FEBRUARY BIRTHDAYS

The season of birthdays is upon us. Happy birthday to Naomi and Ursula to Bart, and Edwin [Little] and Edwin [Big].Also anyone who is reading and who’s birthday it is!
February birthdays, bring with them difficult feelings this year, especially on Bigs birthday the 23rd, the 23rd Feb is also my Mum’s Birthday, so it’s a bittersweet day this year. She has been very much in my thoughts recently and I’m sure those of my sisters….I’m quite convinced that she is egging us on to do some posthumous celebrating on her behalf…so come March, and my return to UK, we will do exactly this!

Littles birthday weekend
It was a 6.00 am departure from Marchand on Friday 20th Feb, to ensure we collected Little at his Friday break up time of 1.30 pm ,and could get to the airport for 2.00 in order to collect Leynie [Big`s Mum] and her great friend ,Fee. No dramas en route [thankfully].

The Winchester Mansions greeted us like their favorite guests once again. The manager, Sam, whispered in my ear, that the chef had made a lovely chocolate Birthday cake for Little, which would be presented to him at breakfast the following day.

Lenie was feeling under the weather, and had the most worrying cough, explaining that she had had it for a month and just couldn’t clear it. In view of her long flight I confided in Bossy that if she was not feeling a great deal better by the following morning…we needed to find a doctor to check her out!

The following morning, with Little`s birthday upon us, Lenie rallied during Little`s birthday breakfast, which was made very special, in the open aired courtyard of the hotel, everyone at great pains to ensure that he felt special and cared for, lots of gifts from his relations in Holland [big thanks to Lenie, Bobby,Ellen ,Fee et al] a huge birthday cake with sparklers arrived, causing the entire courtyard to break out into “Happy birthday to you”,and Little to sit looking excruciatingly embarrassed.

Lenie was quite clearly struggling with her health…a doctor was called and promptly diagnosed her with bronchitis. Advising her to rest as much as possible and religiously take the strong anti biotic he prescribed.
Little`s hearts desire was to go to the movies and then go to supper at The Codfather [where we went last weekend/sushi bar/fish restaurant]. Lenie and Fee, decided to skip the movies [and busy shopping mall] and take an open air bus tour around the city and visit the “Gold of Africa exhibition” [highly recommended by the doctor].
This meant that the Edwin’s and I could focus on hitting Canal Walk…a HUGE shopping centre outside of CT [ in fact one of what I call, the “BIG FIVE”….C.T is renowned for its five huge shopping Malls]…we could order the present that he had decided on ….a FAT SAC…the most enormous bean bag….big enough to fall asleep on. Have lunch and then go to the movies.
Meeting up with the girls at the hotel late afternoon we set out for the restaurant. Despite it being a great day, I sensed that Little was missing his siblings …Birthdays have always been close family occasion for him, his brothers and sister remain hugely important … making do with telephone conversations just didn’t quite hit the spot! And he spent a great deal of the day talking about Jessie Tommy and Finn.

Sunday saw us enjoying a lazy morning , Lenie was feeling dreadful.! We set out for the school drop off and return to Marchand at around 12.30. On Little`s arrival at school with ¾ of a huge birthday cake still left, he was immediately surrounded by a hungry flock of boys begging for a slice, we left him trying to wave and fend off cake attacks!

Monday [Bossy`s birthday] was an extremely quiet day..Lenie was not up to anything other than lying in her bed with the airco on at full bore. She managed to rally in the evening and we went out for a very quiet Birthday supper. However by Tuesday morning she was very unwell, so a hastily arranged trip to the doctor in Kaimous and to our great surprise he ordered her straight to hospital in UP. Lenie was settled into her intensive care bed !!!with reassurances from the staff that they would take great care of her. We returned feeling very sad indeed. What a disaster for the girls South Africa expedition. Their plan had been to fly to Jo burg on Wednesday to stay with Fee’s relations and then onwards for a girlie bash/safari, in Sun City for a week, before flying back home to Amsterdam a week on Saturday.
Fee has made a decision to crack onto Jo berg on Wednesday and await news of Lenies progress. We are all hoping that she can join Fee at a later stage.

Thoughts of Diamond diving at Augrabies falls

In order that Fee’s time with us didn’t descend into “nothingness”, we both woke bright and breezy on Tuesday morning and traveled the 10 or so kilometers to the Augrabies water falls and game reserve,[just up the road from us] it is spectacular…not, of course on the scale of Victoria falls, but hugely impressive. Here, the Orange River thunders spectacularly, over a 185 ft cliff, into a deep gorge, carved out of granite bed rock, crashing down a further 115 ft over a series of secondary falls and cataracts,where the water sends vast columns of spray into the air. The two large pools at the base of each fall are said to be at least 135ft deep, and reputedly contain an abundance of diamonds. Being a bit of a “rock girl” myself, I found the pools strangely compelling, Fee reminded me that at least 20 people each year, are lost over the edge here…never to be seen again![ Neither would I ,if I managed to scoop a handful of rocks!!!!]

. Having left early, before the sun was impossibly hot, the pair of us sat and ate a leisurely breakfast in the open air restaurant, feeling very fortunate to see weavers making their beautiful little basket nests from about 3 foot away, and seeing a red bishop, in his full mating plumage, also saw a Laughing dove…so that’s one off my list. Infuriatingly, I forgot to take my long lens, so the photos are of very poor quality!.But they will give you some idea of what we saw.

We returned to the farm, just in time to be whisked away by Bossy , for Fee’s tour around the factory and then directly onwards to UP for Lenies visit. She has been moved out of IC,into a high dependency ward so that’s a good sign. After fond farewells to Fee at UP`s tiny airport., we thrashed back through another of the seasonal thunder storms, the 100 kilometers to the farm.
Bossy and I simply threw ourselves into bed. The past few days have been so full of worry and traveling and juggling plans that we both simply crashed.

Binky

When I went to feed Binks on Monday,I saw that he had sustained a very severe injury..The front part of his shell has been cracked and there was blood oozing from it..Binky seemed well in himself and was very pleased to receive a bundle of lettuce leaves and cucumber slices [his favorite]. I raced to find Moses,who immediately babbled away in Affricanns & Tswana and I couldn’t understand a word he said…eventually he said two words that I DID understand “Little Doggy”…I simply couldn’t believe that this injury could have been caused by Bongo…but since we were away at the weekend I had no reason to believe otherwise. Phoned Bossy to get him to talk to Moses, who confirmed that Bongo had been discovered trying to drag Binks into the kitchen. Even more upsetting…..Moses told Bossy that he felt that Binks will probably die of his injuries. Although I still can’t quite believe that Bingo did this, I am nevertheless furious with him and can’t bring myself to even look at him for the moment…he has of course no idea why I am incapable of speaking to him or stroking him, and so is very offended and down at mouth. Fee keeps telling me that Bongo is still only a baby and could have no idea that he has damaged something that was precious to me. Which is of course true…give me a day or two ,and I might find some forgiveness, but at the moment I am furious with Bongo and deeply concerned for Binks. With all the worry over Lenie, this incident seems to have taken on disproportionate importance in my mind!!!!! I even had a dream about Binks last night!
So, first thing this morning[ Thursday 26.02.09] I checked on Binks ,and he was fine hiding in a large patch of South African lilies, and very happy to receive several large slices of juicy cucumber. Simply have to keep my fingers crossed for him.


At last I have found a suitable drinking wine

Thanks to Case`s help, during his visit. I have found the first, of what I hope will be a series of spectacular white wines:
“Haute Cabriere” chardonnay Pinot Noir [blend] 2008. Produced and bottled by Achim von Arnim at the Cabriere vineyards in Franschoek. Although I am not absolutely sure, I would imagine that this wine IS available in Europe. Very elegant and utterly delicious. I paid the equivalent of 5.oo sterling a bottle [which is a great deal for a bottle of wine here],but the old maxim of you pay for what you get. is true in my experience [thus far] of S.A wines. The MD,at the Winchester Mansions did say that when I had found a selection of wines that I liked, to order through him and he would get them at trade prices for me!!!!!!

Rain storms and thunder

After my last post…I have clearly wished an apocalyptic precipitation on the area.We have spent the last week suffering immense downpours and the most massive thunder storms that I have ever witnessed. I am sure it has to do with the openness of the landscape…360 degree viewing of spectacularly angry sky scapes, cloud formations that I have never witnessed. This land really is all about extremes.
The temperature does not drop during or after, rain and thunder storms, and there is so much residual heat in the land, that when the rain eventually subsides, the ground steams, releasing more heat into the atmosphere.
Last night upon our return from visiting Lenie, the air was electric, the sky inky black, after a while sudden manic winds arrived swirling and gusting around the farm, the lightening struck immediately above the farm, knocking out all of our electricity [and sadly air co!!!!], and the rain arrived with such force it found every crack and opening in the house, so Bossy and I were variously fighting for the mops and buckets, and grabbing towels to plug the gaps. Bee slept through the entire drama, Bongo was firstly petrified [adding to the household flooding!] and then became electrically charged…pinging around the house like a mad creature, biting and tugging at any loose thing and when discovered, pinging off like a flea to find something else to attack. He must have been going for the entire two hours of the storm. When we eventually decided that the electricity was gone for good. We bumped our way to the bedroom and Bongo eventually settled down. Only to be re ignited when the electricity returned at 3.00a.m and all the lights came back on!

So this morning I am clearing the debris of the storm INSIDE the farm…no mean feat, and Moses is doing likewise outside, where branches are down and all the local flotsam seems to have accumulated on top of our little hill, from the entire neighborhood!

INTERNET

A delightful little boy named Hugo, came on Tuesday and placed the first of my trial internet arrangements in place…it’s a case of seeing if the arrangements he has put in place actually work. At the moment this is very difficult to ascertain, my connection keeps dropping out…so I will be in the middle of a long email and I loose everything. Hence such brief massages [if you are getting any at al!]. I am assuming this is as a result of the weather at the moment and am having to be very patient…so please bear with me, I will get there eventually.

Kisses to all as usual, miss you all dreadfully…special thoughts to Finn, who had to have 15 stitches behind his ear, as a result of being kneed in the head in a rugby match…please ,please send me a picture Finn [not of the injury!!],but of you with a sock tied around your head. Finn is concerned that his ear will protrude, and despite the doctor’s reassurances to the contrary…has devised his own method of ensuring that a flapping ear is NOT an option!!!!! Not sure Jessie would agree with this!

DawnXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXxxx