Hopscotch

A local version of hopscotch is quite the rage these days on the Cush Christian School playground. As soon as kids arrive in the morning they're at it until the bell rings for assembly, and for many it's their preferred way to spend recess--they have trouble tearing themselves away from it when the end-of-recess bell sounds! It's mostly girls who play, but a few boys do, too.

Plastic Bags

Most yards in Parot tend to be quite tidy; they are swept regularly by the women and girls of the house. However, there are no "official" places to dump garbage, and many public spaces are littered with a variety of objects, including plastic bottles, cans, glass bottles, paper, and plastic bags.





The plastic bags are easily blown by the wind and end up all over. They are not only an eyesore, but a health hazard for animals that eat them and for humans--rainwater collects on them and becomes a breeding place for mosquitoes.


The plastic bag problem is not unique to my area or to South Sudan. It's a problem in many countries, including the one where I used to live in West Africa.

I was encouraged to read last month on the Radio Tamazuj website that one of the states next to ours, Warrap, has banned the use of plastic bags.

I saw how this kind of legal measure can make a difference when I visited the country of Rwanda a few years ago. There, not only plastic bags are banned, but littering is as well. Rwanda is the cleanest African country I've seen, and it's also cleaner than many Western countries. I didn't see any litter at all when I was there.

Note: The pictures in this post were taken last month during one of the many times when the air was full of dust, which often happens during the first months of the year. The dust makes the sky very hazy.

Cows on the Path

One morning recently while walking to school I came up to some cows who were comfortably settled in on the path ahead of me. Although there are a lot of cows around, I've not seen them lying right on the path like before.

They didn't make any attempt to move as I grew closer, so I walked around them, feeling somewhat uneasy and slightly intimidated about walking amidst them on the path.








I looked behind and saw a group of kids from the school.

Without missing a beat, they came right on ahead on the path, stepping among the cows as if they were used to seeing them there every day--almost as if they weren't even there. (Sorry, I didn't get a picture.) These kids have grown up with cows and are so used to them--unlike city-girl me!

Local Fruit: Tuk

We have quite a few African fan palm trees (Borassus aethiopum) in our village. The Dinka name for this tree is "tuk" (rhymes with "kook").

This kind of palm doesn't produce well-known fruit like coconuts or dates, but it does produce a fruit that is greatly appreciated by folks here, especially children.

The tuk fruit is ripe this time of year and kids at Cush Christian School often bring it to eat before school or at recess.

The fruit is very fibrous and has a large pit in the middle. It eaten by chewing and sucking on the fibres until all the flavour is out of them, then spitting them out.

I haven't tried tuk, partly because it has a strong odour that I find quite unpleasant. The students are not supposed to bring a tuk into the classroom because of this.

If a child has snuck one in and hidden it in his or her desk, the odour gives it away. As soon as I smell it, I'm on the hunt to find it and have it taken out ASAP!

Fruit Tasting

Last week we had visitors from one of our partner organizations. The plane that picked them up flew in from Uganda and the pilot kindly brought us some fruit which we can't get in our area. I received half a dozen oranges and apples as well as a pineapple.

I decided to share the fruit with the kids in my class. They know the names of these fruits and have seen them in pictures, but none of them had seen them in real life.

My assistant teacher, Pastor Kerubino, took the pictures I'll share here. The lighting wasn't great but they give an idea of the fun we had.

The "fruit tasting" was a surprise. First I had the kids all go outside and wash their hands. Then I had them gather round me at a table at the front of the class. They had no idea what I was going to do. I started taking things out of a big bag. It was great to see their reactions when I brought out an orange, then an apple, then a big knife. I cut the fruit in half and showed the kids the seeds inside.

Then I bought out the pineapple. Pineapples have such a unique shape that the kids recognized it right away and several burst out laughing. I had them touch it to feel the sharp little spiny bits, then I cut it up and gave them each a piece. Some were a little hesitant to try it, and all were extremely interested to see the reaction of the first ones who tasted it. There was a lot of laughter (and relief?!) when the first tasters gave it the "thumbs up."

I then gave the kids pieces of apple and orange that I had cut up at home that morning. In the picture below, the kids to my right are bending forward to see the reaction of the first kids who tasted the apple. It was declared just as tasty as the pineapple, and they also really like the orange. Overall, it was a really fun experience.

Sleeping Outside

This time of year daytime temperatures are quite high and it doesn't cool down much at night. This can make it quite difficult to sleep, so many (most?!) of my neighbours carry their beds or mats outside and sleep there. Even if there's not much of a breeze, it beats sleeping in a hut with almost no ventilation.

One morning this week I snapped the picture above of a yard that I pass each day on my way to school. The beds hadn't yet been taken inside for the day. You can see a few metal beds, a wooden bed (just beyond the red metal bed in the forefront) and a mat on the ground. These are the three typical things my neighbours sleep on.

Metal beds are somewhat of a luxury. Most people use wooden beds instead, or simply sleep on a mat on the ground (if there is a bed, it's usually an adult and a baby or small child/children who sleep on it, and older children sleep on a mat).

People here don't have box springs on their beds. For both the metal and the wooden beds, a grid of plastic string is "woven" across the metal or wooden frame to make the support for the mattress to be put on or for people to lie on. (This picture is of the string grid on a metal bed frame I have on my porch, supported by bricks, for people to sit on.) The string grid is usually very firm at first, but it wears out and can get really saggy.

The mattresses here are foam, of varying densities depending on the money people have available. Some of them get soft very quickly and don't offer much support.

Many people don't have money for a mattress so simply sleep on the string grid, usually with a sheet or cloth of some kind on it to make it more comfortable.

The yard photo above also shows the three main kinds of houses in my area: the traditional hut (back left), the mud/cement brick "modern" house with tin roof (back centre) and the grass mat shack (back right).

Magnificent Mahogany

There's a beautiful African mahogany tree in the centre of Parot, the village where I live. It dwarfs all the other trees for quite a distance, and it stays green all year round. It's so refreshing to see such a huge mass of green during this very dry time of year!

The main road (not an official one, but a very well used path/track) from several outlying villages to nearby Wanyjok market passes through Parot next to the tree. So there is a regular flow of people and vehicles going by this spot. Also, the Parot well is near the tree--you can see it on the far right in the photo above.

Some people have tables set up under the tree to sell things like roasted groundnuts, cookies, tea and sugar. It's a pretty good location since so many people pass by every day.