about getting a cat for more than a year, and he finally relented saying we could go to the shelter to ‘look’. I had an inkling that looking would turn into getting, so I agreed.
The shelter had a no-kill policy so there were dozens of cats to choose from. There was even an offer that day to adopt a black cat for free. We checked out all the black cats, but none of them were ours. Then 7 year old Lucy caught our eye because A) she was very pretty and B) she was a chill little kitty who was lounging at the back of her cage rather than meowing like crazy for our attention.
When we approached her, she stood up, stretched and turned around to show us her butt. We both laughed out loud. We asked to cuddle her and when we did, she purred loudly and rubbed up against us. Then Ben pointed out that she matched our living room rug, and we both knew we’d found our cat.
It was a big deal for Ben to agree to get a cat. He’d never had one before – he was a dog person – and he was understandably nervous about possible bad cat habits she might have – like scratching and biting, ruining the furniture, general meanness and/or indifference, jumping on counters and spreading cat germs, and worst of all, sleeping on his face. Lucy turned out to be just as perfect at home as she was in the shelter – she had no bad cat habits.
She was affectionate – in fact, Lucy was borderline slutty. She’d flop in front of anyone with a pulse who walked on two legs, begging to be petted. She would happily sit on laps, purring loudly, or do ‘halvesies’ which was front paws and head on the lap, back paws and bum on the chair, also purring loudly. She’d stay like that all day if you let her. She took to sitting on Ben’s lap, staring up at him adoringly, as he worked. And if you were drinking something while she was sitting on you, she’d want to sniff it, just to see what it was.
She was funny – she’d catch sight of her tail and stare at it as if to say, ‘what the fuck is that?’ Then she’d pounce on it and chase it around and ‘round like dogs do. Like me, she loved leather handbags and shoes, but unlike me, her love of them bordered on obsession. I can’t tell you how many times we apologised to guests who’d abandoned bags or shoes near the door only to watch our cat making love to them – the handbags and shoes, that is. She’d rub up and down on them and purr like a mad little puss. When I planted potted herbs on our balcony, she’d took to having a morning constitutional where she’d stop and smell each herb. I didn’t know at the time that I was planting a garden for her, but I’m pretty sure that’s what she thought. She also thought birds and cats on TV were real, and would go around the back of the TV looking for them.
She was a total cat – she’d watch birds playing on the balcony and make this weird sound – ‘ah-ah-ah-ah’. I’d never heard a cat do that before Lucy, but apparently, it’s very catlike. She was terrified of thunder and fireworks, and would run into our bedroom and shove her fat little bottom all the way under the bed. We’d have to coax her out afterwards. She would plant herself in the middle of the living room, stick her leg in the air and start licking her nethers. When we’d laugh – as we did pretty much every time – she would stop and look at us as if to ask ‘What?!’ and then continue. She loved to be brushed. It was one of the two words she knew – the other was her name. Until she got sick, she’d come when called. She loved the red dot, the feathered thing on the end of the string, playing with shoelaces (we used to say that she was helping us get dressed), and watching her favourite TV show called ‘The Back of the Red Couch’.
Lucy was fun to have around, loving and sweet, and she made us laugh. She was family and we will miss her. Here’s to you, Miss Lucy, and 5 wonderful years together.
I am writing this one-handed and I’m wearing pyjamas in the middle of the day.
Eleven days ago I had a shoulder reconstruction and since then I’m sporting bandages on my left shoulder and a sling. I have at least 3 more days off work in ‘complete rest’ mode, and then maybe I can start back at work doing light duties from home.
I have pain in my shoulder and arm and it is different day to day and hour to hour – throbbing, dull ache, sharp at the site of my stitches, not painful at all. They gave me really powerful painkillers, but these make me nauseous, so I’ve been OTC-only for a while.
The shoulder pain was expected and actually doesn’t bother me as much as limitations imposed on me as a patient recovering from shoulder surgery. I mean, I knew I wouldn’t be able to do a lot of stuff, but I wasn’t prepared for how that would affect me.
I don’t like it.
I am getting better at asking for help as I get older, but it is still hard for me. It is not a pride thing as much as me not wanting to trouble others with my needs. It’s probably a little bit of a pride thing too, because I am fiercely independent and self-sufficient. I do know the limits of my abilities and at those limits is where I ask for help, but the limits have suddenly and drastically changed.
Things you can’t do when one arm is in a sling and you can’t get your bandages wet and you can’t really lean forward and it hurts if you move too much:
make a meal – even putting cereal and milk in a bowl – this is a two-handed activity if you’ve been doing it that way your whole life, and can go very wrong if attempted one-handed – in the mornings, I sit at the breakfast bar and tell my boyfriend, Ben, how many flakes to put in the bowl – I am usually chief cook in our home so it’s frustrating not to be able to whip up dinner in 10 minutes like I usually do
wash my hair – the 1000s of times I took this simple activity for granted! My recent hair washing experiences have included plastic wrap, masking tape, the laundry sink, and for the first time ever, Ben
putting my hair into a pony tail – girls with long(ish) hair, try it – or even just mime doing it – you can’t do it alone. Ben can now do a neat low pony, but we have yet to graduate to the more advanced messy bun
drying off after a bath – when you’re an adult, bath time should be fun or a luxury – at the moment, it is neither – it is solely perfunctory – I feel like an overgrown toddler, needing help to wash under my right arm and to dry my back and legs
typing – actually I can do this – it just takes a looooooong time
car doors and seatbelts – sure, I can open the car door one-handed, but when I did it hurt like hell – I realised how much that one action relays to my other shoulder, so in this condition, it’s best done by someone else so I don’t bust a stitch
opening jars, bottles, etc. – see ‘car doors’ above
washing dishes – see ‘opening jars’ above
walking – yep, walking hurts – you move a lot of your body when you walk, and here’s a shocker, your body parts are all connected! Ow!
carrying – you can can more with 2 hands together than with 1 hand x 2 – this means lots of trips when moving rooms – and see ‘walking’ above
working out – I know this is an obvious one, but daily exercise has become vital for my general wellbeing – it gets the kinks out of my body and my brain – I rely on the endorphins, I like being flexible and strong – it keeps the aches and the blues at bay
general chores and stuff you do around the house 50 times a day without thinking – I am bumping up against this one a lot
How have these limits on my self-sufficiency affected me?
If I’m honest, I’m a little blue. I don’t like being helpless. I am a doer. I get shit done. All I have gotten done in the last 11 days is read 4 novels, watch 3 complete series on Netflix, trawl Facebook and Reddit 3 times a day, and develop an excruciating headache that sent me to bed for 2 days.
And healing.
I am very busy healing, and even though my current state frustrates me, I know this is my number one priority. I must heal so I can get back to doing all the other stuff.
Very special thanks to my darling Ben who has become my left hand. And thank you to friends for visits and driving me to the doctor and helping me do stuff I can’t do by myself at the moment.
I can’t tell you how many times I have been asked this question since I returned from Cape Town, South Africa just over two weeks ago. It’s a perfectly valid question, as I was doing something quite unique. In February, I spent two weeks with 12 others from around the world, working with small children in the township of Vrygrond, as part of the 2015 Pearson Global Assist Fellowship. In the mornings, we worked in pairs and threes in one of the many crèches in and around Vrygrond, that are supported by the organisation, True North. In the afternoons, we gathered at True North’s community centre, where we partnered with Pearson South Africa to deliver a 2-week literacy program for 5 and 6 year-olds.
The 2015 Fellows (Courtesy of Romeo Ramirez)
For the first few days after I returned, I was fighting horrid jetlag and trying to catch up on the hundreds of emails that had filled my work inbox in my absence. The question was wasted on me then. “How was it?” ‘It was exhausting,’ I wanted to say. It’s been over two weeks since I landed in back in Melbourne and I feel like I am still catching up on sleep. However, ‘exhausting’ is not a satisfying answer for someone who wants to hear that it was amazing and life-changing. Initially I trotted out the usual clichés, just to hold everyone at bay until I could wrap my head around exactly what it was. At that point, I just didn’t know. I remember saying to my room-mate sometime in the middle of the fellowship, “I know there is a lesson to be learned here, but right now, I just don’t know what it is. I hope it will reveal itself when I’m home.”
And it has. Now that I have stepped back from it and have had time to reflect, I feel I can answer the question with greater depth: Exhausting, humbling, replenishing, amazing… Still, listing adjectives just doesn’t do the experience justice, so I will attempt a better response to the question here.
“How was it?”
Humbling
Most of the people I met had so much to give – their time, their experience, their laughter, their wisdom. I sat down with people from True North and Pearson South Africa who are literally saving the world, one school, one crèche, one child at a time. Their work matters. Their work can mean the difference between a child being protected and educated and fed, and being left out in the world to fend for themself. I worked side-by-side with teachers who are acutely aware that just beyond the lilac-painted fence of the crèche, there are knife fights, drug deals, prostitution and domestic violence – all on a regular basis. These women are educated, intrepid, and respected, because their work is noble and their work is hard.
The crèches in Vrygrond – and the extension of Vrygrond called Overcome, where I worked with fellows, Romeo and Esther – cater for babies through to 6 year-olds. The children are under the care of the teachers for up to 10 hours a day. They eat breakfast there – a tasteless rice gruel – and lunch – a protein-enriched rice. The children nap, play, draw, read stories, sing songs, and learn basics like shapes, colours, letters and numbers. In many ways, these crèches are just like any other childcare centre, except that they do all this with few resources, no sewerage, no electricity, and in a place that can be extremely dangerous.
Lunch: rice with proteinThe play area for 45 children
Exhausting
The creche where I worked is called Little Lambs and in Overcome, there are no paved roads like in Vrygrond. The crèche has no electricity, a corrugated iron roof and walls to match. On the days when it is hot outside, it is even hotter inside. 45 children are packed into three small classrooms, and the children share the same toileting facility – a handful of non-flushable ‘potties’. The teachers use a port-a-potty, which takes up a large portion of the cemented play area. Water trickles from two taps – one on the front wall of the crèche and one in the ‘kitchen’ where the children’s meals are prepared. When children are given water to drink, they share the same four or five cups, each taking turns and waiting for their classmates to finish. The cups aren’t washed in between children. The children are told to wash their hands after toileting and playing outside and before they eat – yet for washing, they all use the same bucket of water which is replenished only once a day – and there is no soap.
When I arrived each morning, I would set up an activity at one of the small tables, and the children would rotate to me in groups. Others worked on puzzles or crafts. There was a constant chorus of, “teacher, teacher, teacher,” as each child vied for a moment of my attention. After the table activities, they had a 1/4 of a piece of fruit and played outside on the rectangle of concrete. Then I’d usually read a story and sing songs with them – ones that had actions, so we could work on coordination and memory. ‘Incy-wincy Spider’ became an instant favourite. And there is nothing sweeter than hearing a group of children sing, “Twinkle, twinkle, little star, how I wonder what you are…” Then it was usually time for lunch. Before the meal, the children put their hands together, bowed their heads and sang, “Thank you, Father, for our food, many, many blessings, Amen,” to the tune of ‘Frère Jaques’. I suppose that they are blessed – or a least, fortunate – because although they often came to school in the same clothes several days in a row, and they may not have had an evening meal the night before, there are about 1500 children in Vrygrond and Overcome who aren’t in crèches at all.
Play time for the babies’ class
The classroom I worked in was for three and four year-olds. Admittedly, they were a challenging group in the first few days, but they grew to learn that I didn’t put up with naughtiness and only paid attention to well-behaved children. ‘Time Out’ was my closest ally in the first few days, and I channelled the Super Nanny every time I said, “No. That’s unacceptable.” The naughtiest child in the class on day one – Daniel – was one of the oldest and biggest children in the class. He was loud, aggressive, and a bully. After the third Time Out in about 20 minutes, his teacher removed him from the room and took him in with the babies. He hated that and begged to come back to the class. For some reason and from then on, he worked very hard for my approval, and thrived when he was given important tasks, like handing out rice to the other children.
Making puppets. Daniel in the centre.
We had two trips to the nearby park over the two weeks. To say that I was nervous about taking 3 dozen children through the dusty streets of the township to the park, was a gross understatement. Firstly, as strangers in the township, we fellows were not allowed to walk around outside the crèche without an escort by someone from the township – or someone from True North. Simply, we were not safe on our own, and we got more than a few sideways glances as we chaperoned the children from one place to another. Then there was the aforementioned violence, drug deals and prostitution. It wasn’t as though those activities rolled to a halt because the local pre-school was on the move. And there was the fact that the children had very little road sense; we spent most of the journey corralling them off the road as though we were herding naughty little sheep. Once at the park, they were fine. They ran and ran and ran – something they couldn’t do within the small confines of the crèche. By the time we got back to the crèche a couple of hours later, they were ready for a nap, and so was I.
Snack time at the park: Teacher Geraldine hands out 1/4-pieces of fruitHeading back from the park
Replenishing
As a person who has opted not to have children of my own, I am sometimes asked if it’s because I don’t like children. That’s not why – and the reason why is a whole other blog post, so I won’t go into it here. The thing is, I love being around children. I loved being around these children. My time with them exhausted me physically – and even mentally at times – but it fuelled me emotionally. And what I learned from these little faces, was that it doesn’t matter where you go in this world, kids are kids. When I would sneak into the babies’ room – ’cause they were irresistibly sweet and affectionate – they would smile and reach their chubby little hands up to me. They loved clapping and singing, just like babies and toddlers anywhere, and they giggled with delight when tickled. And they craved cuddles, which I happily obliged them with.
The older children were funny, cheeky, inquisitive, and each saw themselves as the centre of the universe – just like any other group of 3 and 4 year-olds. They love being read to, cuddled, praised, and to sing. They wanted attention, affection, and someone to kiss it better. Over only two weeks, I went from a stern stranger to someone who could make them smile with just a wink or a silly face.
With the cheeky little cuties – the bigger the smile, the cheekier the child
Gratifying
In the afternoons, we returned to True North’s community centre, where we each worked with two children on a pre-literacy program developed by a team at Pearson South Africa. The aim of the program was two-fold: to determine how much impact the proposed literacy activities could make in just 8 sessions (of 2 hours each), and to introduce a reading resource specifically designed for children who lived in townships. We worked from four newly-developed books, and the illustrations were just incredible. The children instantly engaged with the accurate representations of their world. Vrygrond is a place where most books they read are cast-offs, and are often irrelevant to their lives or inappropriate for their age group. It was incredible to watch their delight as each new page was revealed.
My two were called Trizza and Clever. Trizza was shy at the start of the project, but by the second week was comfortable enough around me to show her bossier side. She was extremely bright and sometime lost patience with Clever, who was slower to master the given tasks and concepts. Clever was a kind and warm child, gregarious and a leader on the playground, but I wondered if his moniker would set unreasonable expectations for him throughout his life. He struggled with some basic literacy tasks, but I admired that he never quit. He was often among the last in the room to complete a task, but he always wanted to finish. By the end of the two weeks, Trizza demonstrated an enhanced ability to recall details and sequences. Clever, who began the fortnight by roughly turning pages, creasing and tearing them, learned to respect books as something precious, and how to turn pages carefully. They were both excited to be given their own take-home copies of each of the four books. “Who are you going to show your book to?” I asked each time they got a new one. “My mummy and my sister,” Trizza would say. “My daddy!” replied Clever. Both of them smiled with pride at having something special to share with their loved ones.
Trizza and Clever
Enjoyable
It was mostly hard work, but it wasn’t all hard work. After preparing lessons for the following day, we gathered to drink wine and talk about our lives back home. We told funny anecdotes about loved ones, and learned the names of each other’s children, best friends and significant others. We exchanged job descriptions, because although we all worked for Pearson, we had a diverse range of roles. We debriefed about the highs and lows of our days, laughing and crying in equal measure. Half of us got sick: colds, food poisoning, and a mystery illness which seemed to combine the two. We shared gifts and goodies we had brought from home, teased each other relentlessly, gave dozens of supportive hugs, danced to Madonna, and drove each other crazy by hogging the bathroom or using up all the internet.
Over the two weeks, we became a sort of mismatched, semi-dysfunctional, supportive, infuriating, and endearing family.
Over the 17 days I spent in Cape Town I also got to catch up with some dear friends who live there – 2 couples I know through previous travels. I managed several early morning workouts and yoga practices, which were particularly memorable because Cape Town sunrises are so breathtaking. Over one weekend, we all went sightseeing (organised by the fellowship) and wine tasting (organised by us). We were taken out to dinner several times to lovely restaurants, and I must say, South Africans do incredible seafood, and have an extensive (super-affordable) repertoire of delicious wine. And, after the fellowship wrapped up, four of us did an overnight safari at a private game park (this must be saved for its own post). And, most happily, I made some dear friends, including my roomie, Jenni, from Texas and my crèche-mates, Romeo and Esther.
RoomiesRomeo from Mexico – my crèche-mate
So, how was it?
It was something I will remember my whole life. I know how fortunate I am to have such an incredible opportunity.
Sandy Barker | Author 
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