So left Lajamanu. It kind of grew on me over time, a bit like a foot fungus (he he, that was more for the boom boom than an honest appraisal). As the guys at Darwin CSIRO said, it's a rough area and there were multiple things happening in the community that meant the kids were disrupted - it would be a pretty tough gig as a teacher but they are sometimes the most rewarding because when a kid comes back at lunchtime and decides he wants to spend it building a bigger, stronger, tougher, leaner bridge... it's kind of cool. Then he wanted to test it so we went outside and tried it, a few other kids came around and decided they wanted to test bridges too, and so it kind of grew into an informal bridge building workshop.
Once they'd mastered the art of suspending a toy truck above the great divide, they decided to move on to measuring jugs... then buckets with water... then, with a few minutes to go, the original bridge-enthusiast managed to combine two previous ideas and balanced a brick. (I have a photo but the work CDMA modem isn't the best way to upload photos)
I also bought a picture from the middle school boys. They are hosting a cultural festival next year so they've started painting a whole pile of things and selling a few pictures for fundraising. So I had to negotiate a price with a couple of the boys. They wanted $350. I managed to talk them down to $25. What can i say, they drive a hard bargain ;o)
The road out of Lajamanu was a bit bumpy. I fell asleep once we'd left the large collection of solar panels just outside the town and woke up to the sense that we were ski-ing rather than driving along the road. And we continued to slide right off the edge of the road - which was preferable to the other option - braking, flipping over and being trapped on a dirt road literally in the middle of nowhere.
And we didn't hit any termite mounds (despite R!'s protestations that they are the same as ants, i would beg to differ and ask what species of ants build 2 metre tall towers that face magnetic north... and he would probably reply termites since they are a species of ants and things would quickly degenerate from there so i'll just write TERMITES AREN'T ANTS and leave it at that.) Oh, I should mention here that he really isn't a bug person, but he's not as bad as my other colleague M! who bought a tent to set up inside school libraries so that the bugs couldn't get her at night. And i have photos of that too but again, see above :o(
But we're all fine. Wasn't as bad as the time R! was driving in Wagga Wagga and a bus almost ran us off the road. I was sitting in the passenger seat watching it get closer, and closer, and closer.... oh, and the time we almost ran into a truck in Batchelor 'cause R! didn't give way... wait a minute, i see a pattern evolving here...
In comparison to Lajamanu, Kalkaringi is a huge change of pace. Partly because it feels much more like the schools back home, but probably more because only 5 of 15 students actually turned up (possibly because the mine company is paying out royalties in Lajamanu which is why it was so crazy there or the sorry business happening all over this area or because the fishing was good... who knows...) We managed to keep the kids engaged for over an hour doing maths puzzles. Tommorrow we do the little kids which should be fun - they are harder (especially because many of them haven't learnt English properly yet) but they are easy to entertain.
So have one more day here and then we're off to Pigeon Hole - possibly. News is that an old man died and there may be sorry business happening so it's possible the school could be closed. Hope not - would like to visit and see just how wrong all my assumptions are yet again.
Hope alls well down Ngunnawal country.
Nettles
1 comment:
... should there be something more here? =o)
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