Snakes.

Alright I’m really into animals . . . and reptiles I guess.

So during our training we somehow had a large group discussion on animals that we should be cautious of. For instance, Heather can’t walk from one of her schools to the other because she may get attacked by lions (she’s next to Kruger Park). I have alligators in my river, or so I’ve heard from many mouths.

Many of us live in areas where there are poisonous snakes, specifically mambas. They come in green and black. Thanks to one hilarious Joanna we learned that mambas can have bursts of speed up to 15 feet/second! Yes, we should fear them.

A couple of weeks ago I heard from Andrew that his host brother, Mamakgeme, saw a mamba cascading in front of the drop-in center. What does Mamakgeme do? He saves the children’s lives by jumping in his truck and running over the snake a few times!

Yesterday I was in my “office”, Mannyetha’s library and heard screaming and saw running. I checked out the situation in the courtyard and found hundreds of children beating a small snake (not a mamba). Later a teacher placed the corpse in a clear bottle for observation. She also found a complete scale that had been shed nearby.

Today during morning assembly the headmaster spoke to the learners about the green mambas in the toilets. His words went something like this . . .

“Do not just run to the toilet. You must look up, down, and all around, you must have a friend look up, down, and all around. Do you know why? (In unison 700 children say no) There are mambas, green mambas, in the toilets. They bite. Do you know what happens if they bite you? (again a resounding no) You will not be eating porridge any longer, you will not see your parents, you will be buried. So for the junior phase learners be careful and look around before you do whatever you do there. Small ones, there is a bush over there, just go to the bush. It is not safe to go to the toilet.”

As I look out my window I can see 7 children, 7 children with pants dropped to their ankles.

I’ve never been afraid of animals or reptiles- just spiders, roaches, chachas, etc. But I am thinking if I saw a mamba I would probably freak out.

In my bedroom the main issue is flies, they are everywhere! Sometimes I encounter huge bugs with antennas, beetles, a roach or so, mammoth sized wasps, etc. Then outside at night I have centipedes the length of my hand and width of a pinky finger, black insects with red spots that are the size of my palm, frogs in the water buckets, rats in the toilet, roaches in the main house, chickens on my back porch, and so on.

Just after the sun sets I usually gather with my family in the front cement courtyard. We drink tea, the kids do homework, and I usually play with Toka, my adorable 5-yr old brother. We are in love. He tells me every day In Sepedi how beautiful I am, he tells his friends he loves me, he falls asleep on my lap, he hangs on my feet, he calls my name even though he has nothing to say. We walk home from school holding hands, I hold his backpack. He’s adorable. At night he “protects” me. He crushes beetles and chachas with his bare feet, stomping until the guts cover his already dirty soles. Then he points to them and says in Sepedi “They are dead, they can’t breathe!” Toka occasionally tries to kill insects on the gravel by peeing on them. Thanks bouti.