Last night at Windhoek Warehouse was so much fun!!The artist's name was Ele Motho.He is a Namibian singer; his band has 2 guitars, a bass guitar, a keyboardist, a drummer, and a backup singer.Sound familiar to some of you (minus the backup singer)?JA lot of his songs have a political message behind them or about how Namibia and Africa are beautiful.The music was great.Everyone was getting up to dance, but it's not like dancing in America at all. Everyone is just having a ton of fun doing their own thing from traditional tribal dancing, to swaying, to flailing of arms!LolAvrille, her daughter Shade, and Pandu were there.I don't know if I mentioned, but a lot of people have the name Pandu here.It's a shortened form of an Oshwambo word that means thank you.Shade was too funny jumping around the dance floor and playing with the band's rain stick.Shawn from PAY was there too with a bunch of German students.It was a lot of fun!

Today was pretty normal.Went to work this morning and gave the 8th grade and 9th grade their tests.For me that was particularly boring, so I read looking up after every few sentences to see if there were any questions.No one dared to talk which I found very interesting.Even those that wanted to go to the bathroom or get a drink asked after they finished the test and so quietly that I could barely hear them and I was standing right next to them.The only ordeal was that Sandeele and Sylvester were fighting over the window being open before the test.Sylvester wanted the one furthest from him open, but if that was open then it hit Sandeele in the head, so he wanted the one near Sylvester open.It's very interesting that as soon as the teacher intervenes…no one argues.We usually have to compromise over the windows.After those 3 periods, I had 5 free periods and 2 breaks in a row because it's Thursday.I finished my book in the teacher lounge while talking to some of the other teachers and listened to the gossip stories in one of their local newspapers. It was one of the grade 12 student's birthday today so they usually bring in treats at Combretum.She brought in these huge platters of food and put the remaining platter and a liter of Coke in the teacher lounge.It had sausage, cheese, pieces of pizza, chicken nuggets, and veggies one minute, and literally 3 minutes later was clean.I've never seen all of the teachers in the lounge before and now I know why…they don't fit.But they certainly tried today.

Thursday is also staff meeting today.The morning meetings are only for full time teachers and there are a lot of part time teachers that come in and out of the school for their few classes.Sue Brown always bakes brownies which were also eaten quite quickly.Apparently everyone was hungry today. Most of the teachers don't eat lunch normally though.She's been out of the school a lot the past week trying to get all the evidence against the fired secretary for the police.The secretary, Lydia, stole something like N$52,000 and Sue thought that it would be easy to get back because the police would not hesitate selling her property, but apparently Lydia is in a lot of debt too.They're really crunched for money at the moment.And their school trip to Waterburg is next weekend…eek.

Mom and Hopson stopped by around 12:40 to see my last class.Mom videotaped a bit of it even though I didn't really want videotaped.They were just reviewing for their test tomorrow.

At PAY they are in the process of moving from one building to the building next door.They did the majority of the work today.When I got there, the computer room and half the bookshelves with books were set up in the library.The volunteers that don't have other jobs during the day had been there all day cleaning and moving furniture. I went back in before I left and they had the rest of the bookshelves set up and all of the tables and chairs courtesy of the older students.It looks very nice!!!

I tutored in math, science, accounting, and French today.On Thursdays, MiniPAY is supposed to take over our sports arena until 4.That means during the winter, our PAY students only get 30 minutes to play.However, they've been running really late the past few weeks.To give PAY something to do Chiquita brought in art supplies.Chiquita is a med student at Dartmouth.She actually did her undergraduate in Lafayette in PA, but currently lives in Canada, and grew up in Zimbabwe.She has been interviewing students at PAY to find their misconceptions about HIV/AIDS and teach them the truth. Chiquita is planning on making a booklet for PAY with some of the interviews and all her research in it.Today's art class was also connected.The students were asked to draw whatever came to mind when thinking about HIV/AIDS.There were a lot of scary creatures, a lot of ribbons with quotes above them about being loved, a lot of pictures of crying women, and a lot of grave sites.After they finished their pictures, they had to do a skit about a person getting HIV and how they got it, how they coped, and how other people treated them.They were very interesting.I taped one on the Flip and I will put it up on the blog (along with some other videos I have) sometime this weekend.

After awhile, I got really bored of the skits and went to help make sandwiches.Lot, one of the older PAY students who hangs out with the volunteers a lot, was watching us complaining that he doesn't like to eat, but he likes food and he needs to gain weight.He said the only meal he eats is breakfast due to time limits and not wanting to eat.And when he needs energy to play basketball, he eats chocolate.He has a lot of muscle, but still wants to be fatter.Sam, Valerie, and I were also comparing British, Canadian, and American English.It was pretty funny.Valerie had a little of both of our phrasing.And Sam kept singing some song about Pennsylvania that I've never heard before, but she hears all the time when she visits her aunt in Virginia.She also offered to let me stay with her whenever I'm in England next.I've decided I have to go soon! Lol The ride home wasn't nearly as fun as yesterday.J

We're just hanging in tonight because our weekend seems pretty packed.Tomorrow I have the Brit's farewell party and a dinner with Peter and his fam and mom's boss Verner and his fam and Hopson and possibly some other people.Saturday is the tournament at PAY all day and then Avrille's farewell party at night.Long enough for you Laur?? Haha Sorry if my blogs are too long everyone! But I'm afraid I'm not going to shorten them because it's also for me to remember my trip! Love and miss you all!

Love,

Shannon