4th grade questions. .

I have been communicating with my cousin Renee Bromer’s 4th grade teacher in Naperville, IL. Ms. Veach sent me this adorable list of questions from her class. I have also included my responses.

Nick wants to know: Do you eat pancakes in SouthAfrica? (Not normally, but you can find crepes here, which are called pancakes. And how do you say "Hello"? Thobela! (Toe-bell-ah)

Maegan wants to know: Do you celebrate birthdays? How do you celebrate? What kinds of birthday traditions do you have? (We do celebrate birthdays by having cake, but they are never celebrated at school and some people don’t know when their real birthday is, so they just celebrate around the time of their birthdays.)

Nick asks: What kind of wildlife do you have that you see on a regular basis? We see bunnies and robins and ducks, what kinds of things do you see? (We see goats, donkeys, cows, sheep, chickens, dogs, cats, snakes, rats, many types of birds and insects. Sometimes we see monkeys by the river! )

Nora has 2 questions: What kind of sports do you do? What do you eat for breakfast and dinner, normally? (Girls play netball which is somewhat similar to basketball but played on dirt usually. Boys play soccer. Normally people eat bread and butter or pap and chicken for most meals. Pap is a white thick corn-based food that really fills you up and people eat it for most meals.)

Nick would like to know how long your school days are. Our school day goes from 9:05 to 3:35. (Here school is from 7-3.)

Joey asks: Do you have the book, "Green Eggs and Ham" by Dr. Seuss? And have you read it? (Hehe, I love that book! No, we don't have that book here sadly.)

Renee asks: Do you have fast food places like McDonald's in your country? (We do have McDonald's here, but KFC is much more popular! Plus we have fast food places called: Chicken Licken and Something Fishy. Most people in my village do not leave so they can't eat there often.)

Tommy wants to know: Do your houses have basements? And do you have a lot of food to eat? (No houses here have basements. -What an interesting question!- People do not have very much food to eat here, just enough to get by. )

Aarij wants to know: How do you keep people safe from the pit latrine (they had a lot of questions about this)? (Haha! It's a regular toliet you sit on, but instead of flushing it when you're done everything just falls into a big pit. When children are being potty trained they just go outside on the ground until they are big enough for the toliet.)

Leen asks: If you do have McDonald's or fast food, do they serve the same foods that they serve here? (They serve many similar foods at fast food restaurants, people love to eat french fries, but here they are called chips and chips are called snacks.)

Wyli wants to know if your homes are far apart or close together? Can you walk to each other's houses easily? (Because of the history of apartheid in this country, prior to 1994 people of each different color had to live in their own areas. (blacks, colored (mixed race), indian, and white) So now this is slowly changing in urban areas but in the rural areas, where I live, only black people live here. The homes are close together because the apartheid government made black people live in one small area. We can easily walk to each others homes.)

Jacob wants to know if you go on field trips. (Once a year my school tries to organize a field trip to the city. )

Kayla asks: Is there such a thing as a white giraffe? (We read a book about one in class together) (Hehe, not that I know of. . but it’s very likely. . there are white lions!)

Lucas wants to know: Do you have any pets at home? What kinds of animals? (Some people have dogs or cats but people here do not treat animals like we do in the states. Animals usually just eat scraps or hunt for food. They are very skinny and have many diseases. Kids throw sticks at dogs or sometimes beat them. I recently was given a kitten and have been treating it really well to show others what a great friend a pet can be if you love them. )

Brendan wants to know if you know the Double Cheeseburger song from McDonald's. (Nope. Is this a popular song now?)

Robby asks: Has a villager ever been eaten by a lion? Has a stampede of elephants ever come through the village? (Haha, not here! But I know that one friend of mine had to take a car to school because lions roamed near her home. Sometimes a hippo or crocodile will be found in the river. In the past few months 3 dogs and 1 child were killed by a green mamba.)

Dorinda wants to know if anyone has ever seen or touched a white giraffe. (Not in my village!)