Nearly Christmas

Nearly a week since I last posted. The internet can be very on and off but seems a bit more stable at the moment. Both Miriam and Sean have gone home so it is quite quiet in the flat. People do keep popping in for a variety of things so I'm not lonely and I can always go down and talk to the college boys and pupils who are still here. There will be about 28 of us in total on Christmas day. The plan is to go to the beach, apparently everyone in Freetown has the same plan so I hope there will be a bit of shade. It seems rather churlish to go on about the heat when I know it is so cold over there and I will go onto the BBC website when I have sent this and see what is going on.

I was quite tired again today. There was very loud music until quite late but eventually I fell asleep but when I woke up at 4am, someone a bit further away still had his music blaring out so that was it for a few hours. There really is no escape from the noise, I just try and screen it out. There was an evangelical rally nearby yesterday which involved a brass instrument and a drum. At the end, they processed through the streets near the school.

I was sitting in the morning doing some typing for worksheets when I smelled smoke and a fishy smell. When I looked out, they had lit a fire in the kitchen area, an open lean to and had a tarpaulin spread over it covered in fish. When they had finished smoking them, they put cloths down on the tin roof of the house and spread the fish out to dry in the sun for the day. They will turn up in the soup that is the basis for most of their food.

I have spent the day getting all the chemicals and equipment out of the science cupboard, washing it up,recording it and putting it back nice and tidy. Most of the science staff are new so they don't know what is in there at all. I am doing a training for the science staff from all the schools on 2/3rd January but I'm not sure what I will do that will fill two days. But then again, they have never done any practical demonstrations, never mind done a practical with a class. The classes are more than 40 and the lab holds about 15 so the classes will have to be split somehow. There are 800 pupils on three floors and sometimes they are so close together, you just can't squeeze between them. There is no space at all around the building so they don't get out at all and sit like that for 4 hours at a time with no breathe of air most of the time.
The harmattan, the wind from the Sahara seems to have gone away for a bit but I am told it will be back. There is more sand around and it coats the tiled floor with a thin layer.
I am trying to send e cards but they take a long time and the connection sometimes drops in the middle, so if you don't get a personal message, have a good Christmas and New Year.
Keep warm and safe,
Pat