Joe's Birthday

Woke up today to Joe being jumped on and sung to by the girls. I think there are three birthdays while we are over here so plenty of excuses for a piss up. We tried to get as much of a lie in a possible then made our way to the school. Malafatsana, our contact over here, lives around Leribe and is nearby so he picks us up every morning in his open back jeep to drive us to the school and shooting along with the wind battering you at seven in the morning while hanging out of a bakkie for dear life definitely wakes you up in the morning!Today was our last day in Pitseng High School and after an initial bit of tiredness we have gotten to know our class. Dee in particular is having great laugh with the nuns and Sister Juliet in particular. She has made us all honorary members of the Sisters of Charity so I'm not only co-chief of Butha-Buthe but I'm also a nun now too! At lunchtime we bumped into an American lad Eric and he joined us for some chicken and pa-pa. He's over here as a Peace Corp worker for two years working and living in a local village and helping in any way he can, it's amazing to think of people dedicating themselves to that long a commitment and you really have to have the upmost respect for someone willing to do that. Once we had finished we had a really nice presentation and were given prayer sheets by the nuns and a traditional Basotho hat and then seeing as it was Joe's birthday we had a cake after the presentation. The nuns have a bakery on the school campus which does cakes and bread for the mission and they made a savage cake that my Granny would have been proud of. John Tau who I mentioned before gave a really moving speech about Lesotho and the needs of the country and extended his thanks to Camara and us. The man has a real gravitas about him and the room just falls silent as soon as he goes to speak. A really inspirational man and someone I really would like to stay in touch with. Cormac is back with us also for the night before heading off to the other countries that Camara are involved in, I reckon he's just back for the piss up for Joe's bday!! ; )

We then headed back to Aloes guest house for yet more cake, dinner and some drinks. Joe seemed a little suprised with so much cake in one birthday but that didn't exactly stop him. He even got a lovely present of a girls bracelet off the daughter of the guesthouse owner. We were joined by Malafatsana, his wife and daughter Grace, and John Tau who lives nearby and then after dinner some locals came by to give us a performance of the local dance. Hopefully all these videos of local dances and singing will be put up on youtube once I get back but it really does have to be seen to be believed. They use an instrument like a violin made out of horse tail and the songs are like chants in Sesotho of things like "We're going to the lowlands" but it all fits in so well with the dancing. We then tried to repay the favour by belting out Molly Malone and The Fields Of Athenry but we weren't a patch on the locals! Then followed what can only be the most mistimed and drunkenest rendition of Bohemian Rasphody that the continent of Africa has ever witnessed... I can only apologise to all who were in attendence...