Sleepless in South Africa (aka the weekend report)

by Kaili

It was a great weekend, even if Friday night I was sleepless (literally) and Saturday night Robyn was restless. I was up almost until sunrise, but I fell asleep just 15 minutes shy of it. Saturday night, Robyn slept on and off, but had the presence of mind to take advantage of that fact when she woke up just before sunrise. She took many gorgeous photos, but this one is my favorite.

6:45 am.

Saturday, there was a very long marumba practice outside on the lawn. marumbas are large wooden xylophone-like instruments, and a marumba band often has a drummer, steel pans and djembes as well. On Saturday, a Soweto based Marumba band, led by a Canuck like us (though he’s been living here for ten years), joined the Sparrow band on the lawn between the hospice and the children’s clusters. As soon as we realized where the music was coming from, Robyn and I shook off our Saturday morning stupor and ran out of the house with our cameras.

We hung out outside with the children all morning and afternoon. It was a beautiful day and it was great fun. I tried to film a bunch of it with my digital camera, but a child from my art class took over as cameraman. I haven’t had a chance to look at the footage but I saw him doing some VERY interesting things with the camera.

On Saturday evening, we hung out with some of the teenage girls in their cluster and they braided our hair. After drenching our hair in Vaseline they spent over an hour pulling at our hair and making it beautiful. My stylist, unfortunately, could not make up her mind, so I ended up leaving with only one cornrow.

Hangin’ out in TC with Ntokozo, Wendy and Mbali