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The children
at Shiviti Primary School in Utah Village were delighted with the recent
visit of 17 students from the Johannesburg College of Education. The
students arrived at Shiviti armed with 28 sacks of books containing
a range of activities and games based on storybooks. The games and activities
are geared toward the development of oral language (both in Shangaan
and English), listening and reading. The morning was spent with the
staff and children working through the contents of the sacks with the
students. Shy beginnings soon became inquisitive questions, laughter
and a wonderful sense of sharing between future teachers and a rural
school full of children wanting to learn and explore new things.
The JCE students have participated with 12 other schools around South
Africa - distributing some 350 Books Sacks.
We look forward to hosting next year's students for another fun-filled
experience.
Pendrae
Scott
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It has
been a rather busy month at Vuyatela with the arrival of the Habitat
for Humanity volunteers. They have been involved with the building of
hundreds of homes in the Durban area. We have had the pleasure of hosting
them after all the hard work was completed and a tad bit of pampering
was the call of the day.
During the month we have had a number of the big five visiting us in
and around the lodge. One Tusk, our resident bull elephant, took it
upon himself to re-do our herbaceous borders. We have had to see a couple
of trees reduced to topdressing and the gardens flattened….. no
shortage of mulch here! He also decided to take on our lovely mosaic
pots and finish off the aloes, we literally had One Tusk pulling from
the one side and Mark pulling from the other to try and save the pots
(One tusk clearly won the tug of war without the pot being smashed).
With the help of Bulu our little fearless Ingune dog we chased One Tusk
out of the lodge at high speed. Campbell and Steve were hot on their
heels encouraging the chase. As can be imagined there was much trumpeting
and adrenaline pumping. After a second chasing a couple of days later,
Mark had to go and have some quite time. After all this excitement,
Bulu was shattered too!
We also had a Leopard walk between the kitchen and staff houses, Rob
was in the kitchen at the time and was rather surprised at the "spots
before his eyes" through the window. A couple of evenings later
we had an awesome sighting of a new male Leopard. Steve picked up on
the Leopard on the Gowrie dam wall and eventually the sighting was taken
over by Nicole from the deck of Khaya 1, where the game drive concluded.
Since then we have given the Leopard the name of Twitch.
There was also a big birthday bash for Jack Scott who turned one this
year. We ended off the month with a huge gardening effort to repair
One Tusk's "garden make-over" efforts. Now we are looking
forward to the summer rains to start the regrowth and prepare for One
Tusk's next meal!
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Once again
it's a month for both fond farewells and then not one, but two returns
to Bush Lodge!! We bid farewell to Peter Pretorius who has been filling
in for Jimmy as a field guide and we wish him success with his lion
research project. Of course, this means we then get to welcome Jimmy
back from his travels overseas! He's back in the driving seat, hard
at work and has already added some amazing game sightings to his repertoire.
Then, not to be left out is Tristan, one of our previous students who
left us in January to return to Australia and his studies. He's back
for a second round of slave labour during his four-week vacation - might
it be the good food that's brought him back?
This month we began offering therapies at Bush Lodge, with Djuma's resident
therapist, Nicole and we trust from the great response that this additional
service is going to add greatly to the experience we offer.
On the wildlife side, the camp continues to get wilder with Liane being
woken at 3.30am by one of the resident male leopard's (possibly 3-Spot)
standing at her patio doors peering in! Judging from his interest in
the computer display it may be worthwhile offering him a course as opposed
to Liane being main course...
Although the Winter solstice has passed, the nights continue to get
chillier, BUT the game viewing is getting much hotter so it a small
price to pay. We hope all of you in the Northern Hemisphere are enjoying
your summer vacations and we hope to see you back at Djuma!
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